The little song died on her lips, and unconsciously she lowered her bow, and stood silent, returning helplessly the look bent so sternly upon her.
When Jacques de Arthenay found himself able to speak at last, he started at the sound of his own voice.
"Who are you ?" he asked.

"How did you come here, young woman ?" Marie held out her fiddle with a pretty, appealing gesture.

"I come--from away!" she said, in her broken English, that sounded soft and strange to his ears.

"I do no harm.

I play, to make happy the children, to get bread for me." "Who came with you ?" De Arthenay continued.