The letter was hardly read and wept over, when little Anglice arrived.  On beholding her, Antoine uttered a cry of joy and surprise,—­she was so like the woman he had worshipped.

As a man’s tears are more pathetic than a woman’s, so is his love more intense,—­not more enduring, or half so subtile, but intenser.

The passion that had been crowded down in his heart broke out and lavished its richness on this child, who was to him, not only the Anglice of years ago, but his friend Emile Jardin also.

Anglice possessed the wild, strange beauty of her mother,—­the bending, willowy form, the rich tint of skin, the large tropical eyes, that had almost made Antoine’s sacred robes a mockery to him.

For a month or two Anglice was wildly unhappy in her new home.  She talked continually of the bright country where she was born, the fruits and flowers and blue skies.  Antoine could not pacify her.  By-and-by she ceased to weep, and went about the cottage with a dreary, disconsolate air that cut Antoine to the heart.  Before the year ended, he noticed that the ruddy tinge had fled from her cheek, that her eyes had grown languid, and her slight figure more willowy than ever.

A physician was called.  He could discover nothing wrong with the child, except this fading and drooping.  He failed to account for that.  It was some vague disease of the mind, he said, beyond his skill.

So Anglice faded day after day.  She seldom left the room now.  Antoine could not shut out the fact that the child was passing away.  He had learned to love her so!

“Dear heart,” he said once, “what is’t ails thee?”

“Nothing, mon pere”—­for so she called him.

The winter passed, the balmy spring air had come, and Anglice seemed to revive.  In her little bamboo chair, on the porch, she swayed to and fro in the fragrant breeze, with a peculiar undulating motion, like a graceful tree.

At times something seemed to weigh upon her mind.  Antoine noticed it, and waited.  At length she spoke.

“Near our house,” said little Anglice, “near our house, on the island, the palm-trees are waving under the blue sky.  Oh, how beautiful!  I seem to lie beneath them all day long.  I am very, very happy.  I yearned for them until I grew sick,—­don’t you think so, mon pere?”

“Mon Dieu, yes!” exclaimed Antoine, suddenly.  “Let us hasten to those pleasant islands where the palms are waving.”

Anglice smiled.

“I am going there, mon pere!”

Ay, indeed.  A week from that evening the wax candles burned at her feet and forehead, lighting her on the journey.

All was over.  Now was Antoine’s heart empty.  He had nothing to do but to lay the blighted flower away.

Pere Antoine made a shallow grave in his garden, and heaped the fresh brown mould over his idol.

In the genial spring evenings the priest was seen sitting by the mound, his finger closed in the unread prayer-book.