d
could not be content until they had learned the private affairs of all
those persons with whom they came in contact. They kept a little store,
and each Saturday went into the country to get rid of the dust of the
week; but they were making money, and some day would live altogether at
Soisy-sous-Etiolles.

"Is that place far from Etiolles?" asked Jack, with a start.

"O, no, close by," answered the gentleman, giving a friendly cut with
his whip to his beast.

What a fatality for Jack! Had he not told the falsehood, he could have
gone on in this comfortable carriage, have rested his poor little weary
legs, and had a comfortable sleep, wrapped in the good woman's shawl,
who asked him, every little while, if he was warm enough.

If he could but summon courage enough to say, "I have told you a
falsehood; I am going to the same place that you are;" but he was
unwilling to incur the contempt and distrust of these good people; yet,
when they told him that they had reached Villeneuve, the child could not
restrain a sob.

"Do not cry, my little friend," said the kind woman; "your mother,
perhaps, is not so ill as you think, and the sight of you will make her
well."

At the last house the carriage stopped.

"Yes, this is it," said Jack, sadly. The good people said a kind
good-bye. "How lucky you are to have finished your journey," said the
woman; "we have four good leagues before us."

Little Jack had the same, but durst not say so. He went toward the
garden-gate. "Good night," said his new friends, "good night."

He answered in a voice choked by tears, and the carriage turned toward
the right. Then the child, overwhelmed with vain regrets, ran after it
with all his speed; but his limbs, weakened instead of strengthened
by inadequate repose, refused all service. At the end of a few rods he
could go no further, but sank on the roadside with a burst of passionate
tears, while the hospitable proprietors of the carriage rolled
comfortably on, without an idea of the despair they had left behind
them.

He was cold, the earth was wet. No matter for that; he was too weary to
think or to feel. The wind blows violently, and soon the poor little boy
sleeps quietly. A frightful noise awakens him. Jack starts up and sees
something monstrous--a howling, snorting beast, with two fiery eyes that
send forth a shower of sparks. The creature dashed past, leaving behind
him a train like a comet's tail. A grove of trees, quite unsuspect