something quick and red flashing up a tree--a squirrel
frightened by the Danish hounds; that was all. And Marsa was happy with
the languorous happiness which nature gives, her forehead cooled by the
fresh breeze, her eyes rested by the deep green which hid the shoes, her
whole being refreshed by the atmosphere of peace which fell from the
trees.

Then, calling her dogs, she would proceed to a little farmhouse, and,
sitting down under the mulberry trees, wait until the farmer's wife
brought her some newly baked bread and a cup of milk, warm from the cows.
Then she would remain idly there, surrounded by chickens, ducks, and
great, greedy geese, which she fed, breaking the bread between her white
fingers, while Duna and Bundas crouched at her feet, pricking up their
ears, and watching these winged denizens of the farmyard, which Marsa
forbade them to touch. Finally the Tzigana would slowly wend her way
home, enter the villa, sit down before the piano, and play, with
ineffable sweetness, like souvenirs of another life, the free and
wandering life of her mother, the Hungarian airs of Janos Nemeth, the sad
"Song of Plevna," the sparkling air of "The Little Brown Maid of
Budapest," and that bitter; melancholy romance, "The World holds but One
Fair Maiden," a mournful and despairing melody, which she preferred to
all others, because it responded, with its tearful accents, to a
particular state of her own heart.

The girl was evidently concealing some secret suffering. The bitter
memory of her early years? Perhaps. Physical pain? Possibly. She had been
ill some years before, and had been obliged to pass a winter at Pau. But
it seemed rather some mental anxiety or torture which impelled the
Tzigana to seek solitude and silence in her voluntary retreat.

The days passed thus in that villa of Maisons-Lafitte, where Tisza died.
Very often, in the evening, Marsa would shut herself up in the solitude
of that death-chamber, which remained just as her mother had left it.
Below, General Vogotzine smoked his pipe, with a bottle of brandy for
company: above, Marsa prayed.

One night she went out, and through the sombre alleys, in the tender
light of the moon, made her way to the little convent in the Avenue Egle,
where the blue sisters were established; those sisters whom she often met
in the park, with their full robes of blue cloth, their white veils, a
silver medallion and crucifix upon their breasts, and a rosary of wooden
beads s