The Hearths and Thickets of the Bocage

I winna spare for his tender age,
    Nor yet for his hie kin;
  But soon as ever he born is,
He shall mount the gallow's pin. --Fause Foodrage.


Dusk was closing in, but lamps had not yet been lighted, when with
a trembling, yet almost a bounding heart, Eustacie stole down the
stone staircase, leading to a back-door--an utterly uncanonical
appendage to a nunnery, but one much used among the domestic
establishment of Bellaise.

A gleam of red light spread across the passage from the half-open
kitchen door, whence issued the savoury steam of the supper
preparing for Monseigneur.  Eustacie had just cautiously traversed
it, when the voice of the presiding lay-sister called out,
'Veronique, is that you?'

'Sister!' returned Eustacie, with as much of the Angevin twang as
she could assume.

'Where are you going?'

'To the Orchard Farm with this linen.'

'Ah! it must be.  But there are strict orders come from Madame
about nobody going out unreported, and you may chance to find the
door locked if you do not come back in good time.  Oh! and I had
well-night forgot;  tell your mother to be here early to-morrow,
Madame would speak with her.'

Eustacie assented, half stifled by the great throb of her
fluttering heart at the sense that she had indeed seized the last
moment.  Forth then she stepped.  How dark, waste, and lonely the
open field looked!  But her heart did not fail her; she could only
feel that a captivity was over, and the most vague and terrible of
her anxieties soothed, as she made her way into one of the long
shady lanes of the Bocage.  It was nearly dark, and very muddy, but
she had all the familiarity of a native with the way, and the farm,
where she had trotted about in her infancy like a peasant's child,
always seemed like home to her.  It had been a prime treat to visit
it during her time of education at the convent, and there was an
association of pleasure in treading the path that seemed to bear
her up, and give her enjoyment in the mere adventure and feeling of
escape and liberty.