Let the child's clothes be washed under her own eye and let her keep the key of the chest which contains them.

Should anything happen to the child send instantly to me." These instructions sank deep into Jeanne's heart.

She begged Beauvouloir to regard her always as one who would do him any service in her power.
On that the poor man told her that she held his happiness in her hands.
Then he related briefly how the Comte d'Herouville had in his youth loved a courtesan, known by the name of La Belle Romaine, who had formerly belonged to the Cardinal of Lorraine.

Abandoned by the count before very long, she had died miserably, leaving a child named Gertrude, who had been rescued by the Sisters of the Convent of Poor Clares, the Mother Superior of which was Mademoiselle de Saint-Savin, the countess's aunt.

Having been called to treat Gertrude for an illness, he, Beauvouloir, had fallen in love with her, and if Madame la comtesse, he said, would undertake the affair, she should not only more than repay him for what she thought he had done for her, but she would make him grateful to her for life.