Decidedly, she had arrived.
Marie took out her violin, and tuned it softly, with little rustling, whispering notes, speaking of perfect accord between owner and instrument; then she looked up at the child and smiled, and began to play "En revenant d'Auvergne." It was a tune that the little people always loved, and when one heard it, the feet began to dance before the head.

Sure enough, the door opened in another moment, and the child came slipping out: not with flying steps, as a city child would come, to whom wandering musicians were a thing of every day; but shyly, with sidelong movements, clinging to the wall as it advanced, and only daring by stealth to lift its eyes to the strange woman with the fiddle, a sight never seen before in its little life.

But Marie knew all about the things that children think.

What was she but a child herself?
she had little knowledge of grown persons, and regarded them all as ogres, more or less, except Old Billy, and La Patronne, who really meant to be kind.
"Come, lit' girl!" she said in her clear soft voice.

"Come and dance! for you I play, for you I sing too, if you will.