‘No, no, it was none of our people!’ repeated the little nun.  ’Not one of them, poor lost creatures as too many are, would have committed the act—­so sacrilegious, so ungrateful!  Ah! you must not believe them wicked.  It is misery that drove them to rise.  Hold!  I met a young man—­alas!  I knew him well when he was a child—­I said to him, ‘Ah! my son, you are on the bad train.’  ’Bread, mother—­it is bread we must have,’ he answered.  ’Why, would you speak to one who has not eaten for twenty-four hours?’ I told him he knew the way to our kitchen.  ‘No, mother,’ he said, ’I shall not eat; I shall get myself killed.’’

Many a lamentable detail of this description did she narrate, as she busied herself with the wound; and Louis listened, as he had listened to nothing else that day, and nearly emptied his travelling purse for the sufferers.  Isabel and Virginia waylaid her on the stairs to admire and ask questions, but she firmly, though politely, put them aside, unable to waste any time away from her children—­her poor wounded!

On Monday forenoon tranquillity was restored, the rabble had been crushed, and the organized force was triumphant.  Still the state of siege continued, and no one was allowed free egress or ingress, but the Captain pronounced this all nonsense, and resolutely set out for a walk, taking the passports with him, and promising Lady Conway to arrange for her departure.

By-and-by he came in, subdued and affected by the procession which he had encountered—­the dying Archbishop borne home to his palace on a litter, carried by workmen and soldiers, while the troops, who lined the streets, paid him their military salutes, and the people crowded to their doors and windows—­one voice of weeping and mourning running along Paris—­as the good prelate lay before their eyes, pale, suffering, peaceful, and ever and anon lifting his feeble hand for a last blessing to the flock for whom he had devoted himself.

The Captain was so much impressed that, as he said, he could not get over it, and stayed for some time talking over the scene with the young ladies, before starting up, as if wondering at his own emotion, he declared that he must go and see what they would do next.

Presently afterwards, Fitzjocelyn came down stairs.  His aunt was judiciously lying down in her own apartment to recruit her nerves after her agitation, and had called Virginia to read to her, and Isabel was writing her journal, alone, in the sitting-room.  Lady Conway would have been gratified at her eager reception of him, but, as he seemed very languid, and indisposed for conversation, she continued her occupation, while he rested in an arm-chair.

Presently he said, ’Is it possible that you could have left that bracelet at Miss Longman’s ?’

‘Pray do not think about it,’ exclaimed Isabel; ’I am ashamed of my ohildishness!  Perhaps, but for that delay, you would not have been hurt,’ and her eyes filled with tears, as her fingers encircled the place where the bracelet should have been.