"Oh," cried the milk-woman, "you need not stare about in that wild way. Mlle. Clara is not here now to take your part. You don't slip through my fingers, I promise you!" "Alas! madam," uttered Fleur-de-Marie, trembling violently, "I seek not to escape from you. Be assured, I am both ready and willing to answer all the questions put to me, if I can be of any service to you by so doing. But what harm have I done to these people, who surround and threaten me in this manner?" "What have you done?" repeated a number of voices, "why, you have dared to stick yourself up with our betters, when we, who were worth thousands more than such as you, were made to keep our distance,--that's what you have done!" "And what right had you to cause this poor woman to be turned away with her fatherless children?" cried another. "Indeed, it was no fault of mine. It was Mlle. Clara, who wished--" "That is not true!" interrupted the speaker. "You never even opened your mouth in her favour. No, not you? You were too well pleased to see her bread taken from her." "No, no! no more she did," chimed in a burst of voices, male and female. "She is a regular bad one!" "A poor widow-woman, with three helpless children!" "If I did not plead for her with Mlle. Clara, it was because I had not power to utter a word." "You could find strength enough to talk to a set of thieves and murderers!" And, as is frequently the case in public commotions, the country people, more ignorant than vicious, actually talked themselves into a fury, until their own words and violence excited them to fresh acts of rage and vengeance against their unhappy victim. The menacing throng, gesticulating, and loudly threatening, advanced closer and closer towards Fleur-de-Marie, while the widow appeared to have lost all command over herself. Separated from the deep pond only by the parapet on which she was leaning, the Goualeuse shuddered at the idea of their throwing her into the water; and, extending towards them her supplicating hands, she exclaimed: "Good, kind people! what do you want with me? For pity's sake do not harm me!" And as the milk-woman, with fierce and angry gestures, kept coming nearer and nearer, holding her clenched fist almost in the face of Fleur-de-Marie, the poor girl, drawing herself back in terror, said, in beseeching tones: "Pray, pray, do not press so closely on me, or you will cause me to fall into the water." These words suggested a cruel idea to the rough spectators. Intending merely one of those practical jokes which, however diverting to the projectors, are fraught with serious harm and suffering to the unfortunate object of them, one of the most violent of the number called out, "Let's give her a plunge in! Duck her! duck her!" "Yes, yes!" chimed several voices, accompanied with brutal laughter, and noisy clapping of hands, with other tokens of unanimous approval. "Throw her in!--in with her!" "A good dip will do her good! Water won't kill her!"