all have it, shall I not. Oh, do not refuse it me--I am so
much in want of a friend!"

"You, lady? you in want of the friendship of a poor creature like me?"

"Yes," answered Adrienne, as she gazed on the other with an expression of
intense grief; "nay, more, you are perhaps the only person, to whom I
could venture to confide my bitter sorrows." So saying, Mdlle. de
Cardoville colored deeply.

"And how do I deserve such marks of confidence?" asked Mother Bunch, more
and more surprised.

"You deserve it by the delicacy of your heart, by the steadiness of your
character," answered Adrienne, with some hesitation; "then--you are a
woman--and I am certain you will understand what I suffer, and pity me."

"Pity you, lady?" said the other, whose astonishment continued to
increase. "You, a great lady, and so much envied--I, so humble and
despised, pity you?"

"Tell me, my poor friend," resumed Adrienne, after some moments of
silence, "are not the worst griefs those which we dare not avow to any
one, for fear of raillery and contempt? How can we venture to ask
interest or pity, for sufferings that we hardly dare avow to ourselves,
because they make us blush?"

The sewing-girl could hardly believe what she heard. Had her benefactress
felt, like her, the effects of an unfortunate passion, she could not have
held any other language. But the sempstress could not admit such a
supposition; so, attributing to some other cause the sorrows of Adrienne,
she answered mournfully, whilst she thought of her own fatal love for
Agricola, "Oh! yes, lady. A secret grief, of which we are ashamed, must
be frightful--very frightful!"

"But then what happiness to meet, not only a heart noble enough to
inspire complete confidence, but one which has itself been tried by a
thousand sorrows, and is capable of affording you pity, support and
counsel!--Tell me, my dear child," added Mdlle. de Cardoville, as she
looked attentively at Mother Bunch, "if you were weighed down by one of
those sorrows, at which one blushes, would you not be happy, very happy,
to find a kindred soul, to whom you might entrust your griefs, and half
relieve them by entire and merited confidence?"

For the first time in her life, Mother Bunch regarded Mdlle. de
Cardoville with a feeling of suspicion and sadness.

The last words of the young lady seemed to her full of meaning
"Doubtless, she knows my secret," said Mother Bunch to herself;
"doubtless, my journal has fallen