“Tell Martin to put on the candelabra with the gold shade!” Marie Josephine called after Cécile as she went up the terrace steps, and her friend looked back over her shoulder, smiling assent. [Illustration: Cécile] A few minutes later the two girls were walking through the forest in the demesne at Les Vignes, their arms about each other. They wore long, full summer dresses of fine, sprigged Indian muslin, which blew about them in the soft breeze. Cécile had on a garden hat, which she had tied under her chin with a pink bow, but Marie Josephine swung her hat back and forth by its black velvet streamers. She would not have gone so far as to carry one if she had not known that Hortense and the governess would have been shocked at her going about without a hat. “I think that Neville will come to-night, Marie Josephine, perhaps by sundown. Think of it, news of them all, news of Lisle!” Cécile bowed her head suddenly, almost as though she were praying. “We will be so glad to see Neville that we will not know what to do. If I see him coming down the drive, I shall run and run until I come up to him. He will have messages from maman and Lisle and Rosanne. Perhaps he will bring word that they are on the way to us!” Marie Josephine put out her hand to pat Flambeau, who was walking beside them. “It is a fortnight since he went. He should have returned before this. It is not more than a good two days’ ride with a fast horse and Neville rides well. I hope so much that he comes to-night, Marie Josephine. Chérie, we left in the midst of so much and we have heard nothing since. I wish that we were not so far away from everything,” Cécile answered. “You are worrying, Cécile, and you are not to do that. Try and be like Bertran and Denise, who ride and dance and never seem to give a thought to Paris. We are better off than if we were near a town. Jacques, the runner, told Mother Barbette so. He said we were well out of all the jamboree, but—oh, I know what you mean, chérie; we want news of Lisle!” Cécile stopped in the middle of the pathway and kissed Marie Josephine on each cheek. “I’ll go back now and sit with the others under the oak tree. Sometimes I am envious of little Jean because he has you for a comrade more than I.” Cécile was smiling as she spoke, but Marie Josephine felt that she was in earnest. “If only you would come with us sometimes to the woods. We know of so many pretty places and we have such jolly times,” she said.