one beautiful memory of a home. It was all he had, and the few words
that Joyce's singing had startled from him were all that he remembered
of his mother's speech.

If Joyce had happened upon him in any other way, it is doubtful if their
acquaintance would have grown very rapidly. He was afraid of strangers;
but coming as she did with the familiar song that was like an old
friend, he felt that he must have known her sometime,--that other time
when there was always a sweet voice calling, and fireflies twinkled
across a dusky lawn.

Joyce was not in a hurry for Marie to come now. She had a hundred
questions to ask, and made the most of her time by talking very fast.
"Marie will be frightened," she told Jules, "if she does not find me at
the gate, and will think that the gypsies have stolen me. Then she will
begin to hunt up and down the road, and I don't know what she would say
if she came and found me talking to a strange child out in the fields,
so I must hurry back. I am glad that I found you. I have been wishing so
long for somebody to play with, and you seem like an old friend because
you were born in America. I'm going to ask madame to ask Brossard to let
you come over sometime."

Jules watched her as she hurried away, running lightly down the road,
her fair hair flying over her shoulders and her short blue skirt
fluttering. Once she looked back to wave her hand. Long after she was
out of sight he still stood looking after her, as one might gaze
longingly after some visitant from another world. Nothing like her had
ever dropped into his life before, and he wondered if he should ever see
her again.