nity of the two men told her
that she must be silent.

"Mademoiselle Planus, my sister, you will put clean sheets on my bed.
Our friend Risler does us the honor to pass the night with us."

The sister hastened away to prepare the bedroom with an almost
affectionate zeal; for, as we know, beside "Monsieur Planus, my
brother," Risler was the only man excepted from the general reprobation
in which she enveloped the whole male sex.

Upon leaving the cafe concert, Sidonie's husband had had a moment of
frantic excitement. He leaned on Planus's arm, every nerve in his body
strained to the utmost. At that moment he had no thought of going to
Montrouge to get the letter and the package.

"Leave me--go away," he said to Sigismond. "I must be alone."

But the other knew better than to abandon him thus to his despair.
Unnoticed by Risler, he led him away from the factory, and as his
affectionate heart suggested to the old cashier what he had best say to
his friend, he talked to him all the time of Frantz, his little Frantz
whom he loved so dearly.

"That was genuine affection, genuine and trustworthy. No treachery to
fear with such hearts as that!"

While they talked they left behind them the noisy streets of the centre
of Paris. They walked along the quays, skirted the Jardin des Plantes,
plunged into Faubourg Saint-Marceau. Risler followed where the other
led. Sigismond's words did him so much good!

In due time they came to the Bievre, bordered at that point with
tanneries whose tall drying-houses with open sides were outlined in blue
against the sky; and then the ill-defined plains of Montsouris, vast
tracts of land scorched and stripped of vegetation by the fiery breath
that Paris exhales around its daily toil, like a monstrous dragon, whose
breath of flame and smoke suffers no vegetation within its range.

From Montsouris to the fortifications of Montrouge is but a step. When
they had reached that point, Planus had no great difficulty in taking
his friend home with him. He thought, and justly, that his tranquil
fireside, the spectacle of a placid, fraternal, devoted affection, would
give the wretched man's heart a sort of foretaste of the happiness that
was in store for him with his brother Frantz. And, in truth, the charm
of the little household began to work as soon as they arrived.

"Yes, yes, you are right, old fellow," said Risler, pacing the floor of
the living-room, "I mustn't think of that woman any more. S