"Oh, Maxime, that’s impossible. It was such a serious quarrel. It was nothing at first, but you know one gets excited and loses one’s head. Listen, Maxime! We were playing battledore, and Lucy made a mistake about the score. I was six hundred and eighty, and she was only six hundred and fifteen, and she declared she was six hundred and sixty-five! You must say that was a little too bad. Of course I said my figure was right, and she said hers was. ’Well, mademoiselle,’ I said to her, ’let us ask these young ladies. I appeal to them.’ ’No, mademoiselle,’ she replied, ’I am sure I am right, and you don’t play fair.’ ’And—and you, mademoiselle,’ I said to her—’you are a liar!’ ’Very well, mademoiselle,’ she said then, ’I despise you too much to answer you.’ Just at that moment Sister Sainte-Félix came up, which was a good thing, for I am sure I should have hit her. Now, you know what happened. Can we possibly make it up? No, it is impossible; it would be cowardly. But I can’t tell you how I suffer. I don’t believe there’s any one in the world so miserable as I am." "Yes, dear, it’s difficult to imagine anything more distressing; but it seems to me that you partly brought it on yourself, for it was you who used the most offensive word. Tell me, is Lucy in the parlour?" "Yes, there she is, in the corner." With a dignified and careful movement of her head she indicated a very fair little girl. Her cheeks, too, were flushed, and her eyes were red. Apparently she was giving an account of the drama, which Sister Sainte-Félix had so fortunately interrupted, to an old lady who was listening attentively. Mlle. Lucy, while she talked with an earnestness appropriate to the subject, kept looking furtively at Hélène and me. "Dear child," I said to Hélène, "do you trust me?" "Yes, Maxime, I trust you very much." "In that case I will tell you what to do. Go very gently behind Mlle. Lucy’s chair; take her head in your hands—like this, when she is not looking—and kiss her on both cheeks—like this, with all your might—and then you will see what she will do in her turn." For a second or two Hélène seemed to hesitate; then she set off at a great rate, fell like a thunder-clap on Mlle. Campbell, but nevertheless gave her the sweetest of surprises. The two young sufferers, at last eternally united, mingled their tears in a touching group, while the respectable old Mrs. Campbell blew her nose with a noise as of a bagpipe. Hélène came back to me radiant. "Well, dear," I said, "I hope you’re going to eat your bread now."