"Yes, Madame."

"Are women allowed to go into this Chamber?--Then why isn't his wife
there? For I can understand that it's a great affair for him. On such a
day as to-day he will need to feel that all those he loves are beside
him. Look you, my boy, you must take me to this sitting. Is it very
far?"

"No, very near. Only it must have begun before this. And then," added
the Giaour, a little embarrassed, "this is the hour when Madame needs
me."

"Ah! Do you teach her this thing that you're professor of? What do you
call it?"

"Massage. It comes down to us from the ancients. There, she's ringing
her bell now. Some one will come to call me. Do you want me to tell her
that you are here?"

"No, no, I prefer to go to the Chamber at once."

"But you have no card of admission, have you?"

"Bah! I'll say that I am Jansoulet's mother and that I have come to hear
my son tried."

Poor mother! she did not know how truly she described his position.

"Wait a moment, Madame Francoise. Let me, at least, send some one to
show you the way."

"Oh! do you know, I've never been able to get used to these servant
people. I've a tongue in my head. There are people in the streets; I
shall find my way well enough."

He made one last attempt, without disclosing the whole of his thought:

"Be careful. His enemies will speak against him in the Chamber. You will
hear things that will hurt you."

Oh! the lovely smile of maternal faith and pride with which she
answered:

"Don't I know better than all those people what my son is worth? Is
there anything that could make me unjust to him? If so, I must be a
mighty ungrateful woman. Nonsense!"

And, with a threatening shake of her cap, she departed.

Straight as a statue, with head erect, the old woman strode along under
the arches she had been told to follow, somewhat disturbed by the
incessant rumbling of carriages and by her slow progress, unaccompanied
by the movement of her faithful distaff, which had not quitted her for
fifty years. All these suggestions of enmity, of persecution, the
priest's mysterious words, Cabassu's dark hints, excited and terrified
her. She found therein an explanation of the presentiments which had
taken possession of her so firmly as to tear her away from her habits
and her duties, the superintendence of the Chateau and the care of her
invalid. Strangely enough, by the way, since fortune had cast upon her
son and her that cloak of gold with its heavy fold