room. Little Fanchonette, with her hands
covering up her face, was running round the
gallery in a sort of distracted manner, calling
"au secours! au secours!" We were at
the room-door in an instant.

"O such a terrible thing!" said madame;
"don't go in—don't go in!"

I knew well what that terrible thing was,
having had a dreadful presentiment from the
very first minute. Upon his bed was lying
M. Lemoine, on his face, quite stiff and
cold; and, as they turned him over, two
discoloured marks upon his throat came into
view. He had been most foully done to
death—had poor M. Lemoine.

Suddenly some one whispered, Where was
the stranger: he who had arrived yesterday?
—and some one else walked away on tip-toe
towards his room. He had departed. It was
plain, too, that his bed had not been slept in.
It was easy, therefore, to know at whose door
to lay this foul deed.

By this time, madame, now quite motionless
and exhausted, had been got into the house,
as well as the yellow-haired young lady.
M. le conducteur said very quietly to me,
that it was an awful thing to happen, an
awful thing. He felt for madame's situation,
but he had his orders and must go forward
without delay. So he was at my service from
that moment.

As we came down the steps, we found that
the court had filled up with a strange rapidity;
many men in the blue garments having
gathered there, talking softly together and
surmising; the gens-d'armes would be there,
they said, in a few minutes. Le BÅ“uf and
others were already scouring the country.
So I ascended into the great diligence,
sorrowfully; thinking what blight and desolation
had of a sudden fallen upon the peaceful
house. The cocher was impatient; he had
had a hard time of it with his four struggling
animals. They had been making the
stones and gravel fly about furiously for the
last quarter of an hour. The door was slammed
to, the conductor had clambered up to his
nook, the musical jingling, the crunching, the
rumbling began again afresh, and the great
diligence moved onward. As we reached
the top of the hill, we met six tall men in
cocked hats and boots, and very white
shoulder-belts. These were the gens-d'armes
that had been sent for; now on their way to
the old Yellow Tiger Inn.

How many years was it before I came by
that road again, through the pleasant byeways
and paysages of France the Beautiful,
as her sons and daughters like to call her?
Close upon four, I think. This time I had
been wandering over the country in true
Zingaro humour; casting about for ancient
quiet little towns, removed from great highways
and tourist profanities, where abound,
choice street corners and maimed statues in
broken arches and a rare fountain or so,
with a certain primitiveness of dress and
manners among its men and women by way
of local colouring. I thought frequently of
the late Mr. Sterne and his tender soul, and
went round very much after the easy,
lounging manner of that famous
sentimentalist.

In an admirable specimen of this ancient
town architecture, bearing the name of
Montçeaux, I found myself one evening, after
some three or four days' soujourning, sitting
by an open lattice and looking out on their
chief street. This was in a furnished lodging
over a little wine-shop, which I had
secured at incredibly small charges. I knew
that over my head there was a wonderful
bit of gable with vast slopes of red tiling,
and, as of course, a little belfry and weathercock,
wherein the daws did most congregate.
I knew that, externally, great beams,
handsomely coloured, crossed diagonally just
below my little diamond-paned lattice, and
that underneath was a deep doorway with
well-wrought arch and pillars, which might
very well have been abstracted from the old
church hard by. I knew also that at the
angle of the house, just on line with my
lattice, was a niche, or resting-place, for a
certain holy woman, now in glory, who had
once been richly dight in gold and colouring,
but was now as dull and grey as her stone
canopy. To her, I noted that every man as
he passed uncovered reverently; which was
indeed only fitting, she being patroness and
special guardian of the town.

The day's work was done, and it was a
Saturday evening. Therefore were gathered
about the street corner, under the saint,
many of the Montçeaux wise men taking
their ease in the cool of the evening and
discussing the fair or festival nearest at hand.
Past them would flit by, occasionally, coming
from drawing water at the fountain, the
Maries and Victorines of the place, in petticoats
of bright colours and dainty caps, and
with little crosses on their necks. There came
by, too, a tall dark man, without a hat, holding
up his gown with one hand—monsieur le
curé, in a word—who stayed for a few
moments' talk with the wise men. His day's
work at the church, shrifts and all, was
now over, and he was speeding on to the
presbytère close by. Altogether, I said to
myself, as pretty a little cabinet bit as I have
seen for many a long day.

Down the little street facing us (the
patroness from her angle could command
undisturbed prospect of no less than three
streets) came tripping lightly a young girl in
black, with a littie black silk hood half drawn
over her head. I saw her coming a long way
off, even from the moment she had issued
from the old house that hung so over upon
the street. As she drew nearer, there came
upon me suddenly a reminiscence as of
Lancry and of a juicy brush and clear limpid
colouring. I thought I recollected something