At this word the youth's cheek colored up, though usually pale, and he quivered.
"I am no man's servant, sir," he retorted. "I am son of one who was a farmer for the baron, and my mother nursed Mademoiselle Andrea."
"I understand; you belong to the household as foster-brother of the young lady—I suppose she is young?"
"She is sixteen."
He had answered only one of the two questions, and not the one personal to him.
"How did you chance to be on the road in such weather?" inquired the other, making the same reflection as our own.
"I was not on the road, but in the cave, reading a book called 'The Social Contract,' by one Rousseau."
"Oh, found the book in the lord's library?" asked the
gentleman with some astonishment.
"No, I bought it of a peddler who, like others of his trade, has been hawking good books hereabouts."