“You need not worry at all, ProtÉ. No one will know. It will be quite easy. Gonfleur is waiting at the door. You have said yourself that Mademoiselle Marie Josephine should not miss the fun.”

A small figure in a white cloak was following the little maid up a stairway leading from a side garden door of the Saint FrÈre house as she spoke.

“Mademoiselle may not be asleep. She often lies awake these nights. It is indeed a shame that she should not have gone with the others. But you, Mademoiselle, will they miss you?”

They were outside the nursery door as Rosanne de SoignÉ answered. She looked up at ProtÉ and spoke indignantly.

“They think that I am asleep in bed with some silly bonbons under my pillow. It is the same with me as with Marie Josephine; they treat me as though I were a child. To-night I have an idea! You will hear me tell Mademoiselle!”

ProtÉ opened the door leading to a small room off the day nursery which was Marie Josephine’s own apartment. She was not asleep, and as they came into the room she sat up in bed and said:

“What is it, ProtÉ? What has happened?”

“Nothing has happened, Mademoiselle, except that your friend, Mademoiselle Rosanne de SoignÉ, has come to see you,” ProtÉ replied, lighting a candle as she spoke.

Rosanne came up to the bed and, before Marie Josephine, in her bewilderment, could speak, said eagerly:

“You are to come with me, Marie Josephine. ProtÉ is to dress you at once. You shall not be left out of the ball. Listen! I know a place where we can see it all, watch the dancing, and hear the music! Gonfleur is to bring us goÛter when the others are having theirs. It will be the greatest fun!”

Marie Josephine was so surprised for a moment that she could not speak.

“Hurry, for we must not miss any of it. ProtÉ has your stockings. Let her put them on,” urged Rosanne.

Marie Josephine stuck out her foot obediently, and ProtÉ, kneeling beside her, pulled on the stockings, muttering to herself distressfully:

“This is dreadful. What if Madame la Comtesse should know! May the good saints protect me if Madame should find us out!”

When ProtÉ said this, Marie Josephine seemed to wake up to the situation and, leaning over, patted the round knob at the back of the little maid’s head.

“You are a foolish girl, ProtÉ. Have you not raged to me and to Monsieur Lisle because I was not invited? You even spoke to Le Pont. I heard you say to her, 'They must have been selfish indeed to have so forgotten the Little Mademoiselle!’”

While Marie Josephine was speaking, ProtÉ was putting on her little silken undergarments, fastening the tapes which tied them with nervous fingers. Then she slipped a light silk frock over her head and put a blue cape about her shoulders.

“Come, Mesdemoiselles, I will escort you to Gonfleur. I shall be waiting for you at the garden door when the clock strikes ten, Little Mademoiselle. You must be in bed and asleep before Madame la Comtesse and the others return,” admonished ProtÉ.

They had come out to the upper landing and they stood for a moment looking down into the great hall below. A man servant in red and white livery was passing through the hall. He stooped and extinguished the candles, until at last only a tall one in a high, golden candlestick on a marble table near the door was left burning.

“We must go down the other way. It would not do for the servants to know. One cannot be too careful in these bad times,” whispered ProtÉ as they walked down a long hall, lit dimly by flaring candles in bronze sockets.

There was a light patter of steps behind them and turning they saw that Flambeau was following them. ProtÉ shook her stubby finger at him, whispering in a hissing sort of way that made her voice sound almost like a whistle in the gusty corridor.

“Ah, the bad dog! You are to go back at once to Mademoiselle’s room. You are not to follow!”

Marie Josephine and Rosanne giggled, and Flambeau came forward slowly, in spite of ProtÉ’s upraised hand and threatening looks.

“You know that he will come, as he goes everywhere with us. There is no use to urge him to go back.” Rosanne pulled impatiently at ProtÉ’s arm as she spoke. The little maid only raised her hands as though in despair, and the four of them started to descend the steep flight of stairs. The two girls were both laughing softly with excitement, holding each other’s hands and looking back at Flambeau.

Marie Josephine knew this staircase well, but she said nothing. No one must know that she had ever been down these stairs before, because they were a part of grandfather’s secret.

An old man was waiting for them at the door leading into the garden. It was Gonfleur, the servant who had come with Rosanne. He held a lighted lanthorn in one hand and when he saw ProtÉ and the children, he started to shuffle slowly along the path ahead of them, holding the lanthorn carefully so that they could see their way.

“We are both fools, you an old one and I a young one, Gonfleur. See that you return with Mademoiselle Marie Josephine at ten exactly, or it will be the worse for you!” ProtÉ called after him in her funny, hissing way.

Gonfleur made no reply and, holding open the heavy garden door, let his two charges through and then followed them. They found themselves on the walk outside, the sultry dampness of an August night all about them. The roar of the city could be heard in the distance and from the corner came the sound of rough laughter and harsh voices. They turned away in the opposite direction from the voices and, as it was only a very little way to the iron door leading to the back entrance to the De SoignÉ mansion, they found themselves shut away from the street soon again, almost before they knew it.

It had been exciting to them both, that little walk through the night. Neither of them had ever been out this way before. Marie Josephine had never seen the city after sundown but once, and that was when, because of some trouble with their horses, they had been delayed in coming back from Pigeon Valley, where they spent their summers, and their coach had not entered Paris until evening. That had been the summer before.

When once they were inside the little door leading to the vast back quarters of the great mansion, there was no longer any need of Gonfleur’s lanthorn to light them, for all the way up the winding stairs were flaring torches. At the foot of the stairs the old servant bowed and left them. Rosanne called after him.

“You are not to forget to come with the sweets, Gonfleur!”

“I will remember, of a surety, Mademoiselle.”

They were so far from the region of the bal masquÉ that only the faintest sound of music came to them. Rosanne took her friend’s hand and they climbed up the steep stairs side by side. Marie Josephine knew where they were going or at least she guessed. It was the place above all others where she liked best to play. It was a little square balcony in the wall at the very tiptop of the house and one could reach it by this back flight of stairs. The two children had discovered it some years ago and, on the rare occasions when they were left to themselves, they had climbed up to it and looked down into the vastness of the great hall below.

The music of a minuet was being played as the two settled themselves in a corner of the balcony and looked down. The minuet music was very pretty, and the sight upon which they gazed was pretty, too.

“It is like maman’s picture of which she is so fond—the picture where all the people are dancing. It is by Monsieur Watteau. Grandfather told me so,” whispered Marie Josephine.

“There is no need at all for whispering,” Rosanne answered in natural tones. “No one could hear us if we were to shout ever so loud!”

They sat close together because they felt a little cold. Drifts of chill air came in from behind them. It seemed as though even in mid-summer there was always a breath of dampness at the De SoignÉs’.

Below them the many-colored throng moved through the dainty measures of the dance. The sound of laughter and young voices blended with the sweet strains of the music. It seemed like fairyland to the two who looked down on it.

“We can only guess who they are until they take off their masks, but I think that fat one in the red mantle is my cousin Bertran du Monde,” Rosanne said, leaning far over and peering around the corner, as she tried to follow the figure of a boy in red.

Marie Josephine looked too.

“Yes, that is Bertran. What a fat, funny boy he is! Do you remember how he teased us the afternoon that he came to tea with us all in our schoolroom? He is a stupid boy. You do not mind my saying that even if he is your cousin, do you?” Marie Josephine laughed mischievously as she spoke.

Rosanne laughed happily.

“No, it is true. He is a stupid, fat boy, and he is often very rude. See, is that not your cousin Hortense, the tall girl dancing with——?”

Marie Josephine interrupted her.

“It’s Lisle, Hortense and Lisle. She is almost as tall as he is and she is only fifteen. She looks so very grown-up. How happy I should be if I could dance the minuet with Lisle! He always thinks me such a baby!”

There was a little choke in Marie Josephine’s voice as she said this, and she looked down very wistfully at the fun going on in the great banquet hall.

“The fruit and bonbons and the eau sucrÉ are in the small room at the right. They will be going in there very soon after dancing for refreshment. Gonfleur has promised to bring us sweets and he will not forget. He is very good.” Rosanne lowered her voice a little though there was really no need. The music had stopped and gay, chattering groups walked slowly about or went on, as Rosanne had prophesied, to the room beyond.

Marie Josephine did not answer. She was deep in thought, her chin wedged in between the carved wooden spokes of the tiny balcony. How wonderful to be down there in the midst of all the glitter of lights and jewels, gold lace and flowers, and to have Lisle for her partner, Lisle in his blue velvet and brilliants!

Rosanne’s quick eyes looked here and there. Her one desire was to discover her friends and cousins among the gay throng below. She agreed with Marie Josephine that they had found Bertran, but was not so sure about his sister CÉcile.

“CÉcile would not let me see her beforehand. She did not come in with the others when they bade me good night. She knows about the balcony. I told her I’d be here and she thought it the greatest fun. She said she would do her best to see me and let me see her. She said she would come right underneath me if she could and that she would look up. Then I could tell that it was she. You see I don’t know what her costume is at all.” As she spoke, Rosanne moved a little so that Flambeau could wedge himself in next to her.

“Did you tell CÉcile that you were coming with Gonfleur to get me?” whispered Marie Josephine. She could not help whispering; it made it all seem more exciting.

Rosanne shook her head. “No, I didn’t dare to do that. She would have been worried. Oh, she would have begged me not to go. Why, no one would think of such a thing, Marie Josephine; no one would ever believe I’d go out alone with just a servant at night!”

“It was a splendid thing to do, and I’ll not forget it,” answered Marie Josephine warmly. Then, with Flambeau’s head upon her knee, she sat quietly looking down. The music of a gavotte had begun and it was like a ripple of laughter. It made Marie Josephine think of Pigeon Valley and her home, Les Vignes.

They had always spent their summers at Les Vignes until this year. Marie Josephine had often heard the governess say: “We must thank God for Les Vignes, children. It is a refuge from all trouble.” Marie Josephine knew that there had been fighting in the streets, and that many of their friends had left France. Her maman no longer went out to grand soirÉes. There was sadness and restlessness everywhere.

“But I am happy to-night. Everyone is happy,” she thought. She had often heard Hortense and Denise anticipating the wonder of their first ball. They would wear the family jewels. It would be the grandest affair! Well, they had three years to wait. This was small in comparison to what that gala ball would be! This was just a handful of boys and girls in costumes made up for the moment by governesses and servants. There were bad times in the city. The people had imprisoned the king, Louis XVI, and the queen, Marie Antoinette, in the Tuileries palace.

“Things are always happening, but to-night they are happy things,” Marie Josephine said to Rosanne, and by way of answer, her friend said excitedly:

“There is CÉcile, all in white! She’s holding out her silver wand as she dances. See! She’s looking up at us and smiling, though she cannot see us. It is too dark up here, and we are too far away.”

“I love CÉcile better than any one except maman and Lisle and grandfather and Dian and you,” Marie Josephine answered solemnly.

“Not better than your own sister!” exclaimed Rosanne in shocked tones.

Marie Josephine nodded. “Yes, better than Denise. CÉcile is like a maiden in a fairy tale, Denise isn’t.”

“Listen. Is that not Gonfleur coming up the stairs? He is bringing the goÛter,” said Rosanne.

The girls peered down through the little door at the back of the balcony and after a moment Gonfleur turned a bend and came toward them.

“How fast he is climbing! I did not know his malady, the rheumatism, would permit him to go so fast!” exclaimed Marie Josephine.

When he came a little nearer Rosanne called softly to him:

“Good Gonfleur, you have come with sweets for us. You do well to hurry!”

The old man puffed for a moment as he reached the top step. Then he picked up Marie Josephine’s cloak from the back of the chair and began to put it around her.

“You are to come at once, Mademoiselle—at once, if you please, at once,” he muttered as he tied the ribbons at her throat with trembling fingers.

“What are you doing, Gonfleur? Mademoiselle Saint FrÈre is not to go home until we have had the sweets. Where are they? Do not hurry so!” Rosanne put her hand on Gonfleur’s arm and shook it. “Do not say that it has been discovered that she came here to-night,” she went on.

Gonfleur shook his head. “There is need of haste. The Little Mademoiselle cannot stay longer. No, she is not found out. It is not that. Would to the kind God is was only that, Mademoiselle. It is not a good night to be out.” Gonfleur stood shaking his head, still trembling as he answered.

“Not a good night. What can you mean! It is a beautiful night. Do you not see how splendid it is downstairs and how happy we all are?” Rosanne frowned and spoke impatiently, holding on to Marie Josephine’s cape. “You shall not take her away so soon. She shall have the sweets and fruit before she goes.”

“It is not happy outside, Mademoiselle Rosanne,” Gonfleur answered. Then turning to Marie Josephine, he said: “We will go back as we came, Mademoiselle. It is only a step to your portal where ProtÉ will be waiting, but we must not delay. I entreat you, Mademoiselle, not to delay.”

Gonfleur spoke so earnestly and seemed so uneasy that the two girls were impressed. There seemed nothing else to do but for Marie Josephine to go with him at once. The two friends kissed each other on each cheek and then, her hand in Gonfleur’s and with Flambeau at her heels, Marie Josephine went down the long, steep stairs. On the first landing she turned and looked back at Rosanne, who stood in the dusk of the red velvet lined balcony looking down at her, her fair hair falling about her shoulders. Marie Josephine waved her hand and Rosanne waved back.

Gonfleur’s lanthorn was already lit, and it stood on an iron ledge by the door leading from the foot of the stairs to the courtyard of the great house. The court was deserted and they crossed it quickly, Gonfleur holding his charge’s hand firmly, and not once letting it go except for the moment when he unlocked the door leading from the court to the street. Marie Josephine was indignant with him for hurrying her away in such a fashion in the midst of the fun and before the sweets were served. She would have insisted on staying and would have told Gonfleur to wait until it was her pleasure to go, if her own position had not been an uncertain one. She had never done anything so daring before.

Gonfleur shut the door quickly behind them and they turned to the left, crossed the street, and found themselves at the side portal of the Saint FrÈre house before they knew it. As they stood for a moment in front of the door while Gonfleur fumbled with the lock in his near-sighted way, the loud clatter of horses’ hoofs rang out sharply in the confused night air. Marie Josephine looked back over her shoulder as they turned into the garden. She saw a squad of mounted soldiers rush by at full speed and disappear in a flash down a side street to the right.

Gonfleur muttered to himself as he pushed her gently along the garden path. ProtÉ was waiting at the door and Marie Josephine was glad to see her. ProtÉ took her hand and squeezed it and Marie Josephine squeezed back.

“Put Mademoiselle to bed at once. There is rough work to-night. Hear that!” They stood still and listened. There was a dull, heavy booming sound. ProtÉ raised her hands.

“Cannon; and it’s the Tuileries. Neville told me a half hour ago that there were wild doings to-night. I’ll take care of Mademoiselle, never fear. Now get you home, Gonfleur. The others will be coming when they know there’s trouble.” As she spoke ProtÉ shut the door and bolted it. Then she and Marie Josephine and Flambeau climbed the stairs as quickly as they could.

ProtÉ’s fingers flew in undressing Marie Josephine and very soon she was tucked in her big bed. She lay awake a little while thinking of the music and the dancing and how lovely Rosanne’s cousin CÉcile had looked in her white and silver frock and with her hair powdered.

“She seemed really grown-up, not pretending like Hortense and Denise, yet she is only fifteen. I saw the party anyway. What would Lisle and the girls say if they knew! I am nearly thirteen and they treat me like a baby. I am not a baby. I think more than Denise and I read many books that she does not know about at all, and I know about things too, battles and poems and old, old days that grandfather told me about. I’m not young at all, really I——” She was asleep!

When she awoke it was still dark. Flambeau’s cold nose was touching her arm and Lisle was sitting on the edge of her bed. In her astonishment she sat up and stared at him. He had thrown back the blue velvet, ermine-trimmed mantle that he had worn at the ball, and had unsheathed his jeweled sword. It glowed like a live thing on the whiteness of the satin counterpane. In the light from a flaring socket just outside the open door, his white face, fair hair, and the gleaming crystals on his costume shone in the summer darkness.

Marie Josephine touched his arm. “Lisle, why are you here?” she asked. “Isn’t it the middle of the night?” She shook the curls from her eyes, shivering a little in the midnight cold.

“I was just sitting here. I’m sorry you woke up, but now that you are awake I will tell you something. You are to leave for Pigeon Valley at six in the morning, you and Hortense and Denise, and of course Madame le Pont and ProtÉ,” Lisle said.

“And Flambeau?”

Lisle shrugged his shoulders. “The dog goes everywhere with you. Bertran du Monde is going too, and his servant. They will ride by the coach. Bertran will be staying at Les Vignes with you.”

“Bertran du Monde! But he is not your great friend. You will not want him as a companion. Why does he go?” Marie Josephine was bewildered and not yet quite awake. It all seemed like a dream to her.

“I am not going with you.”

What was it Lisle was saying? His sister grabbed his arm and shook it.

“Don’t tease me. You always go to Les Vignes,” she said, but she felt that he meant what he had said and knew in her heart that he was not teasing.

“I am telling you the truth. You are going at six just as I have said. A rider has gone ahead to-night to prepare the servants at Les Vignes. You are to be quiet and obedient and are not to sulk.” Lisle spoke sternly but he did not frighten his sister at all. She put her arm about his shoulders and laid her face close to his. He did not return her caress, but sat looking straight in front of him. Marie Josephine sat back against her pillows, winking her eyes rapidly to keep the tears back. When she had put her cheek close to her brother’s she had felt something wet. It had been a tear. She must never let him know. He would never forgive her if he found it out.

“When are you coming?” she asked a little timidly.

“I don’t know. I shall not leave maman.”

“You mean because of all the noise and shooting and trouble and keeping the king and queen in prison,” asked Marie Josephine.

Lisle nodded. “Maman will not go. She says it would be disloyal. She is right. If it is disloyal for her, it is disloyal for me. But we will talk no more to-night. Then there is Great-aunt Hortense—we cannot leave her. You are to get up at once when ProtÉ calls you, take your petit dÉjeuner, and then say good-by to maman. You are to shed no tears. Now lie down and go to sleep. I will tuck you up!”

Marie Josephine lay down, shutting her eyes obediently, though the tears forced themselves from under her lashes.

Lisle leaned over and kissed her.

“Always remember that you are a Saint FrÈre, Marie Josephine,” he said.