Presently, from a remote couch spoke her one companion, “I am sitting up on end.  What are you doing?”

“Nothing.  Lying down and staring at the moon,” replied Bessie, and turned her eyes in the direction of the voice.

The figure sitting up on end was distinctly visible.  It was clasping its knees, its long hair flowed down its back, and its face was steadily addressed to the window at the foot of its bed.  “Do you care to talk?” asked the queer apparition.

“I shall not fall asleep for hours yet,” said Bessie.

“Then let us have a good talk.”  The unconscious quoter of Dr. Johnson contributed her full share to the colloquy.  She told her story, and why she was at Madame Fournier’s:  “Father’s ship comes from Yarmouth in Norfolk.  It is there we are at home, but he is nearly always at sea—­to and fro to Havre and Caen, to Dunkirk and Bordeaux.  It is a fine sailing ship, the Petrel.  When the wind blows I think of father, though he has weathered many storms.  To-night it will be beautiful on the water.  I have often sailed with father.”  A prodigious sigh closed the paragraph, and drew from Bessie a query that perhaps she wished she was sailing with him now?  She did, indeed!  “He left me here because I was not well—­it is three weeks since; it was the day of the emperor’s fete—­but I am no stronger yet.  I have been left here before—­once for a whole half-year.  I hope it won’t be so long this time; I do so miss father!  My mother is dead, and he has married another wife.  I believe she wishes I were dead too.”

“Oh no,” cried Bessie, much amazed.  “I have a mother who is not really my mother, but she is as good as if she were.”

“Then she is not like mine.  Are women all alike?  Hush! there is Miss Foster at the door—­listening....  She is gone now; she didn’t peep in....  Tell me, do you hear anything vulgar in my speech?”

“No—­it is plain enough.”  It was a question odd and unexpected, and Bessie had to think before she answered it.

Her questioner mistook her reflection for hesitation, and seemed disappointed.  “Ah, but you do,” said she, “though you don’t like to tell me so.  It is provincial, very provincial, Miss Foster admits....  Next week, when the young ladies come back, I shall wish myself more than ever with father.”

“What for? don’t you like school?” Bessie was growing deeply interested in these random revelations.

“No.  How should I?  I don’t belong to them.  Everybody slights me but madame.  Miss Hiloe has set me down as quite common.  It is so dreadful!”

Bessie’s heart had begun to beat very hard.  “Is it?” said she in a tone of apprehension.  “Do they profess to despise you?”

“More than that—­they do despise me; they don’t know how to scorn me enough.  But you are not common, so why should you be afraid?  My father is a master-mariner—­John Fricker of Great Yarmouth.  What is yours?”