over-blown roses. Half unconsciously, Madelon felt that the
scene, the hour, were in harmony with the pathos of the brown,
faded words, like a chord struck in unison with the key-note
of a mournful song. As she gazed, the tears began to gather in
her eyes; she tried to read the letter again, and the big
drops fell on the paper, already stained with other tears that
had been dried ever so many years ago. But it was already too
dark, she could hardly see the words; she laid the paper down
and began to cry.

It was not the first part of the letter that moved her so
much, though there was something in her that responded to the
devoted, loving words; but she had not the key to their
meaning. She knew nothing of her mother's life, nor of her
causes for unhappiness; and for the moment she did not draw
the inferences that to an older and more experienced person
would have been at once obvious. It was the allusion to
herself that was making Madelon cry with a tender little self-
pity. The child was so weary of the convent, was feeling so
friendless and so homeless just then, that this mention of the
little empty bed that sometime and somewhere had been prepared
and waiting to receive her, awoke in her quite a new longing,
such as she had never had before, for a home and a mother, and
kind protection and care, like other children. When at last
she folded the letter up, it was to put it carefully away in
the little box that contained her few treasures. It belonged
to a life in which she somehow felt she had some part, though
it lay below the horizon of her own memories and
consciousness.