t having been given
us, we were suffered to depart. Schnelling went with us to guide us
through the gloomy mazes of the forest. It was a brilliant August day,
but all was dark in that melancholy region of chasms, rocks and hardy
trees of the North. Francezka walked between Gaston Cheverny and me.
We helped her as we could, over the rough places, but she was
singularly active, and made her way lightly along. Happiness shone in
her face. I began to fear that the lucky result of this catastrophe
would not go far toward teaching her prudence.

When we reached, by degrees, the open champaign country, Schnelling
bade us farewell, courteously. He had behaved handsomely about the
clothes, so Francezka bade him the friendliest possible adieu. Then,
with gaiety of heart, we fared on, at our leisure. When the forests
were left behind, we had before us green fields, sweet streams, mills
and homesteads, and a pleasant highroad. We marched slowly on
Francezka's account. Toward noon we passed a cottage, before which a
peasant was feeding a stout cart-horse. At the cottage door stood a
pleasant-faced woman, with a little army of bright-eyed children
around her. By an inspiration it came to me to offer the peasant a
gold piece for the use of his horse for Mademoiselle Capello, as far
as Uzmaiz. He gaped with delight at the sight of the money. Then,
Francezka, blushing, proposed to go into the cottage and put on her
own clothes. When she came out, dressed in her handsome robe of brown
cloth, richly embroidered, her crimson mantle, and her laced hat, the
little children all set up a cry of "Beautiful lady!" Francezka was
openly charmed by such innocent flattery. Even our old clear-the-way
boys paid her the tribute of an admiring grin; and Gaston Cheverny,
like a young fool, showed his rapture.

But in truth she seemed to me as beautiful then as the rosy dawn. We
perched her upon her charger, and put off again. Francezka was in the
highest spirits, and was a fountain of laughter, like a child. She had
seemed completely the woman up to this time, and now she seemed
nothing more than a joyful, unthinking child. Never was any merrier
journey than the last few miles, before we reached Uzmaiz. I judged
that the payment of the ten thousand crowns would about swallow up
Gaston Cheverny's modest estate; but apparently he gave no more
thought to it than he did to last year's birds' nests.

It was in the middle of the glorious summer afternoon th