Marie-Jeanne smiled with pleasure.
“I must hurry in now,” she said shyly. “Mother, when she wants this medicine and hasn’t got it, is nearly wild.”
“We will wait for you here, then,” said Billie.
Nothing could induce them to enter that awful lodging house again, and the two girls stood shivering in the wet mist while Marie-Jeanne hastened away on her errand. The streets were not empty now. Occasionally a workman passed with a tin pail on his arm; or a tired, battered old creature whom the girls guessed to be a charwoman. Nobody even glanced at them in their ragged dresses except a little boy with an old face, who called out:
“Beggars is out early this morning.”
In five minutes Marie-Jeanne returned with the two capes and the money.
“You got out just in time,” she said. “I met Miss Rivers in the hall as I came away. She was going upstairs as fast as she could carry her big body, no doubt to look into your room and see how you stood the loss of your belongings.”
“What would she have done to us if she had found us there?” asked Nancy.
“There is no telling. She might have turned you out of the house and denounced you, or she might have been very sweet and sympathizing. But she would have got out of it in some way.”
“Marie-Jeanne, I wish we could take you out of all this,” cried Billie impetuously. “Must you stay in this dreadful place?”