"How is it that you're out of bed?" said the peasant; "you'll make yourself ill, getting up at this time of night. Go back to bed again."
The woman made no answer, but picked Jeanne up and carried her back to bed as easily as if she had been a baby. She gently laid her down, and, as she bent over her, she suddenly began to cover her cheeks, her hair, her eyes with violent kisses, while the tears streamed from her eyes.
"My poor mistress! Mam'zelle Jeanne, my poor mistress! Don't you know me?" she sobbed.
"Rosalie, my lass!" cried Jeanne, throwing her arms round the woman's neck and kissing her; and, clasped in each other's arms they mingled their tears and sobs together.
Rosalie dried her eyes the first. "Come now," she said, "you must be good and not catch cold."
She picked up the clothes, tucked up the bed and put the pillow back under the head of her former mistress, who lay choking with emotion as the memories of days that were past and gone rushed back to her mind.
"How is it you have come back, my poor girl?" she asked.
"Do you think I was going to leave you to live all alone now?" answered Rosalie.
"Light a candle and let me look at you," went on Jeanne.
Rosalie placed a light on the table by the bedside, and for a long time they gazed at each other in silence.
"I should never have known you again," murmured Jeanne, holding out her hand to her old servant. "You have altered very much, though not so much as I have."
"Yes, you have changed, Madame Jeanne, and more than you ought to have done," answered Rosalie, as she looked at this thin, faded, white-haired woman, whom she had left young and beautiful; "but you must remember it's twenty-four years since we have seen one another."
"Well, have you been happy?" asked Jeanne after a long pause.
"Oh, yes--yes, madame. I haven't had much to grumble at; I've been happier than you--that's certain. The only thing that I've always regretted is that I didn't stop here--" She broke off abruptly, finding she had unthinkingly touched upon the very subject she wished to avoid.
"Well, you know, Rosalie, one cannot have everything one wants," replied Jeanne gently; "and now you too are a widow, are you not?" Then her voice trembled, as she went on, "Have you any--any other children?"