With raised eyebrows they telegraphed each other that they
would not be surprised if she had an extremely intimate knowledge of
Paris and Parisian ways.
Even the Frenchman she befriended was ungrateful enough not to know
quite what to think of Mary. He raised his hat, and gave her a look of
passionate gratitude, in case anything were to be got by it: but the
deep meaning of the gaze was lost on the lately emancipated Sister Rose.
She blushed, because it happened to be the first time she had ever
spoken to a young man unchaperoned by Lady MacMillan: but she was
regarding him as a fellow-being, and remembering that she had been
instructed to seize any chance of doing a kindness, no matter how small.
She had never been told that it was not always safe for a girl to treat
a Frenchman as a fellow-being.
Afterward, on the boat, when a porter had placed her in a sheltered
deck-seat with a curved top, the fellow-being ventured again to thank
the English Mees for coming to his rescue. It was a pleasure to Mary to
speak French, which had been taught her by Sister Marie-des-Anges, a
French nun from Paris; and she and the young man plunged into an
animated conversation. Her travelling companions had chairs on deck not
far off, and they knew what to think of the mystery now. They were on
the way to Mentone, but as they intended stopping a day in Paris, and
going on by a cheaper train than the _train de luxe_, Mary did not see
them again during the journey.
She was unconscious of anything in her appearance or conduct to arouse
disapproval.
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