ouchette was learning rapidly. The change was so confusing, and
events had chased one another so unceremoniously, that she must be
pardoned if she grasped new ideas with more tenacity than accuracy. It
is what all of us are doing day by day.

* * * * *

It was a long distance by rail.

Fouchette had never dreamed that a railroad could be so long and that
the woods and fields with which her mind had been recently filled
could become so monotonous and tedious. Even the towns and
villages,--of which she had never heard,--that were interesting at
first, soon became stupid and tiresome. She had long ceased to notice
them particularly, her mind being naturally filled with thoughts of
the place to which she was going, and where her whole future seemed to
lay yet undeveloped. She finally fell into a sound sleep.

The next thing she knew was that she was roughly shaken by the
shoulder, and a voice cried, somewhat impatiently,--

"Come, come! What a little sleepyhead!"

It was that of a "religieuse," or member of a religious order, and its
possessor was a stout, ruddy-faced woman of middle life, garbed in
solemn black, against which sombre background the white wings of her
homely headpiece and the white apron, over which dangled a cross,
looked still more white and glaring than they were.

Another woman in the same glaring uniform, though less robust and
quite colorless as to face, stood near by on the station platform.

"Bring her things, sister,--if she has anything."

Following these instructions, the red-faced woman rummaged in the
netting overhead with one hand while she pulled Fouchette from her
corner with the other.

"Come, petite! Is this all you've got, child?"

"Yes, madame," replied the child, respectfully, but with a sinking
heart.

"So this is Fouchette, eh?" said the white-faced woman, as her
companion joined her with the child and her little bundle.

"Yes, madame," faltered Fouchette.

But for the eyes, which were large and dark and luminous, and which
seemed to grasp the object upon which they rested and to hold it in
physical embrace, the face might have been that of the dead, so
ghastly and rigid and unnatural it was.

"She's not much, very sure," observed the other, turning Fouchette
around by the slender shoulder.

"She'll never earn her salt," said the pale-faced sister.

Fouchette noticed that her lips were apparently bloodless and that she
scarcely moved