peared, carrying what looked like a bundle
of linen in her arms. Jeanne would have stepped forward to meet her, but
all strength seemed to have left her legs and she feared she would fall
if she moved. The maid saw her and came up in her ordinary, calm way.

"Good-day, madame; here I am again, though I've had some bother to get
along."

"Well?" gasped Jeanne.

"Well," answered Rosalie, "she died last night. They were married and
here's the baby," and she held out the child which could not be seen for
its wraps. Jeanne mechanically took it, and they left the station and
got into the carriage which was waiting.

"M. Paul is coming directly after the funeral. I suppose he'll be here
to-morrow, by this train."

"Paul--" murmured Jeanne, and then stopped without saying anything more.

The sun was sinking towards the horizon, bathing in a glow of light the
green fields which were flecked here and there with golden colewort
flowers or blood-red poppies, and over the quiet country fell an
infinite peace.

The peasant who was driving the chaise kept clicking his tongue to urge
on his horse which trotted swiftly along, and Jeanne looked straight up
into the sky which the circling flight of the swallows seemed to cut
asunder.

All at once she became conscious of a soft warmth which was making
itself felt through her skirts; it was the heat from the tiny being
sleeping on her knees, and it moved her strangely. She suddenly drew
back the covering from the child she had not yet seen, that she might
look at her son's daughter; as the light fell on its face the little
creature opened its blue eyes, and moved its lips, and then Jeanne
hugged it closely to her, and, raising it in her arms, began to cover it
with passionate kisses.

"Come, come, Madame Jeanne, have done," said Rosalie, in sharp, though
good-tempered tones; "you'll make the child cry."

Then she added, as if in reply to her own thoughts:

"After all, life is never so jolly or so miserable as people seem to
think."

* * * * *

HAUTOT SENIOR

AND

HAUTOT JUNIOR

PART I

In front of the building, half farm-house, half manor-house, one of
those rural habitations of a mixed character which were all but
seigneurial, and which are at the present time occupied by large
cultivators, the dogs lashed beside the apple-trees in the orchard near
the house, kept barking and howling at the sight of the shooting-bags
carried by