ttle girl is not here," he said in annoyance.

"But she is here," replied the manager, making a sign to Perrine to
approach.

"Why was it you did not go back to Maraucourt, girl?" he asked.

"I thought that I ought not to leave here until you told me to go back,"
she replied.

"That was quite right," he said. "You must be here waiting for me when I
come...."

He stopped for a second, then went on: "And I shall also need you at
Maraucourt. You can go back this evening, and tomorrow be at the office.
I will tell you what you will have to do."

When she had interpreted the orders which he wished to give to the
machinists, he left, and that day she was not required to read the
newspapers.

But what did that matter? Hadn't her grandfather said that on the morrow he
would need her at Maraucourt?

"I shall need you at Maraucourt!" She kept repeating these words over and
over again as she tramped along the roads over which William had driven her
in the trap.

How was she going to be employed? She imagined all sorts of ways, but she
could not feel certain of anything, except that she was not to be sent back
to push trucks. That was a sure thing; for the rest she would have to wait.
But she need not wait in a state of feverish anxiety, for from her
grandfather's manner she might hope for the best. If she, a poor little
girl, could only have enough wisdom to follow the course that her mother
had mapped out for her before dying, slowly and carefully, without trying
to hasten events, her life, which she held in her own hands, would be what
she herself made it. She must remember this always, in everything she said,
every time she had to make a resolution, every time she took a step
forward, and each time she took this step she must take it without asking
advice of anyone.

On her way back to Maraucourt she turned all this over in her little
head. She walked slowly, stopping when she wanted to pick a flower that
grew beneath the hedge, or when, in looking over a fence, she could see
a pretty one that seemed to be beckoning to her from the meadow. Now and
again she got rather excited; then she would quicken her step; then she
slowed up again, telling herself that there was no occasion for her to
hurry. Here was one thing she had to do--she must make it a rule, make
it a habit, not to give way to an impulse. Oh, she would have to be very
wise. Her pretty face was very grave as she walked along, her hands full
of lovely wild