ce of each handkerchief is five and twenty francs,
mademoiselle--" she had offered the day before to sell us to the wife
of one of the richest agents de change in Paris, at a napoleon a
piece--"the price is five and twenty francs, if you take the dozen, but
as you appear to wish only ONE, rather than not oblige you, it may be
had for eight and twenty."

{agents de change = stockbrokers; napoleon = gold coin worth twenty
francs}

There was a strange mixture of sorrow and delight in the countenance of
Adrienne; but she did not hesitate, and, attracted by the odor of the
eau de cologne, she instantly pointed me out as the handkerchief she
selected. Our mistress passed her scissors between me and my neighbor
of the cote gauche, and then she seemed instantly to regret her own
precipitation. Before making the final separation from the piece, she
delivered herself of her doubts.

"It is worth another franc, mademoiselle," she said, "to cut a
handkerchief from the CENTRE of the piece."

The pain of Adrienne was now too manifest for concealment. That she
ardently desired the handkerchief was beyond dispute, and yet there
existed some evident obstacle to her wishes.

"I fear I have not so much money with me, madame" she said, pale as
death, for all sense of shame was lost in intense apprehension. Still
her trembling hands did their duty, and her purse was produced. A gold
napoleon promised well, but it had no fellow. Seven more francs
appeared in single pieces. Then two ten-sous were produced; after which
nothing remained but copper. The purse was emptied, and the reticule
rummaged, the whole amounting to just twenty-eight francs seven sous.

{sou = a small coin (5 centimes)--20 sous equal one franc}

"I have no more, madame," said Adrienne, in a faint voice.

The woman, who had been trained in the school of suspicion, looked
intently at the other, for an instant, and then she swept the money
into her drawer, content with having extorted from this poor girl more
than she would have dared to ask of the wife of the agent de change.
Adrienne took me up and glided from the shop, as if she feared her dear
bought prize would yet be torn from her. I confess my own delight was
so great that I did not fully appreciate, at the time, all the hardship
of the case. It was enough to be liberated, to get into the fresh air,
to be about to fulfill my proper destiny. I was tired of that sort of
vegetation in which I neither grew, nor was