"But, _pardieu_, she shows a wisdom quite phenomenal, that little one," the Marquis would tell his friends, with a hearty laugh. It was only natural that he should consider amusing the idea of uniting wisdom and youth and beauty in one person. It is still a universally accepted law that old people must be wise and young persons only charming. Some may think that they could point to a wise child born of foolish parents; to a daughter who is well-educated and shrewd, possessing a sense of logic, and a mother who is ignorant and foolish; to a son who has more sense than his father: but of course such observers must be mistaken. Old theories must be the right ones. The Marquis had no doubt of this, at all events, and thought it most amusing that Juliette should establish order in the chaos of domestic affairs at Gemosac. "You are grave," said Juliette to Barebone, one evening soon after his return, when they happened to be alone in the little drawing-room. Barebone was, in fact, not a lively companion; for he had sat staring at the log-fire for quite three minutes when his eyes might assuredly have been better employed. "You are grave. Are you thinking of your sins?" "When I think of those, Mademoiselle, I laugh. It is when I think of you that I am grave." "Thank you." "So I am always grave, you understand." She glanced quickly, not at him but toward him, and then continued her lace-making, with the ghost of a smile tilting the corners of her lips. "It is because I have something to tell you." "A secret?" she inquired, and she continued to smile, but differently, and her eyes hardened almost to resentment. "Yes; a secret. It is a secret only known to two other people in the world besides myself. And they will never let you know even that they share it with you, Mademoiselle." "Then they are not women," she said, with a sudden laugh. "Tell it to me, then--your secret." There had been an odd suggestion of foreknowledge in her manner, as if she were humouring him by pretending to accept as a secret of vast importance some news which she had long known--that little air of patronage which even schoolgirls bestow, at times, upon white-haired men. It is part of the maternal instinct. But this vanished when she heard that she was to share the secret with two men, and she repeated, impatiently, "Tell me, please." "It is a secret which will make a difference to us all our lives, Mademoiselle," he said, warningly. "It will not leave us the same as it found us. It has made a difference to all who know it. Therefore, I have only decided to tell you after long consideration. It is, in fact, a point of honour. It is necessary for you to know, whatever the result may be. Of that I have no doubt whatever." He laughed reassuringly, which made her glance at him gravely, almost anxiously. "And are you going on telling it to other people, afterward," she inquired; "to my father, for instance?"