PIGEON VALLEY AGAIN “Jean, you must not be sulky. I have told you before that you are a great baby. I only played and pretended to be happy. I shall never be so stupid again.” Marie Josephine and Jean were swinging on the gates of Les Vignes, enjoying the keen rush of air about their faces as they swung back and forth. It was a week since Dian had left in the night and they missed him sadly. “It doesn’t matter whether we miss Dian or not, if only he can be of comfort to maman and Lisle,” Marie Josephine went on. “I heard the man talking to Nannette. You know, the man who brought the news about the king. They have killed the king and the man said that they would kill the poor queen. Lisle will run away and fight for the queen, even if he is only fifteen. I know he will. Lisle, Lisle, I want to see you so much!” “You are not the same since Dian left. You will not play, and you look as though you were thinking all the time,” said Jean, biting into a wizened apple. “I am thinking, Jean. When Neville came back that night that we had supper on the terrace, he brought us no good news. I have not been happy since.” Jean jumped down from the gate, and held it so that it stopped swinging back and forth. He looked up at Marie Josephine. “What is your thought, Little Mademoiselle? Tell me what it is; please tell little Jean!” He looked so young as he stood there. Marie Josephine gave her head an impatient shake, so that the blue hood of her cape fell back on her shoulders. “Your cousin Grigge is coming this way, Jean,” she said. Grigge came up to them along the bleak, frozen road. He would have passed them by with a sort of half nod to Marie Josephine and a scowl for Jean, had not Marie Josephine called out to him: “Will you not come and speak with us, Grigge? We have been talking of Dian the shepherd, and we wish that we could see him.” Grigge had never spoken with the Little Mademoiselle before although he had seen her every summer, and she had always given him a pleasant greeting. He was so eager for news of Dian, that he came up to them at once. “You have heard from him, Mademoiselle! Tell me that you have had word!” He came close to the gates and looked up eagerly at Marie Josephine. She shook her head. “There is no news of him, but he has only been away a week. We are sure that he is happy, wherever he is. Nothing but good could happen to Dian.” Grigge clasped his hands together in his eagerness. “No, no, you are right. Nothing could happen. He will come back,” he exclaimed. Marie Josephine nodded emphatically. “Jean and I will walk with him across the meadows at sunset, and he will have so many wonderful things to tell us about his adventures!”