Sera joyeux.

That was all. But she shook as though a miracle had been enacted. Hilda,
owing partly to the fondness of an otherwise stern grandfather and
partly to the vanity of her unimportant father, had finally been sent to
a school attended by girls who on the average were a little above
herself in station--Chetwynd's, in the valley between Turnhill and
Bursley. (It was still called Chetwynd's though it had changed hands.)
Among the staff was a mistress who was known as Miss Miranda--she seemed
to have no surname. One of Miss Miranda's duties had been to teach
optional French, and one of Miss Miranda's delights had been to dictate
this very poem of Victor Hugo's to her pupils for learning by heart. It
was Miss Miranda's sole French poem, and she imposed it with unfading
delight on the successive generations whom she 'grounded' in French.
Hilda had apparently forgotten most of her French, but as she now read
the poem (for the first time in print), it re-established itself in her
memory as the most lovely verse that she had ever known, and the
recitations of it in Miss Miranda's small classroom came back to her
with an effect beautiful and tragic. And also there was the name of
Victor Hugo, which Miss Miranda's insistent enthusiasm had rendered
sublime and legendary to a sensitive child! Hilda now saw the sacred
name stamped in gold on a whole set of elegant volumes! It was
marvellous that she should have turned the page containing just that
poem! It was equally marvellous that she should have discovered the
works of Victor Hugo in the matter-of-fact office of Mr. Cannon! But was
it? Was he not half-French, and were not these books precisely a
corroboration of what her mother had told her? Mr. Cannon's origin at
once assumed for her the strange seductive hues of romance; he shared
the glory of Victor Hugo. Then the voices in the corridor ceased, and
with a decisive movement he unlatched the door. She relinquished the
book and calmly sat down as he entered.

III

"Of course, your mother's told you?"

"Yes."

"I had no difficulty at all. I just asked her what she was going to do
about the rent-collecting."

Standing up in front of Hilda, but on his own side of the desk, Mr.
Cannon smiled as a conqueror who can recount a triumph with pride, but
without conceit. She looked at him with naive admiration. To admire him
was agreeable to her; and she liked also to feel unimportant in his
presence. But she f