lamps. But when they stopped before a
door she touched the _concierge_ upon the arm.

"Do not say my name," she said. "I am her mother."

The woman stared at her more than ever.

"It is not my place to announce you," she said. "I only came up because
I thought you would not find the way."

She could not have told why it was or how it happened, but when at last
she was ushered into the _salon_ a strange sense of oppression fell upon
her. The room was long and lofty, and so shadowed by the heavy curtains
falling across the windows that it was almost dark.

For a few seconds she saw nobody, and then all at once some one rose
from a reclining chair at the farther end of the apartment and advanced
a few steps toward her--a tall and stately figure, moving slowly.

"Who?"--she heard a cold, soft voice say, and then came a sharp cry, and
Laurel white hands were thrown out in a strange, desperate gesture, and
she stopped and stood like a statue of stone. "Mother--mother--mother!"
she repeated again and again, as if some indescribable pain shook her.

If she had been beautiful before, now she was more beautiful still. She
was even taller than ever,--she was like a queen. Her long robe was of
delicate gray velvet, and her hair and throat and wrists were bound with
pearls and gold. She was so lovely and so stately that for a moment Mere
Giraud was half awed, but the next it was as if her strong mother heart
broke loose.

"My Laure!" she cried out. "Yes, it is I, my child--it is I, Laure;" and
she almost fell upon her knees as she embraced her, trembling for very
ecstasy.

But Laure scarcely spoke. She was white and cold, and at last she gasped
forth three words.

"Where is Valentin?"

But Mere Giraud did not know. It was not Valentin she cared to see.
Valentin could wait, since she had, her Laure. She sat down beside her
in one of the velvet chairs, and she held the fair hand in her own. It
was covered with jewels, but she did not notice them; her affection only
told her that it was cold and tremulous.

"You are not well, Laure?" she said. "It was well that my dream warned
me to come. Something is wrong."

"I am quite well," said Laure. "I do not suffer at all."

She was so silent that if Mere Giraud had not had so much to say she
would have been troubled \ as it was, however, she was content to pour
forth her affectionate speeches one after another without waiting to be
answered.

"Where is Monsieur Legrand?" s