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MADAME DAUPHIN HAS A MISSION.
One day Charley began to know the gossip of the village about him from a source less friendly than Jo Portugais.

The Notary's wife, bringing her boy to be measured for a suit of broadcloth, asked Charley if the things Jo had told about him were true, and if it was also true that he was a Protestant, and perhaps an Englishman.

As yet, Charley had been asked no direct questions, for the people of Chaudiere had the consideration of their temperament; but the Notary's wife was half English, and being a figure in the place, she took to herself more privileges than did old Madame Dugal, the Cure's sister.
To her ill-disguised impertinence in English, as bad as her French and as fluent, Charley listened with quiet interest.

When she had finished her voluble statement she said, with a simper and a sneer-for, after all, a Notary's wife must keep her position--"And now, what is the truth about it?
And are you a Protestant ?" There was a sinister look in old Trudel's eyes as, cross-legged on his table, he listened to Madame Dauphin.