or nay," replied Jeanne. "I know not wherever the child hath learnt such
ways with men; surely in the convent she saw none but priests."

"And are not priests men?" sneered Victor, with an evil laugh. "Faith,
and I think there is nought which other men teach which they do not
teach better!"

"Fie, father! thou shouldst not speak ill of the clergy; it is bad
luck," said Jeanne. Jeanne was far honester of nature than either her
father or her child; she was not entirely without reverence, and as far
as she could, without too much inconvenience, kept good faith with her
religion.

When Victorine heard that Willan Blaycke had been at the inn in their
absence, she shrugged her pretty shoulders, and said, laughingly, "Eh,
but that is good!"

"Why sayest thou so?" replied Jeanne. "I say it is ill."

"And I say it is good," retorted Victorine; and not another word could
Jeanne get out of her on the matter.

Victorine was right. As Willan Blaycke rode away from the Golden Pear,
he was so vexed with the unexpected disappointment that he was in a mood
fit to do some desperate thing. He had tried with all his might to put
Victorine's face and voice and sweet little form out of his thoughts,
but it was beyond his power. She haunted him by day and by night,--worse
by night than by day,--for he dreamed continually of standing just the
other side of a window-sill across which Victorine reached snowy little
hands and laid them in his, and just as he was about to grasp them the