tell Abiroc, for it would only grieve her, and she would
talk, talk, and Marie wanted no talking. She only wanted to get away,
out into the open fields once more, where nobody would look at her or
want to marry her, and where roads might be found leading away to
golden cities, full of children who liked to hear play the violin, and
who danced when one played it well.

Early next morning, while Abby was out milking the cows, Marie stole
away. She put on her little blue gown again; ah! how old and faded it
looked beside the fresh, pretty-prints that Abby would always have her
wear! But it was her own, and when she had it on, and the old
handkerchief tied under her chin once more, and Madame in her box,
ready to go with her the world over, why, then she felt that she was
Marie once more; that this had all been a mistake, this sojourn among
the strange, kind people who spoke so loud and through such long noses;
that now her life was to begin, as she had really meant it to begin
when she ran away from Le Boss and his hateful tyranny.

Out she slipped, in the sweet, fresh morning. No-one saw her go, for
the village was a busy place at all times, and at this early hour every
man and woman was busy in barn or kitchen. At one house a child
knocked at the window, a child for whom she had played and sung many
times. He stood there in his little red nightgown, and nodded and
laughed; and Marie nodded back, smiling, and wondered if he would ever
run away, and ever know how good, how good it was, to be alone, with no
one else in the world to say, "Do this!" or "Do that!" Just as she
came out, the sun rose over the hill, and looking at the fiery ball
Marie perceived that it danced in the sky. Yes, assuredly, so it was!
There was the same wavering motion that she had seen on every fair
Easter Day that she could remember. She thought how Mere Jeanne had
first called her attention, to it, when she was little, little, just
able to toddle, and had told her that the sun danced so on Easter
Morning, for joy that the Good Lord had risen from the dead; and so it
was a lesson for us all, and we must dance on Easter Day, if we never
danced all the rest of the year. Ah, how they danced at home there in
the village! But now, it was not Easter at all, and yet the sun
danced; what should it mean? And it came to Marie's mind that perhaps
the Good Lord had told it to dance, for a sign to her that all would go
well, and that she was doing