place.

"Diable! Girl, out of this!" he cried; "this is no place for thee. Go to
thine aunt."

"She did bid me come and serve the supper for the strangers," replied
Victorine. "She herself will not come down."

"Go to the devil! Thou shalt not, and it is I that say it," shouted
Victor; and Victorine, terrified, fled back to Jeanne, and reported her
grandfather's words.

Poor Jeanne was at her wit's end now. "Why said he that?" she asked.

"I know not," replied Victorine, demurely. "He was in one of his great
rages, and I do think that the pigeons are fast burning, by the smell."

"Bah!" cried Jeanne, in disgust. "Is this a house to live in, where one
cannot be let down from one's chamber except in sight of the highway?
Run, Victorine! Look over and see if the strangers be in sight. I must
go down to the kitchen. I would a witch were at hand with a broom or a
tail of a mare. I'd mount and down the chimney, I warrant me!"

Laughing heartily, Victorine ran to reconnoitre. "There is none in
sight," she cried. "Thou canst come down. A man is asleep under the
pear-tree, but I think not he is one of them."

Jeanne ran quickly down the stairs, followed by Victorine, who, as she
entered the kitchen again, took up her position in one corner, and stood
leaning against the wall, tapping her pretty little black slippers with