e in the court one
day, and ask who was the tall gentleman with the tarnished lace who
had just entered?

"It is _un Monsieur Very_," said the concierge.

"And poor Monsieur Very lives alone?" said I.

"How should I know, monsieur?"

"He always walks alone," said I.

"It is true," said the concierge.

"He has children, perhaps?" said I.

"_Tres probable_," said the concierge.

He was little disposed to be communicative, yet I determined to make
another trial.

"You have very pretty lodgers," said I.

"Pardon, monsieur," said he, "I do not understand you."

"Pretty--very pretty lodgers," said I.

"You are facetious, monsieur," said the concierge, smiling.

"Not at all," said I; "have I not seen (a sad lie) a very pretty face
at one of the windows on the back court?"

"I do not think it, monsieur."

"And then there are no female lodgers?"

"_Pardon, monsieur_--there are several."

Here the little concierge was interrupted by a lodger, and I could ask
no more.

I still, however, kept up my scrutiny of the attic window--observed
closely every female foot that glanced about the neighboring courts,
and remitted sadly my attention to the _Grammaire des Grammaires_, in
the quiet room of my demure friend the abbe.

Sometimes, in my fancies, the object of wonder was a young maiden of
the _noblesse_, who, for imputed family crimes, had hid herself in so
humble a quarter. Sometimes I pictured the occupant of the chamber as
the suffering daughter of some miserly parent, with trace of noble
blood--filial, yet dependent in her degradation. Sometimes I imagined
her the daughter of shame--the beloved of a doating, and too late
repentant mother--shunning the face of a world that had seduced her
with its smiles, and that now made smiles the executioners of its
punishment.

In short, form what fancies I would, I could not but feel a most
extraordinary interest in clearing the mystery that seemed to me to
hang about the little window in the court. Unconnected with the
foot-track and the slipper, the window on the court would have been
nothing more than half the courts to be seen in the old quarters of
Paris. Or, indeed, the delicate foot-prints, and articles of female
luxury would have hardly caught attention, much less sustained it with
so feverish curiosity, in any one of the courts opening upon the Rue
de Rivoli, or Rue Lafitte.

The concierge next door, I was persuaded, knew more of his inmates
than he care