“We like a clean parlor, my daughter, even though no one is ever coming to see us, eh?” she said, as entering the apartment she at last sat down, late in the afternoon.  She had put on her best attire.

Olive was not there to reply.  The mother called but got no answer.  She rose with an uneasy heart, and met her a few steps beyond the door that opened into the garden, in a path which came up from an old latticed bower.  Olive was approaching slowly, her face pale and wild.  There was an agony of hostile dismay in the look, and the trembling and appealing tone with which, taking the frightened mother’s cheeks between her palms, she said: 

“Ah! ma mere, qui vini ’ci ce soir?”—­Who is coming here this evening?

“Why, my dear child, I was just saying, we like a clean”—­

But the daughter was desperate: 

“Oh, tell me, my mother, who is coming?”

“My darling, it is our blessed friend, Miche Vignevielle!”

“To see me?” cried the girl.

“Yes.”

“Oh, my mother, what have you done?”

“Why, Olive, my child,” exclaimed the little mother, bursting into tears, “do you forget it is Miche Vignevielle who has promised to protect you when I die?”

The daughter had turned away, and entered the door; but she faced around again, and extending her arms toward her mother, cried: 

“How can—­he is a white man—­I am a poor”—­

“Ah! cherie,” replied Madame Delphine, seizing the outstretched hands, “it is there—­it is there that he shows himself the best man alive!  He sees that difficulty; he proposes to meet it; he says he will find you a suitor!”

Olive freed her hands violently, motioned her mother back, and stood proudly drawn up, flashing an indignation too great for speech; but the next moment she had uttered a cry, and was sobbing on the floor.

The mother knelt beside her and threw an arm about her shoulders.

“Oh, my sweet daughter, you must not cry!  I did not want to tell you at all!  I did not want to tell you!  It isn’t fair for you to cry so hard.  Miche Vignevielle says you shall have the one you wish, or none at all, Olive, or none at all.”

“None at all! none at all!  None, none, none!”

“No, no, Olive,” said the mother, “none at all.  He brings none with him to-night, and shall bring none with him hereafter.”

Olive rose suddenly, silently declined her mother’s aid, and went alone to their chamber in the half-story.

Madame Delphine wandered drearily from door to window, from window to door, and presently into the newly-furnished front room which now seemed dismal beyond degree.  There was a great Argand lamp in one corner.  How she had labored that day to prepare it for evening illumination!  A little beyond it, on the wall, hung a crucifix.  She knelt under it, with her eyes fixed upon it, and thus silently remained until its outline was indistinguishable in the deepening shadows of evening.