Dangeau as an elected member of the Convention had his hands full enough, and there was a great deal of writing done in the little room under the roof. Sometimes, as he came and went, he passed his pale fellow-lodger, and noted half unconsciously that as the days went on she grew paler still. Her gaze, proud yet timid, as she stood aside on the little landing, or passed him on the narrow stair, appealed to a heart which was really tender.
"She is only a child, and she looks as if she had not enough to eat," he muttered to himself once or twice, and then found to his half-shamed annoyance that the child's face was between him and his work.
"You are a fool, my good friend," he remarked, and plunged again into his papers.
He burned a good deal of midnight oil in those days, and Rosalie Leboeuf, whose tough heart really kept a soft corner for him, upbraided him for it.
"Tiens!" she said one day, about the middle of October, "tiens! The Citizen is killing himself."
Dangeau, sitting on the counter, between two piles of apples, laughed and shook his head.
"But no, my good Rosalie—you will not be rid of me so easily, I can assure you."
"H'm—you are as white as a girl,—as white as your neighbour upstairs, and she looks more like snow than honest flesh and blood."
Dangeau, who had been wondering how he should introduce this very subject, swung his legs nonchalantly and whistled a stave before replying. The girl's change of dress had not escaped him, and he was conscious, and half ashamed of, his curiosity. Rosalie plainly knew all, and with a little encouragement would tell what she knew.
"Who is she, then, Citoyenne?" he asked lightly.