t to quarrel with a man who carried fifty thousand francs on his
little finger.

"Well, sir," she said, "as poor Coco annoys you, I will put him in a
back room, where you cannot hear him."

The Englishman made a gesture of satisfaction.

"However," added he, pointing once more to his boots, "I should have
preferred--."

"Don't be afraid. Where I mean to put him it will be impossible for him
to trouble milord."

"Oh! I am not a lord; only an esquire."

With that, Mr. Birne was retiring, after a very low bow, when Delores,
who never neglected her interests, took up a small pocket from a work
table and said:

"Tonight sir, is my benefit at the theater. I am to play in three
pieces. Will you allow me to offer you some box tickets? The price has
been but very slightly raised." And she put a dozen boxes into the
Briton's hand.

"After showing myself so prompt to oblige him," thought she, "he cannot
refuse, if he is a gentleman, and if he sees me play in my pink costume,
who knows? He is very ugly, to be sure, and very sad looking, but he
might furnish me the means of going to England without being sea sick."

The Englishman having taken the tickets, had their purport explained to
him a second time. He then asked the price.

"The boxes are sixty francs each, and there are ten there, but no
hurry," said added, seeing the Englishman take out his pocketbook. "I
hope that as we are neighbors, this is not the last time I shall have
the honor of a visit from you."

"I do not like to run up bills," replied Mr. Birne and drawing from the
pocketbook a thousand franc note, he laid it on the table and slid the
tickets into his pockets.

"I will give you change," said Dolores, opening a little drawer.

"Never mind," said the Englishman, "the rest will do for a drink," and
he went off leaving Dolores thunder struck at his last words.

"For a drink!" she exclaimed. "What a clown! I will send him back his
money."

But her neighbor's rudeness had only irritated the epidermis of her
vanity; reflection calmed her. She thought that a thousand francs made a
very nice "pile," after all, and that she had already put up with
impertinences at a cheaper rate.

"Bah!" she said to herself. "It won't do to be so proud. No one was by,
and this is my washerwoman's mouth. And this Englishman speaks so badly,
perhaps he only means to pay me a compliment."

So she pocketed her bank note joyfully.

But that night after the theater she r