"Be calm; don't weep any more. Tell me how I can serve you."

"Rather than return to that horrible house I was in yesterday I would
throw myself into the sea."

"Do you know of any respectable house where I can keep her?" said I to
the man.

He told me he did know a respectable individual who let furnished
apartments.

"Take me to it, then."

The man was of an advanced age, and he had rooms to let on all the
floors.

"I only want a little nook," said the girl; and the old man took us to
the highest story, and opened the door of a garret, saying--

"This closet is six francs a month, a month's rent to be paid in advance,
and I may tell you that my door is always shut at ten o'clock, and that
nobody can come and pass the night with you."

The room held a bed with coarse sheets, two chairs, a little table, and a
chest of drawers.

"How much will you board this young woman for?" said I.

He asked twenty sous, and two sous for the maid who would bring her meals
and do her room.

"That will do," said the girl, and she paid the month's rent and the
day's board. I left her telling her I would come back again.

As I went down the stairs I asked the old man to shew me a room for
myself. He skewed me a very nice one at a Louis a month, and I paid in
advance. He then gave me a latch-key, that I might go and come when I
liked.

"If you wish to board here," said he, "I think I could give
satisfaction."

Having done this good work, I had my dinner by myself, and then went to a
coffee-house where I found the amiable Knight of Malta who was playing.
He left the game as soon as he saw me, put the fistfull of gold he had
won into his pocket, accosted me with the politeness natural to a
Frenchman, and asked me how I had liked the lady who had given me my
supper. I told him what had happened, at which he laughed, and asked me
to come and see his ballet-girl. We found her under the hairdresser's
hands, and she received me with the playful familiarity with which one
greets an old acquaintance. I did not think much of her, but I pretended
to be immensely struck, with the idea of pleasing the good-natured
knight.

When the hairdresser left her, it was time for her to get ready for the
theatre, and she dressed herself, without caring who was present. The
knight helped her to change her chemise, which she allowed him to do as a
matter of course, though indeed she begged me to excuse her.

As I owed her a compliment, I coul