arrived. As soon as she perceived him she let a perfect tempest
loose in the well, shook her pail in an irritated manner, and made the
blackish water whirl and splash against the stones. In vain did Silvere
try to explain that aunt Dide had detained him. To all his excuses she
replied: "You've vexed me; I don't want to see you."

The poor lad, in despair, vainly questioned that sombre cavity, now so
full of lamentable sounds, where, on other days, such a bright vision
usually awaited him amid the silence of the stagnant water. He had to go
away without seeing Miette. On the morrow, arriving before the time,
he gazed sadly into the well, hearing nothing, and thinking that the
obstinate girl would not come, when she, who was already on the other
side slyly watching his arrival, bent over suddenly with a burst of
laughter. All was at once forgotten.

In this wise the well was the scene of many a little drama and comedy.
That happy cavity, with its gleaming mirrors and musical echoes, quickly
ripened their love. They endowed it with such strange life, so filled it
with their youthful love, that, long after they had ceased to come and
lean over the brink, Silvere, as he drew water every morning, would
fancy he could see Miette's smiling face in the dim light that still
quivered with the joy they had set there.

That month of playful love rescued Miette from her mute despair. She
felt a revival of her affections, her happy childish carelessness, which
had been held in check by the hateful loneliness in which she lived.
The certainty that she was loved by somebody, and that she was no longer
alone in the world, enabled her to endure the persecutions of Justin
and the Faubourg urchins. A song of joy, whose glad notes drowned their
hootings, now sounded in her heart. She thought of her father with
tender compassion, and did not now so frequently yield to dreams of
bitter vengeance. Her dawning love cooled her feverish broodings
like the fresh breezes of the dawn. At the same time she acquired the
instinctive cunning of a young girl in love. She felt that she must
maintain her usual silent and rebellious demeanour if she were to escape
Justin's suspicions. But, in spite of her efforts, her eyes retained a
sweet unruffled expression when the lad bullied her; she was no longer
able to put on her old black look of indignant anger. One morning he
heard her humming to herself at breakfast-time.

"You seem very gay, Chantegreil!" he