ly stopping just to sleep
and to earn a few sous.

"From Switzerland one goes to Italy," said Mattia softly. "If, while
running after Mrs. Milligan, we get to Lucca, how happy my little
Christina will be."

Poor dear Mattia! He was helping me to seek those I loved and I had done
nothing to help him see his little sister.

At Lyons we gained on the _Swan_. It was now only six weeks ahead of us.
I doubted if we could catch up with it before it reached Switzerland.
And then I did not know that the river Rhone was not navigable up to the
Lake of Geneva. We had thought that Mrs. Milligan would go right to
Switzerland on her boat. What was my surprise when arriving at the next
town to see the _Swan_ in the distance. We began to run along the banks
of the river. What was the matter? Everything was closed up on the
barge. There were no flowers on the veranda. What had happened to
Arthur? We stopped, looking at each other both with the same sorrowful
thoughts.

A man who had charge of the boat told us that the English lady had gone
to Switzerland with a sick boy and a little dumb girl. They had gone in
a carriage with a maid; the other servants had followed with the
baggage. We breathed again.

"Where is the lady?" asked Mattia.

"She has taken a villa at Vevy, but I cannot say where; she is going to
spend the summer there."

We started for Vevy. Now they were not traveling away from us. They had
stopped and we should be sure to find them at Vevy if we searched. We
arrived there with three sous in our pockets and the soles off our
boots. But Vevy is not a little village; it is a town, and as for asking
for Mrs. Milligan, or even an English lady with a sick son and a dumb
girl, we knew that that would be absurd. There are so many English in
Vevy; the place is almost like an English pleasure resort. The best way,
we thought, was to go to all the houses where they might be likely to
live. That would not be difficult; we had only to play our music in
every street. We tried everywhere, but yet we could see no signs of Mrs.
Milligan.

We went from the lake to the mountains, from the mountains to the lake,
looking to the right and to the left, questioning from time to time
people who, from their expression, we thought would be disposed to
listen and reply. Some one sent us to a chalet built way up on the
mountain; another assured us that she lived down by the lake. They were
indeed English ladies who lived up in the chalet o