earted fun, his love of active exercise, and his entire
absence of any assumption of age, he was far more boyish than
Ernest. But although her thoughts were too busy now to permit her
to analyse her feelings, she knew that she had been mistaken, and
felt a strange confidence in this lad who had so promptly and coolly
assumed the entire command of the party, and had piloted them with
such steady nerve through the danger.

As for Jeanne, she felt no surprise and but little alarm. Her
confidence in her protector was unbounded. Prompt and cool as he
was himself, she was ready on the instant to obey his orders, and
felt a certain sensation of pride at the manner in which her previous
confidence in him was being justified.

After placing the girls in their shelter Harry had left them and
stood leaning against the parapet of the quay as if carelessly
watching the water, but maintaining a vigilant look-out against
the approach of danger. The number of passers-by increased rapidly.
The washerwomen came down to the boats moored in the stream and
began their operation of banging the linen with wooden beaters.
Market-women came along with baskets, the hum and stir of life
everywhere commenced, and Paris was fairly awake.

Seeing that it was safe now to proceed, Harry returned to his
companions. He had scarcely glanced at them before, and now looked
approvingly at their disguises, to which the marquise had, during
the long hours of the night, devoted the most zealous attention.
Marie had been made to look much older than she was. A few dark
lines carefully traced on her forehead, at the corners of her eyes
and mouth, had added many years to her appearance, and she could
have passed, except to the closest observer, as the mother of
Virginie, whose dress was calculated to make her look even younger
than she was. The hands and faces of all three had been slightly
tinged with brown to give them a sun-burnt aspect in accordance
with their peasant dresses, and so complete was the transformation
that Harry could scarcely suppress a start of surprise as he looked
at the group.

"It would be safe now, mademoiselle," he said to Marie, "for us to
proceed. There are plenty of people about in the streets; but as
the news has, no doubt, already been spread that the daughters of
the Marquis de St. Caux had left the house before those charged
with their father's arrest arrived, it will be better for you not
to keep together. I would suggest