could ever need
one." Her hand slid from his, and she turned away wounded to the quick.

"Have you your coupe at the door?" asked Savarin.

"Simply a fiacre."

"And are going back at once to Paris?"

"Yes."

"Will you kindly drop me in the Rue de Rivoli?"

"Charmed to be of use."

CHAPTER XI.

As the fiacre bore to Paris Savarin and Graham, the former said, "I
cannot conceive what rich simpleton could entertain so high an opinion
of Gustave Rameau as to select a man so young, and of reputation though
promising so undecided, for an enterprise which requires such a degree
of tact and judgment as the conduct of a new journal,--and a journal,
too, which is to address itself to the beau monde. However, it is not
for me to criticise a selection which brings a god-send to myself."

"To yourself? You jest; you have a journal of your own. It can only be
through an excess of good-nature that you lend your name and pen to the
service of M. Gustave Rameau."

"My good-nature does not go to that extent. It is Rameau who confers a
service upon me. Peste! mon cher, we French authors have not the rents
of you rich English milords. And though I am the most economical of our
tribe, yet that journal of mine has failed me of late; and this morning
I did not exactly see how I was to repay a sum I had been obliged to
borrow of a money-lender,--for I am too proud to borrow of friends,
and too sagacious to borrow of publishers,--when in walks ce cher petit
Gustave with an offer, for a few trifles towards starting this new-born
journal, which makes a new man of me. Now I am in the undertaking, my
amour propre and my reputation are concerned in its success; and I shall
take care that collaborateurs of whose company I am not ashamed are in
the same boat. But that charming girl, Isaura! What an enigma the gift
of the pen is! No one can ever guess who has it until tried."

"The young lady's manuscript, then, really merits the praise you
bestowed on it?"

"Much more praise, though a great deal of blame, which I did not
bestow,--for in a first work faults insure success as much as beauties.
Anything better than tame correctness. Yes, her first work, to judge by
what is written, must make a hit,--a great hit. And that will decide her
career. A singer, an actress, may retire,--often does when she marries
an author; but once an author always an author."

"Ah! is it so? If you had a beloved daughter, Savarin, would you
encourage he