Now he laughed and made others laugh as readily and politely as—­Ah!  With whom was she comparing him?  Did the thought of poor Peregrine dwell on his mind as it did upon hers?  But perhaps things were not so terrible to a man as to a woman, and he had not seen those apparitions!  Indeed, when not animated, she detected a certain thoughtful melancholy on his brow which certainly had not belonged to former times.

Mr. Fellowes early made known to Anne that her uncle had asked him to be her banker, and the first care of her kind hostess was to assist her in supplying the deficiencies of her wardrobe, so that she was able to go abroad without shrinking at her own shabby appearance.

The next thing was to take her to Poissy to request her dismissal from the Queen, without which it would be hardly decorous to depart, though in point of fact, in the present state of affairs, as Noemi said, there was nothing to prevent it.

“No,” said Mr. Fellowes; “but for that reason Miss Woodford would feel bound to show double courtesy to the discrowned Queen.”

“And she has often been very kind to me—­I love her much,” said Anne.

“Noemi is a little Whig,” said Madame de Bellaise.  “I shall not take her with us, because I know her father would not like it, but to me it is only like the days of my youth to visit an exiled queen.  Will these gentlemen think fit to be of the party?”

“Thank you, madam, not I,” said the Magdalen man.  “I am very sorry for the poor lady, but my college has suffered too much at her husband’s hands for me to be very anxious to pay her my respects; and if my young friend will take my advice, neither will he.  It might be bringing his father into trouble.”

To this Charles agreed, so M. L’Abbe undertook to show them the pictures at the Louvre, and Anne and Madame de Bellaise were the only occupants of the carriage that conveyed them to the great old convent of Poissy, the girl enjoying by the way the comfort of the kindness of a motherly woman, though even to her there could be no confiding of the terrible secret that underlay all her thoughts.  Madame de Bellaise, however, said how glad she was to secure this companionship for her niece.  Noemi had been more attached than her family realised to Claude Merrycourt, a neighbour who had had the folly, contrary to her prudent father’s advice, to rush into Monmouth’s rebellion, and it had only been by the poor girl’s agony when he suffered under the summary barbarities of Kirke that her mother had known how much her heart was with him.  The depression of spirits and loss of health that ensued had been so alarming that when Madame de Bellaise, after some months, paid a long visit to her sister in England, Mrs. Darpent had consented to send the girl to make acquaintance with her French relations, and try the effect of change of scene.  She had gone, indifferent, passive, and broken-hearted, but her aunt had watched over her tenderly, and she had gradually revived, not indeed into a joyous girl, but into a calm and fairly cheerful woman.