After Auntie left Jeanne and the Pierrot asleep in bed that night, she went into her own room and sat down by her little table. She shaded her eyes with her hands and thought very hard.

Poor Auntie Sue was unhappy. There was a little voice inside of her that never would be still. This voice talked and talked and talked. No one could hear it but Auntie Sue. It was not a person, nor was it a fairy. Yet it was there, and it talked to Auntie Sue.

People call that voice Conscience. You see, many other people beside Auntie Sue have heard that voice. He is known to everyone who does wrong.

And Auntie Sue had done great wrong. Not knowing it, she had been doing a great wrong all these years she had kept Jeanne from her rightful home. And now that voice called Conscience was tormenting her.

To-night he was talking more loudly and more fiercely than he had ever talked before. As Auntie Sue sat before her little table, he did not leave her a moment's peace.

"You see what has happened," he said inside of Auntie Sue. "You see what you have done by keeping Jeanne from Madame Villard. She is starved for play.

"You have made her a poor little girl who has to work. If she lived in the lovely apartment house with her grandmother, she could play and play and play."

Suzanne clapped her hands over her ears to stop the voice. But Conscience came from her heart and did not need her ears to hear him.

He went right on, "What would that soldier say? What would the old man say? What would the grandmother say? And Major d'Artrot?"

"Oh, Major d'Artrot, my good, my honest friend!" sobbed Suzanne.

She thought of her only friend in all the world. She would never dare to confess to him what she had done!She opened her drawer and looked at the picture in the locket. She read again the name and address which had been pinned to the baby's skirt so many years ago: "Madame Villard. Avenue Champs ElysÉes."

The face of Jeanne's father looked back at her. It seemed to her that his eyes were accusing her.

"You have kept her from her rightful home and from the pleasures of childhood," went on the voice. And the face in the locket seemed to agree with the voice.

"To-night the child stayed in the park with a puppet—the only play toy she has ever had. She fell asleep in front of the Guignol, where happy children go to clap and laugh. But you give Jeanne no time for play and laughter."

It was all true. But Suzanne knew that if Jeanne stopped showing the clothes she made, her audience would cease to be interested. If she did not draw her audience, she could not sell the clothes. And if she did not sell the clothes, she could not support Jeanne.

It was all quite terrible for Auntie Sue. And she dared not mention it to a soul. Nobody knew that Jeanne did not belong to her. Nobody knew Jeanne's story, not even the Major.