le to torment an old woman?' she said; 'and it is
not possible that it be a dream.'

'It really IS true,' said Cyril; 'and I congratulate you very much.'

His tone of studied politeness seemed to convince more than the raptures
of the others.

'If I do not dream,' she said, 'Henri come to Manon--and you--you shall
come all with me to Mr the Curate. Is it not?'

Manon was a wrinkled old woman with a red and yellow handkerchief
twisted round her head. She took Henri, who was already sleepy with the
excitement of his Christmas-tree and his visitors, and when the lady had
put on a stiff black cape and a wonderful black silk bonnet and a pair
of black wooden clogs over her black cashmere house-boots, the whole
party went down the road to a little white house--very like the one they
had left--where an old priest, with a good face, welcomed them with a
politeness so great that it hid his astonishment.

The lady, with her French waving hands and her shrugging French
shoulders and her trembling French speech, told the story. And now the
priest, who knew no English, shrugged HIS shoulders and waved HIS hands
and spoke also in French.

'He thinks,' whispered the Phoenix, 'that her troubles have turned her
brain. What a pity you know no French!'

'I do know a lot of French,' whispered Robert, indignantly; 'but it's
all about the pencil of the gardener's son and the penknife of the
baker's niece--nothing that anyone ever wants to say.'

'If _I_ speak,' the bird whispered, 'he'll think HE'S mad, too.'

'Tell me what to say.'

'Say "C'est vrai, monsieur. Venez donc voir,"' said the Phoenix; and
then Robert earned the undying respect of everybody by suddenly saying,
very loudly and distinctly--

'Say vray, mossoo; venny dong vwaw.'

The priest was disappointed when he found that Robert's French began and
ended with these useful words; but, at any rate, he saw that if the lady
was mad she was not the only one, and he put on a big beavery hat, and
got a candle and matches and a spade, and they all went up the hill to
the wayside shrine of St John of Luz.

'Now,' said Robert, 'I will go first and show you where it is.'

So they prised the stone up with a corner of the spade, and Robert did
go first, and they all followed and found the golden treasure exactly as
they had left it. And every one was flushed with the joy of performing
such a wonderfully kind action.

Then the lady and the priest clasped hands and wept for jo