but why, he did not know.

Way back in the uttermost recesses of his little, childish head, he seemed
to remember a time when his life and surroundings had been very different;
when, instead of this old woman, there had been many people around him, and
a sweet faced woman had held him in her arms and kissed him, before he was
taken off to bed at night; but he could not be sure, maybe it was only a
dream he remembered, for he dreamed many strange and wonderful dreams.

When the little boy was about six years of age, a strange man came to their
attic home to visit the little old woman. It was in the dusk of the
evening but the old woman did not light the cresset, and further, she
whispered to the little boy to remain in the shadows of a far corner of the
bare chamber.

The stranger was old and bent and had a great beard which hid almost his
entire face except for two piercing eyes, a great nose and a bit of
wrinkled forehead. When he spoke, he accompanied his words with many
shrugs of his narrow shoulders and with waving of his arms and other
strange and amusing gesticulations. The child was fascinated. Here was
the first amusement of his little starved life. He listened intently to
the conversation, which was in French.

"I have just the thing for madame," the stranger was saying. "It be a
noble and stately hall far from the beaten way. It was built in the old
days by Harold the Saxon, but in later times, death and poverty and the
disfavor of the King have wrested it from his descendants. A few years
since, Henry granted it to that spend-thrift favorite of his, Henri de
Macy, who pledged it to me for a sum he hath been unable to repay. Today
it be my property, and as it be far from Paris, you may have it for the