Cecile felt herself turning cold, almost faint. An impulse to run into that farmhouse, to address that fair-haired young woman, to drag her story, whatever it might be, from her lips, came over her almost too strongly to be resisted. She might have yielded to it, she was indeed about to yield to it, when suddenly a voice at her elbow, calling her by her name, caused her to look round. There stood Joe, but Joe with a face so altered, so ghastly, so troubled, that Cecile scarcely knew him. "Come, Cecile, come back to the hut; I have some'ut to tell yer," he said slowly and in hoarse tones. And Cecile, too terrified by this fresh alarm even to remember the English folks who lived at the farm, followed him back into the forest without a word. CHAPTER XXIII. TELLING THE BAD NEWS. All the way back to the forest not one word passed the lips of Joe. But when the two children, panting from their rapid run, reached the hut, he threw himself on the ground, covered his face for a brief instant, then asked Cecile to come to his side. "For I've a story to tell yer, little Missie," said Joe. Cecile obeyed him at once. A great terror was over her, but this terror was partly assuaged by his first words. "I ha' got some'ut to tell yer, Missie Cecile," said Joe Barnes, "some'ut 'bout my old life, the kind o' way I used to live in Paris and Lunnon." At the words Cecile raised her little flower face with a sigh of relief; she was not going to hear of any fresh trouble; it was only an old, old woe, and Joe needed comfort. "Dear Joe," said the little girl, "yes, tell me about Paris and London." Joe felt himself shrinking away from the little caressing movement Cecile made. He looked at her for an instant out of two great hollow eyes, then began in a dull kind of voice. "It don't make much real differ," he said, "only I thought as I'd like fur yer to know as it wor a _werry_ bitter temptation. "I remember the last night as I slept along o' my mother, Missie Cecile, how she petted me, and fondled of me. "Then I wor stolen away, and my master brought me to Paris. We lived in a werry low part o' Paris, high up in a garret. I wor taught to play the fiddle--I wor taught by blows; and when they did not do, I wor made real, desperate hungry. I used to be given jest one meal a day, and when the others as did better nor me wor eating, I had to stand by and wait on 'em. Then, when I knew enough, I wor sent into the streets to play, and when I did not bring in enough money, I wor beat worse nor ever. One day my master sold me to an Englishman. Talk o' slaves! well, this man give my master a lot o' money fur me. I seed the money, and they told me as I wor apprenticed to him, and that I could not run away, for ef I did, the law 'ud bring me back. My new master tuk me to England. He tuk me to Lunnon. It wor bad in Paris, but in Lunnon it wor worse. I wor farther from my mother. I wor out o' my own country, and I did not know a word of English.