“Heavens! where are you going? You alarm me!”
“I am going to your church. They must know you there—I will ask for your confessor—and we shall see!”
“I entreat you, my dear,” cried Frances, throwing herself in a fright before Dagobert, who was hastening towards the door; “only think, to what you will expose yourself! Heavens! insult a priest? Why, it is one of the reserved cases!”
These last words, which appeared most alarming to the simplicity of Dagobert’s wife, did not make any impression upon the soldier. He disengaged himself from her grasp, and was going to rush out bareheaded, so high was his exasperation, when the door opened, and the commissary of police entered, followed by Mother Bunch and a policeman, carrying the bundle which he had taken from the young girl.
“The commissary!” cried Dagobert, who recognized him by his official scarf. “Ah! so much the better—he could not have come at a fitter moment.”
CHAPTER LIII. THE EXAMINATION.
“Mistress Frances Baudoin?” asked the magistrate.
“Yes, sir—it is I,” said Frances. Then, perceiving the pale and trembling sewing-girl, who did not dare to come forward, she stretched out her arms to her. “Oh, my poor child!” she exclaimed, bursting into tears; “forgive—forgive us—since it is for our sake you have suffered this humiliation!”
When Dagobert’s wife had tenderly embraced the young sempstress, the latter, turning towards the commissary, said to him with an expression of sad and touching dignity: “You see, sir, that I am not a thief.”