"Need, truly. But I do not know--"

"He would be glad to help you. And he knows all about us."

"Yes, I should not have to make long explanations to him."

Just then there was a knock at the door. Both started violently. Absurd as it was, they both expected to see Bailey himself enter. Instead, they saw Madame Everaert, her round face flushed with walking and her hands full of flowers.

"For mademoiselle," she said, laying them down on the table, and nodding and smiling good humouredly. "I have been to Rosendahl to see my goddaughter there, and she has a magnificent garden, so I brought a few flowers for mademoiselle."

Lucia thanked her, and admired the flowers, and she went away without suspecting the fright her visit had caused.

"Get your desk, Lucia," Mrs. Costello said, gasping for breath, and almost exhausted by the terrible beating of her heart, "and write a note for me."

The desk was brought and opened.

"Is it to Maurice?" Lucia asked.

"Yes. Say that we are in great need of a friend."

Lucia began. She found it much more difficult than she had done the other night, when she wrote those few impetuous lines which had been afterwards torn up.

"Dear Maurice," she said, "mamma tells me to write to you, and say that something has happened which has frightened her very much, and that we are in great need of a friend. Will you keep your promise, and come to us?"

This was what she showed to her mother. When Mrs. Costello had approved of it, she wrote a few words more.

"I want to ask you to forgive me. I don't deserve it, but I am so unhappy.

"Yours affectionately, "LUCIA."

She hesitated a little how to sign herself, but finally wrote just what she had been accustomed to put to all her little notes written to Maurice during his absences from Cacouna in the old days.

When the letter had been sealed and sent off by Madame Everaert's servant to the post-office, they began to feel that all they could do for the present was done. Mrs. Costello lay still on her sofa, without having strength or energy to talk, and Lucia took her never-finished crochet, and sat in her old place by the window.

But very soon it grew too dark to work. The Place was lighted, and alive with people passing to and fro. The windows of the guard house opposite were brilliant, and from those of a cafe on the same side as Madame Everaert's there shone out, half across the square, a broad line of light. In this way, at two places, the figures of those who moved about the pavement on each side of the Place, were very plainly visible; even the faces of some could be distinguished. Lucia watched these people to-night with a new interest. Every time the strong glare fell upon a shabby slouching figure, or on a poorly dressed man who wanted the air of being a Frenchman, she thought, "Is that Bailey?" When the lamp came in, Mrs. Costello had fallen asleep, so Lucia turned it down low, and still sat at the window. The light on the tower shone out clear and bright--above it the stars looked pale, but the sky was perfectly serene. Maurice, if he came soon, had every prospect of a fair passage.

"And he will come," she thought to herself, "even if he is really too much vexed with me to forgive me, he will come for mamma's sake."

All next day they both kept indoors. Lucia tried to persuade her mother to drive out into the country, but even for this Mrs. Costello had not courage. At the same time she seemed to be losing all sense of security in the house. She fancied she had not sufficiently impressed on Father Paul the importance of not betraying her in any way to Bailey. She wished to write and remind him of this, but she dared not lest her note should fall into wrong hands. Then she thought of asking him to visit her, but hesitated also about that till it was too late. In short, was in a perfectly unreasonable and incapable condition--fear had taken such hold of her in her weak state of health that Lucia began to think it would end in nervous fever. With her the dread of Bailey began to be quite lost in apprehension for her mother, and her own affairs had to be put altogether on one side to make room for these new anxieties.

In the afternoon of that day Mrs. Costello suddenly roused herself from a fit of thought.

"We must go somewhere," she said. "That is certain, whatever else is. As soon as Maurice comes we ought to be prepared to start. Do go, Lucia, and see if there is any packing you can do--without attracting attention, you know."

"But, mamma," Lucia objected, "Maurice cannot be here to-day, nor even, I believe, to-morrow, at the very soonest, and I will soon do what there is to do."

"There is a great deal. And I can't help you, my poor child. And there ought not to be a moment's unnecessary delay."

Lucia had to yield. She began to pack as if all their arrangements were made, though they had no idea either when, or to what end, their wanderings would recommence, nor were able to give a hint to those about them of their intended departure.

Another restless night passed, and another day began. There was the faintest possibility, they calculated, that Maurice, if he started as soon as he received Lucia's note, might reach them late at night.

It was but the shadow of a chance, for Hunsdon, as they knew, lay at some distance from either post-office or railway station, and the letter might not reach him till this very morning. Yet, since he _might_ come, they must do all they could to be ready. The day was very hot. All the windows were open, and the shutters closed; a drowsy heat and stillness filled the rooms. Mrs. Costello walked about perpetually. She had tried to help Lucia, but had been obliged to leave off and content herself with gathering up, here and there, the things that were in daily use, and bringing them to Lucia to put away. They said very little to each other. Mrs. Costello could think of nothing but Bailey, and she did not dare to talk about him from some fanciful fear of being overheard. Lucia thought of her mother's health and of Maurice, and Mrs. Costello had no attention to spare for either.

Suddenly, sounding very loud in the stillness, there came the roll of a carriage over the rough stones of the Place. It stopped; there was a moment's pause, and then a hasty ring at the door-bell. Both mother and daughter paused and listened. There was a quick movement downstairs--a foot which was swifter and lighter than Madame Everaert's on the staircase--and Maurice at the sitting-room door.

Mrs. Costello went forward from the doorway where she had been arrested by the sound of his coming; Lucia, kneeling before a trunk in the adjoining room, saw him standing there, and sprang to her feet; he came in glad, eager, impatient to know what they wanted of him; and before any of them had time to think about it, this meeting, so much desired and dreaded, was over.

"But how could you come so soon?" Mrs. Costello asked. "We did not expect you till to-morrow."

"By the greatest chance. I had been in town for two days. Our station and post-office are at the same place. When they met me at the station, they brought me letters which had just arrived, and yours was among them. So I was able to catch the next train back to London, instead of going home."

"And which way did you come? The boat is not in yet?"

"By Calais. It was quicker. Now tell me what has happened."

Mrs. Costello looked carefully to see that the door was shut. Then she told Maurice who and what she feared, and how she could not even leave Bourg-Cailloux without help.

"Yet, I think I ought to leave," she said.

"Of course you ought," Maurice answered. "You must go to England."

CHAPTER XXIII.

"You must go to England," Maurice said decidedly. "It is an easy journey, and you would be quite safe there."

"But I ought not to go to England," Mrs. Costello answered rather uncertainly. "And Bailey might follow us there."

"I doubt that. By what you say, too, if he were in England, we might perhaps set the police to watch him, which would prevent his annoying you. However, the thing to do is to carry you off before he has any idea you are in Europe at all."

Lucia stayed long enough to see that the mere presence of Maurice inspired her mother with fresh courage; then she went back to her packing, leaving the door ajar that she might hear their voices. She went on with her work in a strange tumult and confusion. Not a word beyond the first greetings had passed between Maurice and herself, but she could not help feeling as if their positions were somehow changed--and not for the worse.

There had been no words; but just for one second Maurice had held her hand and looked at her very earnestly; whereupon she had felt her cheeks grow very hot, and her eyes go down to the ground as if she were making some confession.

After that he released her, and she went about her occupations. She began to wonder now whether she would have to tell him how sorry she was, or whether enough had been said; and to incline to the last opinion.

Meanwhile she went on busily. In about half an hour she heard Maurice go out, and then Mrs. Costello came to her.

"He is gone to make inquiries," she said; "you know there is a boat to-night, but then we may not be able to get berths."