But the child was in one of her paroxysms of extravagant delight; she only jumped about the more, repeating:  “A soldier! a soldier!” without deigning to give any further explanation.  She had left the door wide open behind her, and so, as Helene rose, she was astonished to see a soldier—­a very little soldier too—­in the ante-room.  Rosalie had gone out, and Jeanne must have been playing on the landing, though strictly forbidden to do so by her mother.

“What do you want, my lad?” asked Helene.

The little soldier was very much confused on seeing this lady, so lovely and fair, in her dressing-gown trimmed with lace; he shuffled one foot to and fro over the floor, bowed, and at last precipitately stammered:  “I beg pardon—­excuse—­”

But he could get no further, and retreated to the wall, still shuffling his feet.  His retreat was thus cut off, and seeing the lady awaited his reply with an involuntary smile, he dived into his right-hand pocket, from which he dragged a blue handkerchief, a knife, and a hunk of bread.  He gazed on each in turn, and thrust them all back again.  Then he turned his attention to the left-hand pocket, from which were produced a twist of cord, two rusty nails, and some pictures wrapped in part of a newspaper.  All these he pushed back to their resting-place, and began tapping his thighs with an anxious air.  And again he stammered in bewilderment: 

“I beg pardon—­excuse—­”

But all at once he raised his finger to his nose, and exclaimed with a loud laugh:  “What a fool I am!  I remember now!”

He then undid two buttons of his greatcoat, and rummaged in his breast, into which he plunged his arm up to the elbow.  After a time he drew forth a letter, which he rustled violently before handing to Helene, as though to shake some dust from it.

“A letter for me!  Are you sure?” said she.

On the envelope were certainly inscribed her name and address in a heavy rustic scrawl, with pothooks and hangers tumbling over one another.  When at last she made it all out, after being repeatedly baffled by the extraordinary style and spelling, she could not but smile again.  It was a letter from Rosalie’s aunt, introducing Zephyrin Lacour, who had fallen a victim to the conscription, “in spite of two masses having been said by his reverence.”  However, as Zephyrin was Rosalie’s “intended” the aunt begged that madame would be so good as to allow the young folks to see each other on Sundays.  In the three pages which the letter comprised this question was continually cropping up in the same words, the confusion of the epistle increasing through the writer’s vain efforts to say something she had not said before.  Just above the signature, however, she seemed to have hit the nail on the head, for she had written:  “His reverence gives his permission”; and had then broken her pen in the paper, making a shower of blots.

Helene slowly folded the letter.  Two or three times, while deciphering its contents, she had raised her head to glance at the soldier.  He still remained close to the wall, and his lips stirred, as though to emphasize each sentence in the letter by a slight movement of the chin.  No doubt he knew its contents by heart.