As we clattered along the dogs barked, and the cottage-doors flew open.  Children toddled to the thresholds, and called after us, in shrill notes, “Good-evening, and a good-night, Monsieur le Cure!” Men’s voices, deeper and slower, echoed the salutation.  The cure was busy greeting each one in return:  “Good-night, my little rogue,” “Good-night, my lamb.”  “Good-night to all of you, my friends;” his cordial voice making each word sound as if it came from his very heart.  I felt that we were perfectly secure in his keeping.

Never, as long as I live, shall I smell the pungent, pleasant scent of wood burning without recalling to my memory that darksome entrance into Ville-en-bois.

“We drove at last into a square courtyard, paved with pebbles.  Almost before the horse could stop I saw a stream of light shining from an open door across a causeway, and the voice of a woman, whom I could not see, spoke eagerly as soon as the horse’s hoofs had ceased to scrape upon the pebbles.

“Hast thou brought a doctor with thee, my brother?” she asked.

“I have brought no doctor except thy brother, my sister,” answered Monsieur Laurentie, “also a treasure which I found at the foot of the Calvary down yonder.”

He had alighted while saying this, and the rest of the conversation was carried on in whispers.  There was some one ill in the house, and our arrival was ill-timed, that was quite clear.  Whoever the woman was that had come to the door, she did not advance to speak to me, but retreated as soon as the conversation was over; while the cure returned to the side of the char a bancs, and asked me to remain where I was, with Minima, for a few minutes.

The horse was taken out by Jean, and led away to the stable, the shafts of the char a bancs being supported by two props put under them.  Then the place grew profoundly quiet.  I leaned forward to look at the presbytery, which I supposed this house to be.  It was a low, large building of two stories, with eaves projecting two or three feet over the upper one.  At the end of it rose the belfry of the church—­an open belfry, with one bell hanging underneath a little square roof of tiles.  The church itself was quite hidden by the surrounding walls and roofs.  All was dark, except a feeble glimmering in four upper casements, which seemed to belong to one large room.  The church-clock chimed a quarter, then half-past, and must have been near upon the three-quarters; but yet there was no sign that we were remembered.  Minima was still asleep.  I was growing cold, depressed, and anxious, when the house-door opened once more, and the cure appeared carrying a lamp, which he placed on the low stone wall surrounding the court.

“Pardon, madame,” he said, approaching us, “but my sister is too much occupied with a sick person to do herself the honor of attending upon you.  Permit me to fill her place, and excuse her, I pray you.  Give me the poor mignonne; I will lift her down first, and then assist you to descend.”