When breakfast brought them all again face to face, Giles marvelled at Alix. If madame Vervier was ready, she was not less so. Pale, with darkened eyelids, there were certain appearances that she need not be expected to keep up. Monsieur de Maubert and André de Valenbois would understand that it had been a shock to her to learn that her mother was again to send her from her. But beyond the evidences of this shock they were to see nothing. Of the greater shock she had received, not a shadow showed itself in her glance or voice. She was grave and quiet only; she showed the calm resignation of the _jeune fille sérieuse_ who bows to the decisions of her elders. She smiled at her mother; she held her kitten to lap milk. And Giles was sorry for his invulnerable goddess, for, if it was hard that she should have to shoulder the burden of André under Alix’s eyes, when she already had more than enough to carry in Owen, it must be for her the bitterest of alleviations that Alix should do all in her power to make the burden light. Madame Vervier must feel, as he felt, that such resource, such understanding in Alix could only rise from the child’s intuition of how sharp was her mother’s need. She stood beside her mother. She helped her. “Maman is going to take charge of my kitten while I am away,” she said calmly to André. If Alix could help her mother, Giles could help her. This was an opportunity. “But why shouldn’t you bring your kitten to England, Alix?” he said. “There’s no quarantine for cats. You could carry it easily in a basket.” From the quick, upward glance that Alix cast at him above the kitten’s lapping head, he saw that its fate, in spite of Maman’s assurances, had indeed preoccupied her. “Oh, may I, Giles?” “Of course you may. _Rather!_” “Your mother will not mind?” “Can you imagine Mummy minding another animal at Heathside? Why, she’s lived and breathed and had her being, always, in a swarm of dogs, cats, and guinea-pigs. You don’t forget, I’m sure, those white rats all over the place last winter. She never said a word even when she found them in her bed.” “I remember. Yes. She is so kind. I should be very glad to have my kitten.” Alix stroked the kitten’s back. She looked down at it, and for a moment Giles was afraid that she might be on the verge of tears. “And if mademoiselle Alix will permit me,” said André, wishing to do his bit, but, for once, blundering sadly, “I will present her, in place of this very ugly little cat, with the most beautiful _chat_ Angora that can be found in Paris. A superb white Angora, mademoiselle Alix; with blue eyes like those of a saint in a missal.—_Cela vous sourit?_” André’s own eyes were as blue and as bright as those of any saint in any missal. “Not at all, thank you,” said Alix. “This ugly little cat is the only one I want.”