e the Italian was going on, Jacintha's dark eyes glanced
suspiciously on each speaker in turn. But her suspicions were all wide
of the mark.

"Now may I go and tell mamma?" asked Rose.

"No, mademoiselle, you shall not," said Jacintha. "Madame Raynal, do
take my side, and forbid her."

"Why, what is it to you?" said Rose, haughtily.

"If it was not something to me, should I thwart my dear young lady?"

"No. And you shall have your own way, if you will but condescend to give
me a reason."

This to some of us might appear reasonable, but not to Jacintha: it even
hurt her feelings.

"Mademoiselle Rose," she said, "when you were little and used to ask me
for anything, did I ever say to you, 'Give me a REASON first'?"

"There! she is right," said Josephine. "We should not make terms with
tried friends. Come, we will pay her devotion this compliment. It is
such a small favor. For my part I feel obliged to her for asking it."

Josephine's health improved steadily from that day. Her hollow cheeks
recovered their plump smoothness, and her beauty its bloom, and her
person grew more noble and statue-like than ever, and within she felt
a sense of indomitable vitality. Her appetite had for some time been
excessively feeble and uncertain, and her food tasteless; but of late,
by what she conceived to be a reaction such as is common after youth has
shaken off a long sickness, her appetite had been not only healthy
but eager. The baroness observed this, and it relieved her of a large
portion of her anxiety. One day at dinner her maternal heart was so
pleased with Josephine's performance that she took it as a personal
favor, "Well done, Josephine," said she; "that gives your mother
pleasure to see you eat again. Soup and bouillon: and now twice you
have been to Rose for some of that pate, which does you so much credit,
Jacintha."

Josephine colored high at this compliment.

"It is true," said she, "I eat like a pig;" and, with a furtive glance
at the said pate, she laid down her knife and fork, and ate no more of
anything. The baroness had now a droll misgiving.

"The doctor will be angry with me," said she: "he will find her as well
as ever."

"Madame," said Jacintha hastily, "when does the doctor come, if I may
make so bold, that I may get his room ready, you know?"

"Well thought of, Jacintha. He comes the day after to-morrow, in the
afternoon."

At night when the young ladies went up to bed, what did they find but