“But you are done with me.  You say nothing to me.  I might as well be dead, for all you care.”

“Let us not talk of such things in this manner,” said Jacqueline, mildly.  But the dignity of her rebuke was felt, for Elsie said,—­

“But I seem to have lost you,—­and now we are alone together, I may say it.  Yes, I have lost you, Jacqueline!”

“This is not the first time we have been alone together in these dreadful three days.”

“But now I cannot help speaking.”

“You could help it before.  Why, Elsie?  You had not made up your mind.  But now you have, or you would not speak, and insist on speaking.  What have you to say, then?”

“Jacqueline!  Are you Jacqueline?”

“Am I not?”

“You seem not to be.”

“How is it, Elsie?”

“You are silent and stern, and I think you are very unhappy, Jacqueline.”

“I do not know,—­not unhappy, I think.  Perhaps I am silent,—­I have been so busy.  But for all it is so dreadful—­no! not unhappy, Elsie.”

“Thinking of Leclerc all the while?”

“Of him?  Oh, no!  I have not been thinking of him,—­not constantly.  Jesus Christ will take care of him.  His mother is quiet, thinking that.  I, at least, can be as strong as she.  I’m not thinking of the shame and cruelty,—­but of what that can be worth which is so much to him, that he counts this punishment, as they call it, as nothing, as hardly pain, certainly not disgrace.  The Truth, Elsie!—­if I have not as much to say, it is because I have been trying to find the Truth.”

“But if you have found it, then I hope I never shall,—­if it is the Truth that makes you so gloomy.  I thought it was this business in Meaux.”

“Gloomy? when it may be I have found, or shall find”—­

Here Jacqueline hesitated,—­looked at Elsie.  Grave enough was that look to expel every frivolous feeling from the heart of Elsie,—­at least, so long as she remained under its influence.  It was something to trust another as Jacqueline intended now to trust her friend.  It was a touching sight to see her seeking her old confidence, and appearing to rely on it, while she knew how frail the reed was.  But this girl, frivolous as was her spirit, this girl had come with her from the distant native village; their childhood’s recollections were the same.  And Jacqueline determined now to trust her.  For in times of blasting heat the shadow even of the gourd is not to be despised.

“You know what I have looked for so long, Elsie,” she said, “you ought to rejoice with me.  I need work for that no longer.”

“What is that, Jacqueline?”

Even this question, betraying no such apprehension as Jacqueline’s words seemed to intimate, did not disturb the girl.  She was in the mood when, notwithstanding her show of dependence, she was really in no such necessity.  Never was she stronger than now when she put off all show of strength.  Elsie stood before her in place of the opposing world.  To Elsie’s question she replied as readily as though she anticipated the word, and had no expectation of better recollection,—­not to speak of better apprehension.