HE next morning was bright and breezy, and Jeanne was early at her post, feeling quite a different girl. The busy little market-place was full of colour and movement, and the gay patches of flowers and fruit, the of fluttering kerchiefs, and the piles of red and yellow , formed an setting to the quiet impressive scaffold which they framed. Jeanne was in short sleeves, according to the of her office, and her round arms showed snowily against her dark blue skirt and , tight-fitting bodice. Her assistant looked at her with .
“Hope you’re better, miss,” he said respectfully. “It was just as well you didn’t put yourself out to come yesterday; there was nothing particular to do. Only one fellow, and he said he didn’t care; anything to oblige a lady!”
“Well, I wish he’d hurry up now, to oblige a lady,” said Jeanne, swinging her carelessly to and fro: “ten minutes past the hour; I shall have to talk to the Mayor about this.”
“It’s a pity there ain’t a better show this morning,” pursued the assistant, as he leant over the rail of the scaffold and into the busy below. “They do say as how the young Seigneur arrived at the Château yesterday—him as has been finishing his education in Paris, you know. He’s as likely as not to be in the market-place to-day; and if he’s disappointed, he may go off to Paris again, which would be a pity, seeing the Château’s been empty so long. But he may go to Paris, or anywhere else he’s a mind to, he won’t see better workmanship than in this here little town!”
“Well, my good Raoul,” said Jeanne, colouring slightly at the obvious compliment, “quality, not quantity, is what we aim at here, you know. If a Paris education has been properly assimilated by the Seigneur, he will not fail to make all the necessary allowances. But see, the prison-doors are opening at last!”
They both looked across the little square to the prison, which fronted the scaffold; and sure enough, a small body of men, the Sheriff at their head, was issuing from the building, conveying, or endeavouring to convey, the prisoner to the scaffold. That gentleman, however, seemed to be in a different and less obliging frame of mind from that of the previous day; and at every pace one or other of the guards was shot violently into the middle of the square, propelled by a vigorous kick or blow from the struggling captive. The crowd, unaccustomed of late to such of feeling, and resenting the prisoner’s want of taste, loudly; but it was not until that ingenious mediæval arrangement known as la marche aux crapauds had been brought to bear on him that the reluctant convict could be prevailed upon to present himself before the young lady he had already so unwarrantably detained.
Jeanne’s profession had both accustomed her to surprises and taught her the of considering her clients as from any one particular class; yet she could hardly help feeling some on recognising her new acquaintance of the previous evening. That, with all his evident of character, he should come to this end, was not in itself a special subject for wonder; but that he should have been with her on the ramparts at the hour when—after excusing her attendance on the scaffold—he was cooling his heels in prison for another day, seemed hardly to be accounted for, at first sight. Jeanne, however, reflected that the reconciling of apparent contradictions was not included in her official duties.
The Sheriff, wiping his heated brow, now read the formal procès delivering over the prisoner to the executioner’s hands; “and a nice job we’ve had to get him here,” he added on his own account. And the young man, who had remained since his arrival, stepped forward and bowed politely.
“Now that we have been properly introduced,” said he courteously, “allow me to apologise for any inconvenience you have been put to by my delay. The fault was mine, and these gentlemen are in no way to blame. Had I known whom I was to have the pleasure of meeting, wings could not have conveyed me swiftly enough.”
“Do not mention, I pray, the word inconvenience,” replied Jeanne, with that timid grace which so well became her. “I only trust that any slight it may be my duty to cause you before we part will be as easily pardoned. And now—for the morning, ! advances—any little advice or assistance that I can offer is quite at your service; for the situation is possibly new, and you may have had but little experience.”
“Faith! none worth mentioning,” said the prisoner . “Treat me as a raw beginner. Though our acquaintance has been but brief, I have the utmost confidence in you.”
“Then, sir,” said Jeanne, blushing, “suppose I were to assist you in removing this gay doublet, so as to give both of us more freedom and less responsibility?”
“A of the office?” the prisoner with a smile, as he slipped one arm out of its sleeve.
A flush came over Jeanne’s fair brow. “That was ungenerous,” she said.
“Nay, pardon me, sweet one,” said he, laughing: “’twas but a poor jest of mine—in bad taste, I willingly admit.”
“I was sure you did not mean to hurt me,” she replied , while her fingers were busy in turning back the collar of his shirt. It was composed, she noticed, of 37the finest point lace; and she could not help a feeling of regret that some slight error—as must, from what she knew, exist somewhere—should compel her to take a course so at with her real feelings. Her only comfort was that the youth himself seemed entirely satisfied with his situation. He hummed the last air from Paris during her ministrations, and when she had quite finished, kissed the pretty fingers with a grace.
“And now, sir,” said Jeanne, “if you will kindly come this way: and please to mind the step—so. Now, if you will have the goodness to kneel here—nay, the sawdust is perfectly clean; you are my first client this morning. On the other side of the block you will find a nick, more or less adapted to the human chin, though a perfect fit cannot, of course, be 38guaranteed in every case. So! Are you pretty comfortable?”
“A bed of roses,” replied the prisoner. “And............