not do anything you did not like."

"Yet you have helped to carry me off this time," said Isabelle
reproachfully. "Is it because you don't love me any more that you have
given me up to my enemies?"

"Agostino ordered me, and I had to obey; besides, some other child could
have played guide to the blind man as well as I, and then I could not
have come into the chateau with you, do you see?--here I may be able to
do something to help you. I am brave, active and strong, though I am
so small, and quick as lightning too--and I shall not let anybody harm
you."

"Is this chateau very far from Paris?" asked Isabelle, drawing Chiquita
up on her lap. "Did you hear any one mention the name of this place?"

"Yes, one of them called it--now what was it?" said the child, looking
up at the ceiling and absently scratching her head, as if to stimulate
her memory.

"Try to remember it, my child!" said Isabelle, softly stroking
Chiquita's brown cheeks, which flushed with delight at the unwonted
caress--no one had ever petted the poor child in her life before.

"I think that it was Val-lom-breuse," said Chiquita at last, pronouncing
the syllables separately and slowly, as if listening to an inward echo.
"Yes, Vallombreuse, I am sure of it now. It is the name of the seignior
that your Captain Fracasse wounded in a duel--he would have done much
better if he had killed him outright--saved a great deal of trouble to
himself and to you. He is very wicked, that rich duke, though he does
throw his gold about so freely by the handfuls--just like a man sowing
grain. You hate him, don't you? and you would be glad if you could get
away from him, eh?"

"Oh yes, indeed!" cried Isabelle impetuously. "But alas! it is
impossible--a deep moat runs all around this chateau the drawbridge is
up, the postern securely fastened--there is no way of escape."

"Chiquita laughs at bolts and bars, at high walls and deep moats.
Chiquita can get out of the best guarded prison whenever she pleases,
and fly away to the moon, right before the eyes of her astonished
jailer. If you choose, before the sun rises your Captain Fracasse shall
know where the treasure that he seeks is hidden."

Isabelle was afraid, when she heard these incoherent phrases, that the
child was not quite sane, but her little face was so calm, her dark eyes
so clear and steady, her voice so earnest, and she spoke with such an
air of quiet conviction, that the supposition was not admissible, an