But now there came towards and past the fountain, from a hidden meadow path, a second girl, who bore upon her head, gracefully poising it, a fragrant bundle of clover, young forest shoots and tufted grasses, under the shadow of which her face was blurred as soft and luminous as a face in tender crayons.
“It is a picture,” said Ned.
“It is half a saint,” said the girl.
Then she cried, in her flexible rich voice—
“Holà, Nicette! I shiver here in a colder shadow than thine.”
“Nicette!” muttered Ned, and he scrutinised the passing figure more closely.
“How, Théroigne?” answered back the other, without slackening her pace or turning her head.
“There runs a new spring in Méricourt!” cried the girl, with an impudent glance at the young man.
“But a new spring! and how dost thou know?”
“My little finger told me. It has veins of ice, Nicette. Thou needst not scruple to bathe in it, for all thy modesty.”