CHAPTER XII.
THE MOTHER BIRD.
One afternoon, some three weeks after Capitaine Lemaitre had called on Madame Delphine, the priest started to make a pastoral call and had hardly left the gate of his cottage, when a person, overtaking him, plucked his gown: "Pere Jerome----" He turned.
The face that met his was so changed with excitement and distress that for an instant he did not recognize it.
"Why, Madame Delphine----" "Oh, Pere Jerome! I wan' see you so bad, so bad! _Mo oule dit quic'ose_,--I godd some' to tell you." The two languages might be more successful than one, she seemed to think.
"We had better go back to my parlor," said the priest, in their native tongue.
They returned.
Madame Delphine's very step was altered,--nervous and inelastic.

She swung one arm as she walked, and brandished a turkey-tail fan.
"I was glad, yass, to kedge you," she said, as they mounted the front, outdoor stair; following her speech with a slight, unmusical laugh, and fanning herself with unconscious fury.
"_Fe chaud_," she remarked again, taking the chair he offered and continuing to ply the fan.
Pere Jerome laid his hat upon a chest of drawers, sat down opposite her, and said, as he wiped his kindly face: "Well, Madame Carraze ?" Gentle as the tone was, she started, ceased fanning, lowered the fan to her knee, and commenced smoothing its feathers.
"Pere Jerome----" She gnawed her lip and shook her head.
"Well ?" She burst into tears.
The priest rose and loosed the curtain of one of the windows.

He did it slowly--as slowly as he could, and, as he came back, she lifted her face with sudden energy, and exclaimed: "Oh, Pere Jerome, de law is brogue! de law is brogue! I brogue it! 'Twas me! 'Twas me!" The tears gushed out again, but she shut her lips very tight, and dumbly turned away her face.

Pere Jerome waited a little before replying; then he said, very gently: "I suppose dad muss 'ave been by accyden', Madame Delphine ?" The little father felt a wish--one which he often had when weeping women were before him--that he were an angel instead of a man, long enough to press the tearful cheek upon his breast, and assure the weeper God would not let the lawyers and judges hurt her.

He allowed a few moments more to pass, and then asked: "_N'est-ce-pas_, Madame Delphine?
Daz ze way, aint it ?" "No, Pere Jerome, no.