Her woollen skirt was stained with weather and torn with briers.

But she had managed always to wash her cap white in brook water, and she had managed always to keep her pretty bright curls soft and silken--for he had liked them so much, and he would soon draw them through his hand again.

So she told herself a thousand times to give her strength when the mist would come over her sight, and the earth would seem to tremble as she went.

On the fifteenth day from the night when she had left her hut by the swans' water, Bebee saw Paris.
Shining away in the sun; white and gold; among woods and gardens she saw Paris.
She was so tired--oh, so tired--but she could not rest now.

There were bells ringing always in her ears, and a heavy pain always in her head.
But what of that ?--she was so near to him.
"Are you ill, you little thing ?" a woman asked her who was gathering early cherries in the outskirts of the great city.
Bebee looked at her and smiled: "I do not know--I am happy." And she went onward.
It was evening.