Mlle. Fouchette Part 13

The inspector was a nice gentleman. And the agents,--it was all a lie about the agents de police. They were all nice men. She had hated and dreaded them; and had they not been good to her? Had they not taken her from the river and fed her and clothed her and visited with swift punishment those who had cruelly abused her?

Fouchette was learning rapidly. The change was so confusing, and events had chased one another so unceremoniously, that she must be pardoned if she grasped new ideas with more tenacity than accuracy. It is what all of us are doing day by day.

It was a long distance by rail.

Fouchette had never dreamed that a railroad could be so long and that the woods and fields with which her mind had been recently filled could become so monotonous and tedious. Even the towns and villages,--of which she had never heard,--that were interesting at first, soon became stupid and tiresome. She had long ceased to notice them particularly, her mind being naturally filled with thoughts of the place to which she was going, and where her whole future seemed to lay yet undeveloped. She finally fell into a sound sleep.

The next thing she knew was that she was roughly shaken by the shoulder, and a voice cried, somewhat impatiently,--

"Come, come! What a little sleepyhead!"

It was that of a "religieuse," or member of a religious order, and its possessor was a stout, ruddy-faced woman of middle life, garbed in solemn black, against which sombre background the white wings of her homely headpiece and the white ap.r.o.n, over which dangled a cross, looked still more white and glaring than they were.

Another woman in the same glaring uniform, though less robust and quite colorless as to face, stood near by on the station platform.

"Bring her things, sister,--if she has anything."

Following these instructions, the red-faced woman rummaged in the netting overhead with one hand while she pulled Fouchette from her corner with the other.

"Come, pet.i.te! Is this all you've got, child?"

"Yes, madame," replied the child, respectfully, but with a sinking heart.

"So this is Fouchette, eh?" said the white-faced woman, as her companion joined her with the child and her little bundle.

"Yes, madame," faltered Fouchette.

But for the eyes, which were large and dark and luminous, and which seemed to grasp the object upon which they rested and to hold it in physical embrace, the face might have been that of the dead, so ghastly and rigid and unnatural it was.

"She's not much, very sure," observed the other, turning Fouchette around by the slender shoulder.

"She'll never earn her salt," said the pale-faced sister.

Fouchette noticed that her lips were apparently bloodless and that she scarcely moved them as she spoke.

"Not for long, anyhow," responded the other, with a significance Fouchette did not then understand.

Without other preliminary they led Fouchette down the platform.

"Where's your ticket?" asked the white-faced woman, coldly.

Fouchette nervously searched the bosom of her dress. In France the railway ticket is surrendered at the point where the journey ceases, as the traveller leaves the station platform.

"Sainte Marie!" exclaimed the ruddy-faced sister,--"lost it, I'll wager!"

"Where on earth did you put it, child?"

"Here, madame," said the latter, still fumbling and not a little frightened at the possible consequences of losing the bit of cardboard. "Ah! here--no, it isn't. Mon Dieu!"

"Fouchette!"

The voice of the pale religieuse was stern, though her face rested perfectly immobile, no matter what she said.

"Let me see----"

"Search, Sister Agnes."

The ruddy-faced woman obeyed by plunging her fat hand down the front of the child's dress, where she fished around vigorously but unsuccessfully.

"Nothing but bones!" she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

Meanwhile, everybody else had left the platform, and the gatekeeper was growing impatient.

Sister Agnes was a practical woman. She wound up her fruitless search by shaking the child, as if the latter were a plum-tree and might yield over-ripe railway tickets from its branches.

It did. The ticket dropped to the platform from beneath the loose-fitting dress.

"There it is!" cried the gatekeeper.

"Stupid little beast!"

And Sister Agnes shook her again, although, as there were no more tickets, the act seemed quite superfluous.

Outside the station waited a sort of carryall, or van, drawn by a single horse, which turned his aged head to view the new-comer, as did also the driver.

"Oh! so you're coming, eh?" said the latter.

"Yes,--long enough!" grumbled Sister Agnes.

They had driven some distance through the streets of a big town without a word, when the last speaker addressed her companion in a low voice.

"You noted the ticket?"

"Yes."

Another silence.

"I don't see what they sent her to us for, do you?"

"That is for the Superieure."

A still longer silence.

"It's a pity," continued Sister Agnes.

"Yes, they ought to go to the House of Correction."