ke it
before."

"Would you like to keep it?" asked Graham.

"Always, do you mean?--for my very own?"

"Yes, always."

"Ah, yes!" she cried, "I should like it very much. I will wear
it round my neck with a string, and love it so much, --better
than Sophie."

She looked at it with great admiration as it glittered in the
moonlight; but her next question fairly took Horace aback.

"Is it worth a great deal of money, Monsieur?" she inquired.

"Why, no, not a great deal--very little, in fact," he replied.

"Ah! then, I will beg papa to let me keep it always, always,
and not to take it away."

"I daresay he will let you keep it, if you tell him you like
it," said Graham, not clearly understanding her meaning.

"Oh! yes, but then he often gives me pretty things, and then
sometimes he says he must take them away again, because they
are worth so much money. I don't mind, you know, if he wants
them; but I will ask him to let me keep this."

"And what becomes of all your pretty things?"

"I don't know; I have none now," she answered, "we left them
behind at Spa. Do you know one reason why I would not dance
to-night?" she added, lowering her voice confidentially.

"No; what was it?"

"Because I had not my blue silk frock with lace, that I wear
at the balls at Wiesbaden and Spa. I can dance, you know, papa
taught me; but not in this old frock, and I left my other at
Spa."

"And what were your other reasons?" asked Graham, wondering
more and more at the small specimen of humanity before him.

"Oh! because the room here is so small and crowded. At
Wiesbaden there are rooms large--so large--quite like this
courtyard," extending her small arms by way of giving
expression to her vague sense of grandeur; "and looking-
glasses all round, and crimson sofas, and gold chandeliers,
and ladies in such beautiful dresses, and officers who danced
with me. I don't know any one here."

"And who were the Count and the Prince you were talking about
to Mademoiselle Sophie in the garden this morning?"

Madelon looked disconcerted.

"I shan't tell you," she said, hanging down her head.

"Will you not? Not if I want to know very much?"

She hesitated a moment, then burst forth--

"Well, then, they were just nobody at all. I was only talking
make-believe to Sophie, that she might do the steps properly."

"Oh! then, you did not expect to see them here this evening?"

"Here!" cries Madelon, with much contempt; "why, no. One m