and he at last relapsed into gloom, and said that
he was tired and would go to bed. Thereupon she wheeled him inside his
bedroom, bade him good-night, and left him to his moodiness, which,
however, was soon absorbed in a deep sleep, for the mind of the little
grey postmaster could no more hold trouble or thought than a sieve.

Left alone, Rosalie began to be tortured. What were they doing in the
house opposite?

Go and look through the windows? But she had never spied on people in
her life! Yet would it be spying? Would it not be pardonable? In the
interest of the man who had been attacked in the morning by the tailor,
who had been threatened by the saddler, and concerning whom she had seen
a signal pass between old Louis and Filion Lacasse, would it not be a
humane thing to do? It might be foolish and feminine to be anxious, but
did she not mean well, and was it not, therefore, honourable?

The mystery inflamed her imagination. Charley's passiveness when he was
assaulted by old Louis and afterwards threatened by the saddler seemed
to her indifference to any sort of danger--the courage of the hopeless
life, maybe. Instantly her heart overflowed with sympathy. Monsieur was
not a Catholic perhaps? Well, so much the more he should be befriended,
for he was so much the more alone and helpless. If a man was born a
Protestant--or English--he could not help it, and should not be punished
in this world for it, since he was sure to be punished in the next.

Her mind became more and more excited. The postoffice had been long
since closed, and her father was asleep--she could hear him snoring.
It was ten o'clock, and there was still a light in the tailor's
shop. Usually the light went out before nine o'clock. She went to the
post-office door and looked out. The streets were empty; there was not
a light burning anywhere, save in the house of the Notary. Down towards
the river a sleigh was making its way over the thin snow of spring, and
screeching on the stones. Some late revellers, moving homewards from the
Trois Couronnes, were roaring at the top of their voices the habitant
chanson, 'Le Petit Roger Bontemps':

"For I am Roger Bontemps,
Gai, gai, gai!
With drink I am full and with joy content,
Gai, gaiment!"

The chanson died away as she stood there, and still the light was
burning in the shop opposite. A thought suddenly came to her. She would
go over and see if the old house