"`I did not know I had fallen asleep,' she said. `My eyes were sore with crying. Oh, Pierrot, are you not sorry for your poor little Edmee?' "Pierre did not speak, but his lip quivered, and he turned away his face. He was too big now to cry, he thought, but it was very difficult to keep back the tears. "`Come now, my children,' said Madame Germain; `you must not look so sad, or my lady will think I have very badly fulfilled her commission. You must cheer Edmee, Pierre; talk to her of the happy time when she will come home again to her own people--two, three years soon pass! Ah, when you are my age you will see how true that is, and not wish the time over.' "Edmee drew the kind face down to hers and kissed it. "`I will promise you to try to be cheerful with mamma,' she said. `It is only here I will allow myself to cry. Now I must go home; Pierrot will come with me to the little gate.' "But all the way home to the Chateau through the village the children scarcely spoke, though usually their tongues ran fast enough. Their hearts were too full; and when they got to the little gate through which a footpath led directly to the side door by which Edmee usually entered, she did not urge Pierre to come in to see her mother. "`Come to-morrow,' she said; `by that time I shall be a little more accustomed to it. To-night it will be all I can do not to cry when mamma speaks to me, and to see you looking so sorry makes me still more unhappy, my poor Pierrot!' "So they said good-night at the gate. I would not undertake to say that on his way home Pierre's resolution not to cry now that he was so big a boy held good. There was no one to see him except the little birds and a rabbit or two that scudded across the path through the park--and it was his first real trouble. "His tears would have been still more bitter, poor boy, had he known how few `to-morrows' he and Edmee would have to spend together; for when the little girl entered the Chateau she was met by unexpected news, and Nanette, who had been on the point of going to fetch her, told her to go at once to her mother's room, as the Countess wished to speak to her. "Feeling still bewildered by all she had heard, Edmee obeyed half-tremblingly. A glance at her mother told her there was further trouble in store for her. The Countess was in tears, and her room, usually so neat and orderly, was all in confusion: cupboards and drawers open, and great travelling cases, which Edmee did not remember ever to have seen before, standing about, and the Countess's maid, Franchise, an old woman who had been in the Valmont family since the time of the last Count's mother, was fussing about with trembling hands, her red eyes telling their own tale. "`Oh, Edmee, my darling, I am glad you have come back!' exclaimed her mother, but without giving her time to say more the little girl flew into her arms.