"That is a picture of my mother, and Desire is dead; long dead."
[Illustration: "'THAT'S NUMBER THIRTY-ONE.'"]
"But it is _exactly_ like Number Thirty-one,--I mean Madame Desire,"
persisted Joyce.
Monsieur looked at her wildly from under his shaggy brows, and then,
turning away, began to pace up and down the room. "I had a sister once,"
he began. "She would have been seventy-three this month, and her name
was Desire."
Joyce stood motionless in the middle of the room, wondering what was
coming next. Suddenly turning with a violence that made her start, he
cried, "No, I never can forgive! She has been dead to me nearly a
lifetime. Why did you tell me this, child? Out of my sight! What is it
to me if she is homeless and alone? Go! Go!"
He waved his hands so wildly in motioning her away, that Joyce ran out
of the room and banged the door behind her.
"What do you suppose is the matter with him?" asked Jules, in a
frightened whisper, as they listened to his heavy tread, back and forth,
back and forth, in the next room.
Joyce shook her head. "I don't know for sure," she answered,
hesitatingly, "but I believe that he is going crazy."
Jules's eyes opened so wide that Joyce wished she had not frightened
him. "Oh, you know that I didn't mean it," she said, reassuringly. The
heavy tread stopped, and the children looked at each other.
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