“Monsieur is an Englishman?” he said, in a doubtful tone.

“From the Channel Islands,” I replied.

“Ah! you belong to us,” he said, “but you are hybrid, half English, half French; a fine race.  I also have English blood in my veins.”

I paid monsieur a compliment upon the result of the admixture of blood in his own instance, and then proceeded to unfold my object in visiting him.

“Ah!” he said, “yes, yes, yes; Perrier was an impostor.  These houses are mine, monsieur.  I live in the front, yonder; my daughter and son-in-law occupy the other.  We had the photographs taken for our own pleasure, but Perrier must have bought them from the artist, no doubt.  I have a small cottage at the back of my house; voila, monsieur! there it is.  Perrier rented it from me for two hundred francs a year.  I permitted him to pass along this walk, and through our coach-house into a passage which leads to the street where madame had her school.  Permit me, and I will show it to you.”

He led me through a shed, and along a dirty, vaulted passage, into a mean street at the back.  A small, miserable-looking house stood in it, shut up, with broken persiennes covering the windows.  My heart sank at the idea of Olivia living here, in such discomfort, and neglect, and sordid poverty.

“Did you ever see a young English lady here, monsieur?” I asked; “she arrived about the beginning of last November.”

“But yes, certainly, monsieur,” he replied, “a charming English demoiselle!  One must have been blind not to observe her.  A face sweet and gracieuse; with hair of gold, but a little more sombre.  Yes, yes!  The ladies might not admire her, but we others—­”

He laughed, and shrugged his shoulders in a detestable manner.

“What height was she, monsieur?” I inquired.

“A just height,” he answered, “not tall like a camel, nor too short like a monkey.  She would stand an inch or two above your shoulder, monsieur.”

It could be no other than my Olivia!  She had been living here, then, in this miserable place, only a month ago; but where could she be now?  How was I to find any trace of her?

“I will make some inquiries from my daughter,” said the Frenchman; “when the establishment was broken up I was ill with the fever, monsieur.  We have fever often here.  But she will know—­I will ask her.”

He returned to me after some time, with the information that the English demoiselle had been seen in the house of a woman who sold milk, Mademoiselle Rosalie by name; and he volunteered to accompany me to her dwelling.

It was a poor-looking house, of one room only, in the same street as the school; but we found no one there except an old woman, exceedingly deaf, who told us, after much difficulty in making her understand our object, that Mademoiselle Rosalie was gone somewhere to nurse a relative, who was dangerously ill.  She had not had any cows of her own, and she had easily disposed of her small business to this old woman and her daughter.  Did the messieurs want any milk for their families?  No.  Well, then, she could not tell us any thing more about Mam’zelle Rosalie; and she knew nothing of an Englishwoman and a little girl.