Old Jehan put his head out of his lattice: it was seven in the evening, and he was going to bed.
"What are you after, little one?" he asked: going to show the fine buckles at a students' ball? Nay, fie; that is not like you."
"I am going to—pray—dear Jehan," she answered, with a sob in her throat and the first falsehood she ever had told. "Do what I ask you—do for your dead daughter's sake—or the birds and the flowers will die of hunger and thirst. Take the key and promise me."
He took the key, and promised.
"Do not let them see those buckles shine; they will rob you," he added.
Bébée ran from him fast; every moment that was lost was so precious and so terrible. To pause a second for fear's sake never occurred to her. She went forth as fearlessly as a young swallow, born in northern April days, flies forth on instinct to new lands and over unknown seas when autumn falls.
Necessity and action breathed new life into her. The hardy and brave peasant ways of her were awoke once more. She had been strong to wait silently with the young life in her dying out drop by drop in the heart-sickness of long delay. She was strong now to throw herself into strange countries and dim perils and immeasurable miseries, on the sole chance that she might be of service to him.
A few human souls here and there can love like dogs. Bébée's was one.
CHAPTER XXVII.
It was dark. The May days are short in the north lands of the Scheldt.