red, drawing near and scrutinising
the head of the gipsy charm, which showed like a little ladybird newly
lighted on the sheet.

'Nothing--a charm--folly. Pray, Madame, allow me to go to sleep.'

So, with another look and a little twiddle between her finger and thumb,
she seemed satisfied; but, unhappily for me, she did not seem at all
sleepy. She busied herself in unpacking and displaying over the back of the
chair a whole series of London purchases--silk dresses, a shawl, a sort of
lace demi-coiffure then in vogue, and a variety of other articles.

The vainest and most slammakin of women--the merest slut at home,
a milliner's lay figure out of doors--she had one square foot of
looking-glass upon the chimneypiece, and therein tried effects, and
conjured up grotesque simpers upon her sinister and weary face.

I knew that the sure way to prolong this worry was to express my uneasiness
under it, so I bore it as quietly as I could; and at last fell fast asleep
with the gaunt image of Madame, with a festoon of grey silk with a cerise
stripe, pinched up in her finger and thumb, and smiling over her shoulder
across it into the little shaving-glass that stood on the chimney.

I awoke suddenly in the morning, and sat up in my bed, having for a moment
forgotten all about our travelling. A moment more, however, brought all
back again.

'Are we in time, Madame?'

'For the packet?' she enquired, with one of her charming smiles, and
cutting a caper on the floor. 'To be sure; you don't suppose they would
forget. We have two hours yet to wait.'

'Can we see the sea from the window?'

'No, dearest cheaile; you will see't time enough.

'I'd like to get up,' I said.

'Time enough, my dear Maud; you are fatigued; are you sure you feel quite
well?'

'Well enough to get up; I should be better, I think, out of bed.'

'There is no hurry, you know; you need not even go by the next packet. Your
uncle, he tell me, I may use my discretion.'

'Is there any water?'

'They will bring some.'

'Please, Madame, ring the bell.'

She pulled it with alacrity. I afterwards learnt that it did not ring.

'What has become of my gipsy pin?' I demanded, with an unaccountable
sinking of the heart.

'Oh! the little pin with the red top? maybe it 'as fall on the ground; we
weel find when you get up.'

I suspected that she had taken it merely to spite me. It would have been
quite the thing she would have liked. I cannot describe to you how