"The surest way to find shelter and safety is to remain in France," Leonard answered. "Listen to my plans. I have a cottage hidden among the trees in a little hollow of the forest of Montmorency. The place is lonely and little frequented. You can take it in a borrowed name as my tenant. An honest couple, well known to me, a gardener and his wife, will assist in the house, and in the cultivation of the little plot of ground. To avert suspicion, you can place your son with me as apprentice. I am one of the most influential members of the Democratic Society of Montmorency. My patronage is therefore a guarantee of your Republican principles. Olivier will learn a trade, and remain under your care, for he can return home every night to dinner, and thus, dear lady, we will await better times." Clarisse consented joyfully, and in eight days the little family were installed in the cottage of the forest, secure and safe, in a narrow valley thickly planted with trees, whose bushy branches formed a second roof over their humble dwelling. Fourteen months Clarisse lived there unnoticed, hearing only of the events happening at Paris from the harrowing accounts of the guillotine and _noyades_ which her son brought from the workshop, peopling the sleep of the two women with fearful dreams. When! oh, when! would they emerge from that obscurity? When would the trumpet-call of deliverance sound for France! Clarisse dared not think. She trembled every instant for her own and her children's safety; for Olivier above all, who already took a too lively interest in the conversations of the workshop, and in popular manifestations. Clarisse did not acknowledge it that morning when she met her son, but she had not slept all night, although she had been aware that he would not return. So when the household duties were over she had come long before the time fixed, to wait for him, as she often did, in that green glade which opened on to the path he was wont to take. When she saw him in the distance she used to beckon to him, anticipating the joy of reunion; all a mother's tenderness smiling in her eyes and on her lips. Clarisse now hoped that, having been out all night, Olivier would not assist at the _fête_. But she was mistaken, for he took his coat from Marie Thérèse and prepared to go. "What! you are not going to spend the day with us?" "Now!" replied Olivier coaxingly. "You don't really mean it. And what about the _fête_? You know well my absence would be noticed. All the youth of Montmorency will be there. But I promise you to return for supper. At all events, I have an hour before me. Let us have a crust and some wine."