The Chevalier and his son searched vigorously.  On the slightest suspicion, they came down to the farm, closed up the outlets, threatened the owners, turned out the house, and the very place they had last searched would become her quarters on the next night!  Messages always had warned her in time.  Intelligence was obtained by Martin, who contrived to remain a confidential agent, and warnings were dispatched to her by many a strange messenger—­by little children, by old women, or even by the village innocent.

The most alarming days were those when she was not the avowed object of the chase, but when the pursuit of game rendered the coverts in the woods and fields unsafe, and the hounds might lead to her discovery.  On one of these occasions Martin locked her up in the great hayloft of the convent, where she could actually hear the chants in the chapel, and distinguish the chatter of the lay-sisters in the yard.  Another time, in conjunction with the sacristan, he bestowed her in the great seigneurial tribune (or squire’s pew) in the village church, a tall carved box, where she was completely hidden; and the only time when she had failed to obtain warning beforehand, she stood kneading bread at a tub in Martin’s cottage, while the hunt passed by, and a man-at-arms looked in and questioned the master on the last traces of the runaway.

It was seldom possible to see Mere Perrine, who was carefully watched, under the conviction that she must know where her nursling was; but one evening Veronique ventured up to Martin’s farm, trusting to tidings that the gentlemen had been Eustacie’s only secure harbour; and when, in a bright evening gleam of the setting sun from beneath the clouds, Veronique came in sight of her Lady, the Queen’s favourite, it was to see her leading by a string a little shaggy cow, with a bell round its neck, her gray cloak huddled round her, though dank with wet, a long lock of black hair streaming over her brow, her garments clinging with damp, her bare ankles scratched with thorns, her heavy SABOTS covered with mire, her cheeks pale with cold and wet.

The contrast overwhelmed poor Veronique.  She dropped on her knees, sobbing as if her heart would break, and declaring that this was what the Abbess had feared; her Lady was fast killing herself.

‘Hush!  Veronique,’ said Eustacie; ’that is all folly.  I am wet and weary now, but oh! if you knew how much sweeter to me life is now than it was, shut up down there, with my fears.  See,’ and she held up a bunch of purple pasque-flowers and wood-sorrel, ’this is what I found in the wood, growing out of a rugged old dead root; and just by, sheltered by the threefold leaves of the alleluia-flower, was a bird’s nest, the mother-bird on her eggs, watching me with the wise black eye that saw I would not hurt her.  And it brought back the words I had heard long ago, of the good God caring for the sparrows; and I knew He would care the more for me and mine, because I have not where to lay my head.’