BY
M. Lefuse
Rosette was a girl of singular resolution. Through what perils she passed unscathed this story will tell.
A loud knocking sounded at the door.
"Jean Paulet," cried a voice, "how much longer am I to stand and knock? Unbar the door!"
"Why, it is Monsieur de Marigny!" exclaimed the farmer, and hurried to let his visitor in.
"Ah, Jean Paulet! You are no braver than when I saw you last!" laughed the tall man who entered, wrapped in a great cloak that fell in many folds. "I see you have not joined those who fight for freedom, but have kept peacefully to your farm. 'Tis a comfortable thing to play the coward in these days! And I would that you would give a little of the comfort to this small comrade of mine." From beneath the shelter of his cloak a childish face peered out at the farmer and his wife.
"Ah, Monsieur! that is certainly your little Rosette!" exclaimed Madame Paulet. "Yes, yes, I have heard of her—how you adopted the poor little one when her father was dead of a bullet and her mother of grief and exposure; and how, since, you have loved and cared for her and kept her ever at your side!"
"Well, that is finished. We are on the eve of a great battle—God grant us victory!" he said reverently—"and I have brought the little one to you to pray you guard and shelter her till I return again. What, Jean Paulet! You hesitate? Before this war I was a good landlord to you. Will you refuse this favour to me now?" asked de Marigny, looking sternly down on the farmer from his great height.
"I—I do not say that I refuse—but I am a poor defenceless man; 'tis a dangerous business to shelter rebels—ah, pardon! loyalists—in these times!" stammered Jean Paulet.