I drew her closer to me and gathered both her hands into my own.
“Perhaps it will not be always so,” I said gently. “Perhaps some day there will be people who will love you and who will try to make you happy.”
She was sobbing against my shoulder, her hands clutching at me nervously.
“You would go with me, Ninon, would you not,” I asked, “if I escaped from here?”
“Oh, yes, M. Pierre,” she sobbed. “I would go with you anywhere.”
“That is right,” I said, and I bent and kissed her forehead. “But first, I must escape, and in order to escape, I must be rid of this chain. Do you think you could find me a file, Ninon?”
“A file? I do not know, Monsieur. I will try. But I must go. She will soon be returning,” and she drew herself away. “If I can find a file, I will bring it to you, M. Pierre,” and a moment later, I heard the door close behind her.
CHAPTER XIII
A NIGHT OF AGONY
I sat for a long time pondering over the unhappy fate of this child. What her story had been I could only guess. Stolen, doubtless, by this devil in whose care she was—brought up, certainly, in the midst of filth and shame; stunted, tortured, misshapen—until she had become a mere fungus of humanity, growing only in the dark, without blood or healthy vigor—a hideous travesty upon girlhood and womanhood. The horror and sadness of the thing moved me strangely—yet had I not seen a thousand such during those hours I had spent in the slums?
But Ninon—would she bear transplanting into other soil? I doubted it, yet it seemed to me that death itself were preferable a thousand times to such a life as this. At least, God willing, I would make the trial.