ened at the head of the stairs and a flood of light met the
new-comers.

In the doorway, which was ten feet high, the little bent form of the
Marquis de Gemosac stood waiting.

"Ah! ah!" he said, with that pleasant manner of his generation, which
was refined and spirituelle and sometimes dramatic, and yet ever
failed to touch aught but the surface of life. "Ah! ah! Safely
accomplished--the great journey. Safely accomplished. You permit--"

And he embraced Barebone after the custom of his day.

"From all sides," he said, when the door was closed, "I hear that you
have done great things. From every quarter one hears your praise."

He held him at arm's length.

"Yes," he said. "Your face is graver and--more striking in resemblance
than ever. So now you know--now you have seen."

"Yes," answered Barebone, gravely. "I have seen and I know."

The Marquis rubbed his white hands together and gave a little crackling
laugh of delight as he drew forward a chair to the fire, which was of
logs as long as a barrel. The room was a huge one, and it was lighted
from end to end with lamps, as if for a reception or a ball. The air
was damp and mouldly. There were patches of grey on the walls, which had
once been painted with garlands of roses and Cupids and pastoral scenes
by a noted artist of the Great Age.

The ceiling had fallen in places, and the woodwork of the carved
furniture gave forth a subtle scent of dry rot.

But everything was in an exquisite taste which vulgarer generations
have never yet succeeded in imitating. Nothing was concealed, but rather
displayed with a half-cynical pride. All was moth-ridden, worm-eaten,
fallen to decay--but it was of the Monarchy. Not half a dozen houses
in Paris, where already the wealth, which has to-day culminated in a
ridiculous luxury of outward show, was beginning to build new palaces,
could show room after room furnished in the days of the Great Louis.
The very air, faintly scented it would seem by some forgotten perfume,
breathed of a bygone splendour. And the last of the de Gemosacs scorned
to screen his poverty from the eyes of his equals, nor sought to hide
from them a desolation which was only symbolic of that which crushed
their hearts and bade them steal back from time to time like criminals
to the capital.

"You see," he said to Colville and Barebone, "I have kept my promise,
I have thrown open this old house once more for to-night's meeting.
You will find that many fri