"I was told that you both went out every morning before light, and did not return until late at night."
"Oh, dear!" cried Florence, with a merry laugh, "when I remember all these things now, how amusing they seem, but there wasn't much fun in them then, I assure you. I'll give you the order of exercises of one of the last days of my purgatory, as I call it. You can form a pretty correct idea of the others from that. I got up at three o'clock in the morning, and devoted an hour either to copying music or colouring some large lithograph. You ought not to be very much surprised at this last exhibition of talent on my part, for you know that, at the convent, colouring engravings of the saints and copying music were almost the only things I did at all creditably."
"Yes, and it was very clever in you to think of putting these accomplishments to some practical use."
"I think so myself, particularly as I often made, in that way, four or five francs a day, or rather a night, over and above my other earnings."
"Your other earnings, and what were they, pray?"
"Well, to resume the account of my day: At four o'clock, I started for the market."
"Great Heavens! for the market? You? And what took you there, pray?"
"I tended the stall of a dairywoman, who was too fine a lady to get up so early. Can you imagine anything more pastoral than a traffic in cream and butter and eggs? I received a small commission on my sales, in addition to my regular salary, so every year I derived an income of two hundred francs, more or less, from this source."
"You, Florence, the Marquise de Luceval, in such a rôle?"
"But how about Michel?"