Miretta made several reverences and left the salon. "That girl pleases me," said Valentine, after watching her leave the room. "Do not you agree with me, madame, that there is something original about her--a sort of firmness, and an indefinable naïveté, which is charming?" "Yes, yes!" replied Madame de Ravenelle, slowly shaking her head; "but I believe that there is something in the girl's heart that she has not told us." "What can it be, aunt?" "I have no desire to fatigue my brain trying to guess!" "Well, I will try, aunt; it will amuse me instead of fatiguing me." "As you please, niece." Miretta ran quickly down into the courtyard, and found Cédrille there, doing sentry duty beside his horse. The poor fellow stood close to Bourriquet's side, having given him the last wisps of hay from the bundle attached to his crupper. The young Béarnais peasant was gazing with respectful admiration at the sculptures and decorations which embellished the mansion; nothing so magnificent had met his eye since he had left his fields; for, on entering Paris, he had been too much occupied in breaking out a path and guiding his horse through the crowd to have any leisure to look about him. Cédrille smiled sadly when he saw the girl coming toward him. "Ah! I was waiting to see you before going away, Miretta," he said; "and I am going to say adieu at once, for I wouldn't dare to come to this splendid palace and ask for you; I feel all dazed here; I don't dare to walk, for fear of making a noise!" "And yet, my dear Cédrille, here is where you are to live, as long as you stay in Paris. They are going to give you a room in this house; my new mistress will have it so. She has a noble and generous manner, and this that she is doing for you to-day, cousin, makes me love her already." "Ah, ah! is it possible? What do you say, cousin--I am to be lodged here--I?--Why, it's a palace!" "No; it's a private mansion." "Ah! but wait a minute! What about my horse--this poor Bourriquet? I don't want to leave him, you know." "You will not have to leave him; Bourriquet will be put in the stable, and you may be sure that the horses are well taken care of there." "Do you mean it? Bourriquet will be fed? and what about me?" "You will be, too, when you happen to be here at the hour when the household of these ladies dines." "If this is the way one is treated in Paris, I begin to believe that you may be happy here, cousin; but, in that case, I must go and thank the masters of the house for offering to take me in." "No, no; that is not necessary; there are no masters here, only mistresses: Mademoiselle Valentine de Mongarcin, in whose service I am now, and her aunt--an old lady, who does whatever her niece wishes; I saw that at once." "Oh! you are shrewd, you are, Miretta! So I needn't go and thank those ladies?"