xcept
on great and necessary occasions. No doubt girls were sometimes
troublesome, and he did not pretend to know how to manage them. Adelaide
must bring up her children in her own way.

Another day of almost entire solitude, with a terrible doubt of Angelot
added to the longing for his presence, so that peace was no longer to be
found in the distant sight of La Mariniere; another day had dragged its
length through the hot hours of the afternoon, when, as Helene walked
restlessly up and down in her room, the blue-green depths of a grove on
her tapestried wall began to move, and out from the wall itself, as if
to join the dancing peasants beyond the grove, came the slender little
figure of Henriette. In an instant the panel of tapestry had closed
behind her and she had sprung into Helene's arms. The girl clutched her
convulsively.

"What does he say?"

"To-night, at nine o'clock, he will be near the little door in the moat.
Meet him there."

"The little door in the moat!"

"You see this. Let me show you the spring"--she dragged her to the wall,
and opened the panel with a touch. Inside it there was a dark and narrow
passage, but opposite another panel stood slightly ajar.

"That is the way into the chapel," Riette whispered. "I came that way.
But you must turn to the right, and almost directly you will find the
stairs. The door is at the foot of them. He will be there."

"It is unlocked?"

"There is no key. I believe there has been none for centuries. Adieu, my
pretty angel. They will miss me; I must go. I told them I wanted to say
a little prayer to Our Lady in the chapel. She often helped me when I
used to play here."

"I hope she will help me, too!" murmured Helene.

In another moment she was terrified at finding herself alone in the
dark; for the child was gone, softly closing the secret door into the
chapel. Helene felt about for a minute or two before she could find the
spring behind the tapestry, and stepped back into her room, shivering
from the damp chill of the passage.

It seemed like an extraordinary fate that that night her mother kept her
downstairs at needlework later than usual. It was in truth a slight mark
of returning favour. Madame de Sainfoy was in a better temper, and
realised that it might be unwise to treat a tall girl of nineteen quite
like a disobedient child. So Helene sat there stitching beside
Mademoiselle Moineau, who was sometimes called upon to take a hand at
cards. To-night