“I understand more better than you,” said Janey, promptly, “for papa tells me everything. I know,” she said, clapping her hands, “I am not to be called the old name any more. I am little Janey Harford. Papa told me so. It is because of naughty, wicked men. Is it not funny, Helen? And you are Helen Harford too. I sing it to myself, over and over, not to forget. Nursey wouldn’t know who we were, if she were to hear. We are all different people now. Dolly, that I put in my little bed is me, and I’m little Janey Harford.” The child made a little chant of it as she frisked along the road. “I’m little Janey Harford, I am little Janey Haar-ford!” It was a piece of delightful fun to Janey. What child can resist the pleasure of being not me, but somebody else? The spirit of an adventurer was in the little girl. She did not cling to the superstitions of propriety and an honest life as Helen did. The mystification charmed her. “It will not be you and me, but it will be two other girls,” Janey said. Perhaps the profound gravity of this new step was lessened to Helen also by its effect upon her little sister. “It is I who am silly,” poor Helen said to herself. She reminded herself how common it was for people to travel _incognito_. “That means out of their right name. The Queen does it!” Helen said suddenly to herself, with a sense of relief and consolation unspeakable. She knew that august lady could do no wrong. They went back slowly through the village, following at a long interval the young ladies from the _château_, in whom Helen felt so great an interest, and who stopped to speak to M. le Curé, and turned round, plainly indicating to him the two figures in the distance. M. le Curé looked very closely at Helen and Janey when he passed them a little afterwards. He was an active, spare, tall man, in his long black _soutane_ and his three-cornered hat of fluffy beaver on his head. He let his eyes rest with a lingering look of pleasure and interest upon the child. Most likely he took Helen, who looked older than her eighteen years, for a young mother with her child, and the Curé knew how to win the hearts of parents. Now that all the intending purchasers had passed, there were very few people about. The cottages did not stand open, as at Fareham; here and there a woman washing her vegetables outside the door, or chopping her wood into small pieces, would break the monotony, but there was no lively coming and going of gossips and neighbours. At one of the two larger houses an old man had come out, and was standing at the door. He had a handkerchief tied round his head, and a long coat, half a dressing-gown, folded across his long legs, and was looking out with the keenest malignant eyes, as if in search of some one. The Curé passed this personage with a stiff nod, but the other only grinned in reply. He grinned also at the young strangers as they came along, and at a lady who suddenly appeared from the door of the other house, dressed