It was a golden childhood.  Even in after years, when, reading the history of these early days in a new light, she suffered a pang for almost every pleasure she had then enjoyed, even then Madelon maintained that her childhood had been one of unclouded happiness, such as few children know.  The sudden changes of fortune, from splendour to poverty of the shabbiest description, the reckless, dishonest expenditure, and the endless debts consequent on it; the means—­doubtful to say the least of them—­employed by M. Linders for procuring money; the sense of alienation from all that is best, and noblest, and truest in life;—­all these, which had gone far to make up the sum of her mother’s misery, affected our Madelon hardly at all.  Some of them she did not know of; the rest she took as a matter of course.  In truth, it mattered little to her whether they lived in a big hotel or a little one; whether the debts were paid or unpaid; whether money were forthcoming or not; she never felt the want of it, we may be sure.  If she did not have some promised fete or amusement on one day, it was certain to come on another; and even the one or two occasions on which M. Linders, absolutely unable to leave an hotel until he had paid part of what he owed there, had been obliged to confiscate everything, caused her no uneasiness.  The next week, very likely, she had other trinkets and knick-knacks, newer and prettier; and indeed, so long as she had her father, she cared for little else.  In any small childish misfortune or ailment she had but to run to him to find help, and sympathy, and caresses; and she had no grief or care in these first years for which these were not a sufficient remedy.

Amidst all the miserable failures, and more unworthy successes of a wasted life, M. Linders gained at least one legitimate triumph, when he won his child’s undying love and gratitude.  All her life long, one may fancy, would Madelon cherish the remembrance of his unceasing tenderness, of his unwearying love for his little girl, which showed itself in a thousand different ways, and which, with one warm, loving little heart, at any rate, would ever go far to cover a multitude of sins.  The only drawback to her perfect content in these early days was the presence of her uncle Charles, whom she could not bear, and who, for his part, looked upon her as a mere encumbrance, and her being with them at all as a piece of fatuity on the part of his brother-in-law.  There were constant skirmishes between them while they were together; but even these ceased after a time, for Moore, who, ever since his sister’s marriage, had clung fitfully to M. Linders, as a luckier and more prosperous man than himself, was accustomed to be absent on his own account for months together, and during one of these solitary journeys he died, about two years after Horace Graham had seen him at Chaudfontaine.  Henceforth Madelon and her father were alone.