When Marie, who was come in quest of her friend Cambray, rang the bell, the door was opened by the lad.
"Is there a strange gentleman here?" she asked.
"I don't know. He went to see Lisette, and I did not see him come away," was the reply.
"Then let me come in," said the young girl. "I want to speak to Lisette, too."
"She will beat me if I let you come in," returned the boy, opening the door after a moment's hesitation.
The fumes of camphor were perceptible even in the vestibule; and when Marie's little conductor knocked at the door of the kitchen, a heaping shovelful of hot and smoking coals was thrust toward him, and a scolding voice demanded irritably:
"What do you want again? Why do you keep annoying me, you little torment!"
"Excuse me, Lisette," humbly apologized the lad, "but our young mistress from the manor is here."
At this announcement Lisette hastily shut the door again, and opened a small loophole in an upper panel, through which she spoke in a sharp tone:
"Why do you come here? Has the Lord forsaken you over yonder, that you come back to this pest-house? Get out of it as quickly as you can. Go down and hide yourself in the Schmidt's cottage—perhaps they will not betray you. Anyway, you can't stop here with us."