"What's your name?" he asked. "Are you M. de Bertrand's daughter? I'm deaf in one ear still, so please don't whisper." "No; I am Lucille de St. Roques. M. and Mme. de Bertrand are my good friends." She flushed slightly. "They are my best friends in all Paris." "And do you live here?" "No; I am come unexpected--quite sudden. My friends did not look for me. When they tell me of the English boy upstairs, and of the kind Monsieur who nurses him, then I say I will go and help. I have had the complaint, and I do not fear." "I wonder where your home is?" Roy said, interested. "Ah, for that, I have not now a true home. My home was in the south of France, but it is my home no longer. Cependant, I have kind friends at Verdun, where I live." She laid a hand on Roy kindly, murmuring, "Pauvre petit!" "You don't call me 'little,'" protested the insulted Roy. "I'm nearly thirteen; almost a man. And I am going to fight Napoleon soon. Do you like Napoleon?" She shook her head. "That's right. Then you're Royalist; and I am glad, for I like you, and I don't like Napoleon. I shall soon be an officer in King George's Army. I'm going to have a commission as soon as I'm sixteen. And then I shall be a brave soldier, you know, like Denham. And have you a father and mother at that place, Ver--something?" "Verdun." Little dreamt Roy how familiar a name it would soon become in his ears. "My father and mother, they were of the old noblesse, and they lost their lives in the Revolution, hélas! Thirteen years ago they were guillotined." "Oh, I say, how horrid!" exclaimed Roy, at a loss to express the sympathy which he really felt. "How dreadful! Why, you must have been quite a child then." "I was not yet eight years old. But that was in truth a terrible time. I was in prison with them for many, many weeks, before they went out to die." Ivor woke suddenly, opening his eyes without warning. Then he stood up, leaning against the solid four-poster for support, since the room went round with him dizzily. He saw a girlish figure, and he vaguely felt that she had no business there, but a momentary pause before speech was necessary. "Do not make so great haste. Will you not rest a little longer?" a kind voice said, and a soft hand came on his wrist. "But indeed, mademoiselle, you must go away at once," he urged earnestly. "It is small-pox. It is----" And he tried in vain to recall the French word, though ready enough usually in talking French. "Pray go. You will take the infection." "But me, I do not intend to go," she replied cheerfully, with her pretty foreign accent. "You need not be afraid for me, monsieur. See, I have had it. I am not in danger, not at all. You are fatigué, n'est-ce pas? It has been a long nursing--yes, so I have heard. When did you take food last?"