"At the Foundling's Home."
"Well, dear, you will never go back there. You are my little girl now, and I will be your mother."
Elizabeth, or Bessy, as they afterwards named her, clung to her new friend, and a sad smile hovered on her wan little face. The child accepted her virgin mother.
Corinne was mistaken as regards Laviguerie. He was not astonished at any thing Germaine ever did. At first, he thought it a little unfortunate that her fancy had happened to fall on the child of a murderess! But the philosopher felt himself bound to rise above common prejudices, and soon became interested in the child himself.
"You expect to bring up the child?" he asked Germaine.
"You have no objection, dear father?"
"I? Not in the least. But suppose you wish to marry some of these days?"
"Dear father, you know that I shall never marry."
Laviguerie shrugged his shoulders thinking that Odette used to say the same, yet she was married. He went back to his library, saying to himself that philosophy is much easier to understand than the workings of any woman's heart, and that women, generally, were incomprehensible creatures.