“It is a leetle cabinet of work of my husband,” said Madame Perrier; “our chamber is above, and the chamber for you and leetle mees is there also.  But the school is not there.  Will you go to bed?  Will you sleep?  Come on, mees.”

“But we are very hungry,” I remonstrated; “we have had nothing to eat since noon.  We could not sleep without food.”

“Bah! that is true,” she said.  “Well, come on.  The food is at the school.  Come on.”

That must be the house at the back.  We went down the broad gravel walk, with the pretty garden at the side of us, where a fountain was tinkling and splashing busily in the quiet night.  But we passed the front of the house behind it without stopping, at the door.  Madame led us through a cart-shed into a low, long, vaulted passage, with doors opening on each side; a black, villanous-looking place, with the feeble, flickering light of the candle throwing on to the damp walls a sinister gleam.  Minima pressed very close to me, and I felt a strange quiver of apprehension:  but the thought that there was no escape from it, and no help at hand, nerved me to follow quietly to the end.

CHAPTER THE EIGHTH.

AT SCHOOL IN FRANCE.

The end brought us out into a mean, poor street, narrow even where the best streets were narrow.  A small house, the exterior of which I discovered afterward to be neglected and almost dilapidated, stood before us; and madame unlocked the door with a key from her pocket.  We were conducted into a small kitchen, where a fire had been burning lately, though it was now out, and only a little warmth lingered about the stove.  Minima was set upon a chair opposite to it, with her feet in the oven, and I was invited to do the same.  I assented mechanically, and looked furtively about me, while madame was busy in cutting a huge hunch or two of black bread, and spreading upon them a thin scraping of rancid butter.

There was an oil-lamp here, burning with a clear, bright blaze.  Madame’s face was illuminated by it.  It was a coarse, sullen face, with an expression of low cunning about it.  There was not a trace of refinement or culture about her, not even the proverbial taste of a Frenchwoman in dress.  The kitchen was a picture of squalid dirt and neglect; the walls and ceiling black with smoke, and the floor so crusted over with unswept refuse and litter that I thought it was not quarried.  The few cooking-utensils were scattered about in disorder.  The stove before which we sat was rusty.  Could I be dreaming of this filthy dwelling and this slovenly woman?  No; it was all too real for me to doubt their existence for an instant.

She was pouring out some cold tea into two little cups, when Monsieur Perrier made his appearance, his face begrimed and his shaggy hair uncombed.  I had been used to the sight of rough men in Adelaide, on our sheep-farm, but I had never seen one more boorish.  He stood in the doorway, rubbing his hands, and gazing at us unflinchingly with the hard stare of a Norman peasant, while he spoke in rapid, uncouth tones to his wife.  I turned away my head, and shut my eyes to this unwelcome sight.