There was a faint sound as of feet upon a staircase; then all was still except the measured tread of Jean Poquelin walking on the veranda, and the heavy respirations of the mute slumbering in the cabin.
The little Secretary was about to retreat; but as he looked once more toward the haunted Louse a dim light appeared in the crack of a closed window, and presently old Jean Poquelin came, dragging his chair, and sat down close against the shining cranny.

He spoke in a low, tender tone in the French tongue, making some inquiry.

An answer came from within.

Was it the voice of a human?
So unnatural was it--so hollow, so discordant, so unearthly--that the stealthy listener shuddered again from head to foot, and when something stirred in some bushes near by--though it may have been nothing more than a rat--and came scuttling through the grass, the little Secretary actually turned and fled.

As he left the enclosure he moved with bolder leisure through the bushes; yet now and then he spoke aloud: "Oh, oh! I see, I understand!" and shut his eyes in his hands.
How strange that henceforth little White was the champion of Jean Poquelin! In season and out of season--wherever a word was uttered against him--the Secretary, with a quiet, aggressive force that instantly arrested gossip, demanded upon what authority the statement or conjecture was made; but as he did not condescend to explain his own remarkable attitude, it was not long before the disrelish and suspicion which had followed Jean Poquelin so many years fell also upon him.
It was only the next evening but one after his adventure that he made himself a source of sullen amazement to one hundred and fifty boys, by ordering them to desist from their wanton hallooing.