“Tut! tut! _I’m_ mistress here, and I’ll have no such overwork!” was the quick, imperative rejoinder. “I’ll make it right with Mrs. Sharp, paying for the time all the same.” Floy submitted, repeating her thanks, for to the over-strained eyes and weary frame a little rest was most refreshing. The work was neatly folded and laid aside. Mary and Kathleen tidied the room, gathering up the shreds of silk and lining, and putting things in place; then receiving orders from Madame for a delicious little supper to be served in her dressing-room for Floy and herself, they went down to prepare it. A bright fire in an open grate filled the room with ruddy light, and Floy was glad that the Madame refused to have any other for the present. Very sad, very quiet the young girl felt, thinking of Espy and his sorrow; and taking, in obedience to her employer’s direction, an easy chair by the window, she gazed out musingly upon the lake, whose dark, restless waters were now faintly illumined by a line of silver light along the eastern horizon. “The moon’s about to rise,” wheezed her companion. “I like to watch it as it seems to come up out of the water. Did you ever see it?” “No, Madame,” returned the girl, smiling slightly, “Mrs. Sharp’s apprentices have little time or opportunity to observe the beauties of nature.” “But Sundays--you do not work then?” “No, Madame, but they find me weary enough to go very early to bed.” “Ah, too bad, too bad! But look, look! what a shame to be deprived of so lovely a sight as that!” cried the Madame as the queen of night suddenly emerged from her watery bed, flooding the whole scene with mellow radiance. “It is very beautiful,” murmured Floy, sighing softly to herself. How often in the happy days gone by she and Espy had enjoyed the moonlight together! “I would not stay there if I were you,” pursued the Madame. “Why should you stay where you are so badly treated? Why should any one?” “Because, Madame, it is there I must gain the knowledge that is to enable me to earn my bread.” “A hard thing for a lady to do. Any one can see you are a lady--your speech, your manners, your appearance, all tell it. But, ah well, you have youth, good looks, health! and though I’m rich, I’d be only too glad to exchange with you,” and in her wheezing tones, and with many a pause for breath, the Madame went on to give a long account of her sufferings by day and by night. Floy listened with a patient attention and sincere sympathy such as the Madame, in her loneliness, was little accustomed to. “It must be very dreadful to have so many ailments,” she said feelingly. “I don’t know how I could bear your difficulty of breathing even, without any of the others.” The Madame started, sat upright, and looked earnestly at the girl, while tears gathered in her eyes.