Zelie--the
perfect product.

Meanwhile there remained my companion--Bibi-Ri. Poor Bibi-Ri....
Whatever had passed between him and that unhappy deluded child I could
not know, you comprehend--in truth I never did know. But they must have
been very close at one time: those two: before his great ambition nipped
him. He was suffering. He writhed. Nevertheless I saw it was going to
make no difference with him.... Not now. Not this late along. I sensed
his effort. I heard him draw his breath sharp like a man who plucks the
barb from the wound.

"One moment, Madame!" He avoided Zelie. In abrupt and flurried speech he
addressed himself to Mother Carron. "A moment, Madame--I beg. This is
mere madness. And painful. And unnecessary.... There is still one easy
way out for her, you know--for Zelie, for me, for everybody. Still a
way."

She unbent to him all at once as to a prodigal son.

"Tiens!" she cried. "You have perceived it?"

"I have remembered. I intended not to tell you: to let it come of
itself. And truly--you drove it somewhat out of mind. But now--"

"At last!"

"If we can only get Zelie to listen--"

"Ha! Just look at her there!"

"It fits the need."

"She never had but one, my boy--to hear you speak out once like this: as
if you meant it." "And besides," he stammered, "it should cancel
any--any obligations you might still hold against me, myself."

"Parbleu! I should hope so!"

He labored on, with a kind of desperate snuffle.

"At the end, Madame, we can always turn for aid to the Church--the
patient friend of us all.... This afternoon--uneasy about Zelie, I
confess, and thinking a decisive step would be best for every one--this
very afternoon I took myself to St. Gregory's and there I saw--"

"Bibi-Ri: in a moment I shall kiss you!"

"For God's sake let me speak, Madame!... I saw the Directress of the
Order of St. Joseph of Cluny. She heard me readily. You know--these good
nuns--how they rescue any they can of the children of Noumea.... Well: I
arranged it.... To-night a travelling sister will visit you here. By
great luck she is returning home very soon. If the dispositions are
favorable she has promised to take Zelie at once, to guard her and to
see her safe--passage free--to France, where refuge and the consolations
of religion, Madame, await her!"

In the silence that dropped you should have seen Mother Carron.

"Refuge!" she began, empurpled. "What is the fellow talking about?
Conso--....