Louisa wished, notwithstanding the fear which she had not yet entirely overcome, to hasten the steps of Madame Croque-Mitaine, in order to escape from the looks of the curious.
"Stop! stop!" said the old woman, "do not pull me so much, I have my sack to carry, and I cannot go so fast."
At last they arrived in front of a dirty little house, into which they entered, through a door half-mouldered away. Madame Croque-Mitaine opened it, and made the children go in before her. She followed them, put down her sack, and called her daughter, saying, "Charlotte, bring some water and a cloth here, to wash these poor little creatures." Charlotte came out of a corner where she was spinning some coarse hemp; her clothes were as ragged as those of her mother, and she was only two or three years older than Louisa; but when the latter saw her, she felt a little more confidence. Charlotte washed Louisa, while the old woman did the same service for little Paul. The cloth was very coarse, and the maids not very careful. Paul cried, and said they rubbed him too hard, but Louisa was too much ashamed to venture any complaint.
When this operation was over, "Now," said the old woman, "you will tell me where you live, that I may take you home."
"In the Rue d'Anjou," said Louisa, immediately.
"Ha! ha! You can speak now without waiting to be pressed; come along, then; it is not very far from here," and she set off with the two children, who were now quite comforted.
As she had left her sack at home, they could walk faster. When once they had reached the Rue d'Anjou, Louisa went direct to her own door. They found, on entering, the whole house in commotion. They had been sought for ever since they had left. All the servants had dispersed themselves in different directions in search of them; and their mother, in great anxiety, had also gone out to look for them. The moment the portress saw them, she uttered a cry of joy, and ascended with them to the apartments. "Here they are! here they are!" she cried out from a distance, to the nurse, who was quite in despair at not having watched them more carefully; and Louisa ran and threw herself into her arms, crying with shame, fear, and pleasure. At the same moment their mother returned, a prey to the deepest anguish. Transported with joy at finding them again, she never thought of scolding them as they deserved. "What has happened to you? What have you done?" she asked, taking them upon her knees, and covering them with tears and kisses.
"They lost their way, madame," said Madame Croque-Mitaine, for Louisa did not dare to reply. "I met them in a cul-de-sac, at some distance from here: the little girl told me that she was going to buy nosegays for herself and you, and a whip for her brother; but surely it must have been without your permission."
"Good heavens, yes!" replied the mother, still trembling, "and is it you, good woman, who have brought them back to me?"
"Yes, madame, but I first went and washed them at my house. No doubt they must have been splashed by a coach; if you had only seen the state they were in!" And Louisa, greatly ashamed, would have been glad to hide her dress, which was covered with mud; while Paul, on the contrary, showed his waistcoat to his mother, saying, "But, mamma, I shall want another waistcoat to go to Saint Cloud."