“What matter?” repeated Prudence, in a high key of indignant amazement. “It may make no matter to you, Madame Masque, but it makes a great deal to me; I can tell you; and into that infected house I'll not put one foot.”
“Just as you please, only in that case there is no need for further talk, so allow me to bid you good-night!”
“But, madame, what of Leoline? Do stop one moment and tell me of her.”
“What have I to tell? I have told you all I know. If you want to find her, you must search in the city or in the pest-house!”
Prudence shuddered, and covered her face with her hands.
“O, my poor darling! so good and so beautiful. Heaven might surely have spared her! Are you going to do nothing farther about it?”
“What can I do? I have searched for her and have not found her, and what else remains?”
“Madame, you know everything—surely, surely you know where my poor little nursling is, among the rest.”
Again La Masque laughed—another of her low, sweet, derisive laughs.
“No such thing, Prudence. If I did, I should have her here in a twinkling, depend upon—it. However, it all comes to the same thing in the end. She is probably dead by this time, and would have to be buried in the plague-pit, anyhow. If you have nothing further to say, Prudence, you had better bid me good-night, and let me go.”