The girl was surprised, but she replied without comment: “Yes, madame; where do we go?”
There was a pause; then: “I do not know. I want to go where I shall get rested. A village in Italy or—” she paused.
“Or France, madame?” Justine was eager.
Mrs. Falchion made a gesture of helplessness. “Yes, France will do.... The way around the world is long, and I am tired.” Minutes passed, and then she slowly said: “Justine, we will go to-morrow night.”
“Yes, madame, to-morrow night—and not next Monday.”
There was a strange only half-veiled melancholy in Mrs. Falchion’s next words: “Do you think, Justine, that I could be happy anywhere?”
“I think anywhere but here, madame.”
Mrs. Falchion rose to a sitting posture, and looked at the girl fixedly, almost fiercely. A crisis was at hand. The pity, gentleness, and honest solicitude of Justine’s face conquered her, and her look changed to one of understanding and longing for companionship: sorrow swiftly welded their friendship.
Before Mrs. Falchion slept that night, she said again: “We will leave here to-morrow, Justine, for ever.”
And Justine replied: “Yes, madame, for ever.”