"I don't know that, but they protected me from the bad ones. And they wouldn't let the dragon devour me, but nursed and cured me, and taught me to pray to the Sainte Vierge."
Here her ologies were becoming somewhat mixed, for she had evidently not attempted to settle in her mind what of gratitude to give unto Theos and what unto Mythos.
"It was one of the good ones, I suppose, that taught you to read and write?"
"Yes, that was Sister Louise whom you saw just now; she's as good a fairy as ever was. Ah, monsieur, you can't understand it, you can't realise what a wonderful thing it is to be able to read and write. You learnt it when you were a child and couldn't know; but I was quite a big girl and had made my first communion when I began to learn those wonderful signs that you can say everything with—everything you can possibly think of—and that make it possible to read anything anybody in the whole world ever thought of."
"Well, I am quite glad you told me. Now I can report to Monsieur Dupont that you are both well and happy."
"That you can; and tell Monsieur Claude that I am grateful to him for bringing me those three fairies. It was that morning, the second time he came—— But I am talking too much," she said, interrupting herself suddenly, "and that is rude. I hope you will excuse, monsieur."
"Excuse! Why, my dear child, I love to hear you talk about all that—I am devoted to Fairyland myself; it is quite the artist's home, you know, and I must tell you my experience of it presently; but first I am curious to know how he came to bring those good fairies to you. And three too; just like in the tales; everything always goes by threes."
"I never thought of that," she said reflectively, and then continued, once for all giving up the idea that talking much was rude. "I've got them pressed between the leaves of my prayer-book. They were three beautiful red roses when he brought them; I never saw such three roses before. I turned them to the light and tried to make them happy whilst they were with me, but to be sure I knew I could not keep them alive long, so when they seemed ready to die, I put them in the book. They were under my pillow when I was very, very ill. I must have been bad, for one night the doctors thought I was going to die, and S[oe]ur Louise wouldn't let S[oe]ur Amélie take her turn to sit by me. But I knew I was not going to die; I even knew I was going to get quite well, because the three good roses told me so—I hope you won't laugh at me, monsieur, for calling a rose a fairy, but I——"
"Now really, mademoiselle, you couldn't for a moment imagine that I should be so matter-of-fact and heartless as to laugh."
"Well, what do you think of her, monsieur?" broke in Monsieur Tamiasse. "What does she look like now? There's her record in that third Division, Casier G, No. 721. There we have her from the first day when she was brought to us, to the day when we thought she was going to be carried away from us, and so on up to date. She is not a bad specimen of the sort we turn out at the Lyons City Hospital, is she? Not that we always succeed. We are beaten more than once by the grim old gentleman with the scythe. But we are always ready to fight him, and we manage sometimes to get hold of his hour-glass and turn it upside down. Well, to-morrow we hand this young lady over to my friend Mademoiselle Chevillard. She will be here at twelve o'clock. Will you come and give your sanction to the transfer?"