With a strong effort she controlled herself, and with her hands locked tightly together, with a tension that surely meant pain.
"The day before yesterday," continued Miss Smith, "I was sitting in my little parlor, in the very house where you found me out, Cecile; I was sitting there and, strange to say, thinking of you, and of the purse of gold you intrusted to me, a perfect stranger, when there came a ring to my hall door. In a moment in came Molly and said that a man wanted to see me on very particular business. She said the man spoke English. That was the reason I consented to see him, my dear; for I must say that, present company excepted, I do hate foreigners. However, I said I would see the man, and Molly showed him in, a seedy-looking fellow he was, with a great cut over his eye. I knew at a glance he was not English-born and I wished I had refused to see him; he had, however, a plausible tongue, and was quite quiet and *well-behaved.
"How astonished I was when he asked for your purse of gold, Cecile, and showed me the little bit of paper, in my own writing, promising to resign the purse at any time to bearer.
"I was puzzled, I can tell you. I thoroughly distrusted the man, but I scarcely knew how to get out of my own promise. He had his tale, too, all ready enough. You had found the girl you were looking for: she was in great poverty, and very ill; you were also ill, and could not come to fetch the purse; you therefore had sent him, and he must go back to the south of France without delay to you. He said he had been kept on the road by an accident which had caused that cut over his eye.
"I don't know that I should have given him the purse,—I don't believe I should,—but, at any rate, before I had made up my mind to any line of action, again Molly put in an appearance, saying that a ragged boy seemed in great distress outside, and wanted to see me immediately; 'and he too can speak English,' she continued with a smile.
"I saw the man start and look uneasy when the ragged boy was mentioned, and I instantly resolved to see him, and in the man's presence.
"'Show him in,' I said to my little servant.
"The next instant in came your poor Joe, Cecile. Oh! how wild and pitiful he looked.
"'You have not given him the purse,' he said, flying to my side, 'you have not given up the purse? Oh! not yet, not yet! Anton,' he added, 'I have followed you all the way; I could not catch you up before. Anton, I have changed my mind, I want you to give me the bit of paper, and I will go back to my old life. My heart is broken. I have seen my mother, and I will give her up. Anton, I must have the bit of paper for Cecile. Cecile is dying for want of it. I will go back to my old master and the dreadful life. I am quite ready. I am quite ready at last.'"
"There was no doubt as to the truth of this boy's tale, no doubt as to the reality of his agitation. Even had I been inclined to doubt it, one look at the discomfited and savage face of the man would have convinced me.