"You will not betray me? You will not set them on my track, if I tell you?" said the peasant girl, apparently longing to confide in the beautiful maiden, but secretly questioning the wisdom of so doing.
"Surely not. Am I not flying from trouble also? Besides, I am going to another country," was the reassuring reply.
"I am Lisette Vermilet," the girl then said. "I am eighteen years old. I have worked from sunrise till sunset every day for seven long years, in the field, in the vineyard, or the dairy, ever since my poor, foolish mother married her tyrant husband. I do it no more. I take care of myself and be no man's slave, and I marry whom I will, when the right one and the right time come. But first," she continued, eagerly, her face lightning with intense longing, "I study; I learn about the world and other things, like some lovely French girls I saw at Mentone last year, who told me all about the flowers, the birds, the earth, and the sea. Oh! I weep when I think of how much there is to know, and I have lost it all—all!" and her voice grew tremulous with repressed feeling as she concluded.
"Poor child! you surely ought to have an education if you want it so much," said her sympathetic listener, in a kindly tone, while she regarded the girl's eager face almost affectionately. "But are you not afraid that your cruel step-father will go after you and bring you back?"
"Tasso Simone would beat me black and blue if he should catch me," she said, with a shiver, as if she recalled some experience of the kind. "Ah! if I had but a disguise he would not know me—I get away better."
A bright idea seemed suddenly to strike her companion, for her face lighted eagerly.
"Let us exchange clothing," she exclaimed, "then no one will recognize either of us."
"Ah! but the signorina has such beautiful clothes, while mine are so poor," sighed Lisette, in a deprecatory tone, but with a wistful glance over the daintily made traveling suit, at the tasteful hat, and expensive boots which her companion wore.
"Never mind; yours are neat and whole, and no one would ever think of looking for me in them, while you will be much more likely to succeed in eluding your cruel father in mine," the young stranger persisted.
"The signorina is very kind," Lisette said, gratefully, as, with an impulsive movement, she bent forward and kissed the fair white hand that lay within her reach, while it seemed to her simple heart that she should feel like a princess in that lovely dark-grey cloth dress, with its daintily stitched bands of blue silk.