more her eye of faith. That was her answer.

"Come," he said, gently, "I wan' sen' some bird ad you' lill' gal."

And they went away, Madame Delphine's spirit grown so exaltedly bold
that she said as they went, though a violent blush followed her words:

"Miche Vignevielle, I thing Pere Jerome mighd be ab'e to tell you
someboddie."

CHAPTER XI.

FACE TO FACE.

Madame Delphine found her house neither burned nor rifled.

"_Ah! ma piti sans popa_! Ah! my little fatherless one!" Her faded
bonnet fell back between her shoulders, hanging on by the strings, and
her dropped basket, with its "few lill' _becassines-de-mer_" dangling
from the handle, rolled out its okra and soup-joint upon the floor. "_Ma
piti_! kiss!--kiss!--kiss!"

"But is it good news you have, or bad?" cried the girl, a fourth or
fifth time.

"_Dieu sait, ma c'ere; mo pas conne!_"--God knows, my darling; I cannot
tell!

The mother dropped into a chair, covered her face with her apron, and
burst into tears, then looked up with an effort to smile, and wept
afresh.

"What have you been doing?" asked the daughter, in a long-drawn,
fondling tone. She leaned forward and unfastened her mother's
bonnet-strings. "Why do you cry?"

"For nothing at all, my darling; for nothing--I am such a fool."

The girl's eyes filled. The mother looked up into her face and said:

"No, it is nothing, nothing, only that--" turning her head from side to
side with a slow, emotional emphasis, "Miche Vignevielle is the
best--_best_ man on the good Lord's earth!"

Olive drew a chair close to her mother, sat down and took the little
yellow hands into her own white lap, and looked tenderly into her eyes.
Madame Delphine felt herself yielding; she must make a show of telling
something:

"He sent you those birds!"

The girl drew her face back a little. The little woman turned away,
trying in vain to hide her tearful smile, and they laughed together,
Olive mingling a daughter's fond kiss with her laughter.

"There is something else," she said, "and you shall tell me."

"Yes," replied Madame Delphine, "only let me get composed."

But she did not get so. Later in the morning she came to Olive with the
timid yet startling proposal that they would do what they could to
brighten up the long-neglected front room. Olive was mystified and
troubled, but consented, and thereupon the mother's spirits rose.

The work began, and presently ensued all the thumping, the trundli