had done right. If the most trifling thing

went wrong, it was because she had not been consulted about it: prove her wrong in any one thing and she would speak a quarter of an hour afterwards, exactly as if she was in the right. She was a prodigiously good housekeeper, and although she took none of the responsibility of the housekeeping herself, she never ceased talking about it to her daughter.

There she was, however, sitting in Mrs. Arnaud's easy chair and talking without ceasing on details of all kinds : about herself, about Mrs. Arnaud's relation with the late Iltyd, about the money she had lent her daughter (she never left that subject alone for above a quarter of an hour together), about the servants, about every kind of minute detail in the house. Always giving advice, offended when it was not taken, re

turning to the charge until it was, and then turning on her daughter for a poor, silly, dear thing, if the matter went wrong. There she was, an old woman of the sea, with but one fact about her which gave any hope of escape from her, and that was her rheumatism.

It was after she had been there half of one day that this great fact about her was discovered. Heloise remembered it first, and, with her brilliant genius, saw hope.

Madame on the very first day shewed the weak point in her armour, and as we said before, Heloise, knowing her well, had hope. Madame was partly agreeable on the first day, but Heloise knew that she could be so, for her own purposes, after dinner, but knowing what would with ordinary luck occur, she said nothing, until Madame, who had been talking at her best, desired to go to bed, and asked where she was to sleep.

'You sleep at the top of the house, grandmamma,' said Heloise, promptly. I shall sleep in the same room now-I have moved up a very nice one. You must be tired, shall I take you to bed?'

'At the top of the house,' said Madame,

6

aghast. My dear Heloise, you know as

well as I do, that I cannot walk up stairs.'

'I do not know what is to be done, then, grandmamma: unless you take aunt Arnaud's bed, and she sleeps in yours; that is to say, in the same room with myself.'

be done,' said Madame. It is hard on a

woman of my age, but I have always sacrificed myself to my children. I will sleep down stairs.'

The arrangement was most promptly made; Mrs. Arnaud and Heloise departed upstairs, leaving the old lady in full possession of the back parlour and the bedroom

adjoining.

The Emperor of Russia calculated the effect of cold on the French Army, but he had a long time to think about it. Heloise had but little time to think about her grandmamma's rheumatism, yet she utilized it in the most dexterous She and her aunt were free at the top of the house, where no grandmamma could reach them.

manner.

Was it for better or for worse that that cunning old French woman was isolated in the lower part of the house with Rachel? That is a question which will answer itself.

To go on with our narrative. The coming of the old French woman sent Heloise and Mrs. Arnaud upstairs, leaving her to get through the night in the best way she could. Mrs. Arnaud and Heloise encamped in the apartments immediately above George Drummond's, and found peace and freedom.

CHAPTER XII.

BARRI.

MADAME never guessed what she had done on the very first day of her coming, by her temper and her rheumatism. She drove

Mrs. Arnaud and Heloise into the third story. Heloise had foreseen this from the first, and had devotedly removed her own bed there, but she had held her tongue about her grandmamma's rheumatism, just to avoid discussion. She had also mentioned the third story, generally, as a 'bedroom,' whereas it was an excellent suite of rooms, slightly lower from floor to ceiling than the two other floors, but most comfortable in