"Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Hannaford, presently, "do tell Mr. Otway the
story of Thibaut."

"Yes, do!" urged Olga.

Piers raised his eyes to the last speaker, and moved them timidly
towards Irene. She smiled, meeting his look with a sort of merry
satisfaction.

"Mr. Otway is occupied with serious thoughts," was her good-humoured
remark.

"I should much like to hear the story of Thibaut," said Piers,
bending forward a little.

"Would you? You shall--Thibaut Rossignol; delightful name, isn't
it? And one of the most delightful of men, though only a servant,
and the son of a village shopkeeper. It begins fifteen years ago,
just after the Franco-Prussian War. My father was taking a holiday
in eastern France, and he came one day to a village where an
epidemic of typhoid was raging. _Tant mieux_! Something to do; some
help to be given. If you knew my father--but you will understand.
He offered his services to the overworked couple of doctors and was
welcomed. He fought the typhoid day and night--if you knew my
father! Well, there was a bad case in a family named Rossignol: a
boy of twelve. What made it worse was that two elder brothers had
been killed in the war, and the parents sat in despair by the
bedside of their only remaining child. The father was old and very
shaky; the mother much younger, but she had suffered dreadfully from