ed man scratched louder--scratch, scratch--as though it
were trying to scratch under the door of Number 19 rue Bienville--for a
moment, and then ceased. The clerk, with one hand behind him and one
touching the desk, murmured a few words, to which the other, after
glancing under his arm at Aurora, gave a short, low reply and resumed
his pen. The clerk returned, came through a gateway in the railing, led
the way into a rich inner room, and turning with another courtly bow,
handed her a cushioned armchair and retired.

"After eighteen years," thought Aurora, as she found herself alone. It
had been eighteen years since any representative of the De Grapion line
had met a Grandissime face to face, so far as she knew; even that
representative was only her deceased husband, a mere connection by
marriage. How many years it was since her grandfather, Georges De
Grapion, captain of dragoons, had had his fatal meeting with a Mandarin
de Grandissime, she did not remember. There, opposite her on the wall,
was the portrait of a young man in a corslet who might have been M.
Mandarin himself. She felt the blood of her race growing warmer in her
veins. "Insolent tribe," she said, without speaking, "we have no more
men left to fight you; but now wait. See what a woman can do."

These thoughts ran through her mind as her eye passed from one object to
another. Something reminded her of Frowenfeld, and, with mingled
defiance at her inherited enemies and amusement at the apothecary, she
indulged in a quiet smile. The smile was still there as her glance in
its gradual sweep reached a small mirror.

She almost leaped from her seat.

Not because that mirror revealed a recess which she had not previously
noticed; not because behind a costly desk therein sat a youngish man,
reading a letter; not because he might have been observing her, for it
was altogether likely that, to avoid premature interruption, he had
avoided looking up; nor because this was evidently Honore Grandissime;
but because Honore Grandissime, if this were he, was the same person
whom she had seen only with his back turned in the pharmacy--the rider
whose horse ten days ago had knocked her down, the Lieutenant of
Dragoons who had unmasked and to whom she had unmasked at the ball! Fly!
But where? How? It was too late; she had not even time to lower her
veil. M. Grandissime looked up at the glass, dropped the letter with a
slight start of consternation and advanced quickly towar