it was dark enough to be convenient, I
went."

"There was still that light in the impasse by which my poor friend
Vaucher had seen Madame Bertin weeping; but from the windows of the
house there came none. It was shuttered like a fort. It was not till
I had knocked many times upon the door that there came any response.
At last I heard bolts being withdrawn--bolt after bolt, as if the
place had been a prison or a treasury; and Madame Bertin herself
stood in the entry. The one lamp in the impasse showed her my
uniform, and she breathed like one who had been running."

"I saluted her and inquired for Bertin."

"'Captain Bertin?' she repeated after me. 'I do not know--I fear----'"

"'My business with him is urgent,' I told her, and at that she
whitened. 'And unofficial,' I added, therefore."

"At that she stood aside for me to enter. I aided her to fasten the
door again, and she led me up the stairs to a small room, divided by
large doors from an inner chamber."

"'If you will please be seated,' she said, 'I will send Captain
Bertin in to you.'"

"She was thinner, I thought, and perhaps a trifle less assured; but
that was to be understood. For the rest, she had the deliberate tones
of the salon, the little smile of a convention that is not irksome.
Her voice, her posture, had that grace one knows and defers to at
sight. It was all very wonderful to come upon in that house. As she
left the room, her profile shone against the wall like a cameo, so
splendid in its pallor and the fineness of its outline."

"She must have gone from the passage by another entrance to the room
beyond the double doors, for I heard her voice there--and his. They
spoke together for some minutes, she at length, but he shortly; and
then the doors slid apart a foot or so, and he came through sideways.
He gave me a desperate look, and pulled at the doors to close them
behind him. They stuck and resisted him, and he ceased his efforts at
once."

"'You wanted to speak to me?' he asked. He seemed to be frowning as a
child will frown to keep from bursting into tears. 'But not
officially, I believe? It is not official, is it?'"

"'No,' I answered. 'It is a message--quite private.'"

"He ceased to frown at that, staring at me heavily, and chewing his
moustache."

"'Sit down,' he said suddenly, and came nearer, glancing over his
shoulder at the aperture of the doors. Something in that movement
gave me the suggestion that he was accustomed to gua