Well, did
you make good harvest while it lasted? has Jeannot a fat bridal portion
promised?"
And old Jehan, who was the tenderest soul of them all in the lane by the
swans' water, would come and look at her wistfully as she worked among
the flowers, and would say to her,--
"Dear little one, there is some trouble: does it come of that painted
picture? You never laugh now, Bebee, and that is bad. A girl's laugh is
pretty to hear; my girl laughed like little bells ringing--and then it
stopped, all at once; they said she was dead. But you are not dead,
Bebee. And yet you are so silent; one would say you were."
But to the mocking of the fruit girl, as to the tenderness of old Jehan,
Bebee answered nothing; the lines of her pretty curled mouth grew grave
and sad, and in her eyes there was a wistful, bewildered, pathetic appeal
like the look in the eyes of a beaten dog, which, while it aches with
pain, does not cease to love its master.
One resolve upheld and made her feet firm on the stones of the streets
and her lips mute under all they said to her. She would learn all she
could, and be good, and patient, and wise, if trying could make her wise,
and so do his will in all things--until he should come back.
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