There are plenty of people about in the streets; but as the news has, no doubt, already been spread that the daughters of the Marquis de St.Caux had left the house before those charged with their father's arrest arrived, it will be better for you not to keep together.

I would suggest that you should walk on with Virginie.

I will follow with Jeanne a hundred yards behind, so that I can keep you in sight, and will come up if anyone should accost you." Marie at once rose, and taking the child's hand set out.

They had to traverse the greater part of Paris to reach their destination.
It was a trial for Marie, who had never before been in the streets of Paris except with her mother and closely followed by two domestics, and even then only through the quiet streets of a fashionable quarter.

However, she went steadily forward, tightly holding Virginie's hand and trying to walk as if accustomed to them in the thick heavy shoes which felt so strangely different to those which she was in the habit of wearing.
From time to time she addressed an encouraging word to Virginie as she felt her shrink as they approached groups of men lounging outside the wine-shops, for there was but little work done in Paris, and the men of the lower class spent their time in idleness, in discussions of the events of the day, or in joining the mobs which, under one pretext or another, kept the streets in an uproar.
Fortunately Marie knew the way perfectly and there was no occasion for her to ask for directions, for she had frequently driven with her mother to visit Louise Moulin.