



Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England




Unawares
By Frances Peard
Published by Roberts Brothers, Boston.
This edition dated 1872.

Unawares, by Frances Peard.

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UNAWARES, BY FRANCES PEARD.

CHAPTER ONE.

  "Quaint old town of toil and traffic."

  Longfellow.

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"You might tell us something, Madame Angelin, since you know so much!"

"Yes, indeed.  What is the good of knowing if you keep it to yourself?"
cried a younger woman, impatiently, placing, as she spoke, her basket of
herbs and vegetables upon the broad stone edge of the fountain around
which a little group had gathered.

"Was it a fit?"

"Has Monsieur Deshoulieres gone to him?"

"Is he dead?"

"What becomes of her?"

"Holy Virgin! will the town have to bury him?"

The individual upon whom this volley of shrill questions was directed
was a small, thin, pungent-faced Frenchwoman, who had just filled her
pitcher at the fountain, and stood with hands clasped over her waist,
and with ineffable satisfaction in her twinkling black eyes, looking
upon the excited questioners who crowded round her.  It is not given to
everybody to know more than their neighbours, nor, as Veuve Angelin
shrewdly reflected, is it a privilege to be lightly parted with.  There
was something very enchanting in the eager attention with which her
information was awaited, and she looked round upon them all with a
patronising benignity, which was, to say the least, irritating.  The May
sun was shining brightly over old pointed roofs; the tiny streams
running out of three grim carved heads in the stone fountain danced and
sparkled in its light; the horse-ch