De Arthenay's house lay somewhat apart from the village street.
It was a pleasant house, long and low, painted white, with vines
trained over the lower part. Directly opposite was a pine grove, and
here Marie and her little friend loved to sit, listening to the murmur
of the wind in the dark feathery branches. It was the sound of the
sea, Marie told little Petie. As to how it got there, that was another
matter; but it was undoubtedly the sound of the sea, for she had been
at sea, and recognised it at once.

"What does it say?" asked the child one day.

"Of words," said Marie, "I hear not any, Petie. But it wants always
somesing, do you hear? It is hongry always, and makes moans for the
sorry thinks it has in its heart."

"I am hungry in my stomach, not in my heart," objected Petie.

But Marie nodded her head sagely. "Yes," she said. "It is that you
know not the deeference, Petie, bit-ween those. To be hongry at the
stomach, that is made better when you eat cakes, do you see, or
_pot_atoes. But when the heart is hongry, then--ah, yes, that is ozer
thing." And she nodded again, and glanced up at the attic window, and
sighed.

It was a long time before she spoke of her past life; but when she
found that Petie had no sharp-eyed mother at home, only a deaf
great-aunt who asked no questions, she began to give him little
glimpses of the circus world, which filled him with awe and rapture.
It was hardly a real circus, only a little strolling _troupe_, with
some performing dogs, and a few trained horses and ponies, and two
tight-rope dancers; then there were two other musicians, and Marie
herself, besides Le Boss and his family, and Old Billy, who took care
of the horses and did the dirty work. It was about the dogs that Petie
liked best to hear; of the wonderful feats of Monsieur George, the
great brindled greyhound, and the astonishing sagacity of Coquelicot,
the poodle.

"Monsieur George, he could jump over anything, yes! He was always
jump, jump, all day long, to practise himself. Over our heads all,
that was nothing, yet he did it always when we come in the tent, _pour
saluer_, to say the how you do. But one day come in a man to see Le
Boss, very tall, oh, like mountains, and on him a tall hat. And
Monsieur George, he not stopped to measure with his eye, for fear he be
too late with the _politesse_, and he jump, and carry away the man's
hat, and knock him down and come plomp, down on him. Yes, very fu