erns of every one about him; but none of them had
been able to penetrate his thoughts, or to discover his occupation. He
had deliberately made his apparent good-nature, his unfailing readiness
to oblige, and his high spirits into a barrier between himself and the
rest of them, but not seldom he gave glimpses of appalling depths
of character. He seemed to delight in scourging the upper classes of
society with the lash of his tongue, to take pleasure in convicting it
of inconsistency, in mocking at law and order with some grim jest worthy
of Juvenal, as if some grudge against the social system rankled in him,
as if there were some mystery carefully hidden away in his life.

Mlle. Taillefer felt attracted, perhaps unconsciously, by the strength
of the one man, and the good looks of the other; her stolen glances and
secret thoughts were divided between them; but neither of them seemed
to take any notice of her, although some day a chance might alter her
position, and she would be a wealthy heiress. For that matter, there was
not a soul in the house who took any trouble to investigate the various
chronicles of misfortunes, real or imaginary, related by the rest. Each
one regarded the others with indifference, tempered by suspicion; it was
a natural result of their relative positions. Practical assistance not
one could give, this they all knew, and they had long since exhausted
their stock of condolence over previous discussions of their grievances.
They were in something the same position as an elderly couple who have
nothing left to say to each other. The routine of existence kept them in
contact, but they were parts of a mechanism which wanted oil. There was
not one of them but would have passed a blind man begging in the street,
not one that felt moved to pity by a tale of misfortune, not one who
did not see in death the solution of the all-absorbing problem of misery
which left them cold to the most terrible anguish in others.

The happiest of these hapless beings was certainly Mme. Vauquer, who
reigned supreme over this hospital supported by voluntary contributions.
For her, the little garden, which silence, and cold, and rain, and
drought combined to make as dreary as an Asian _steppe_, was a pleasant
shaded nook; the gaunt yellow house, the musty odors of a back shop had
charms for her, and for her alone. Those cells belonged to her. She fed
those convicts condemned to penal servitude for life, and her authority
was r