ght Chupin.

And, in fact, nothing could be more repulsive than the tenement in which
Madame Paul had installed herself. It was but one story high, and built
of clay, and it had fallen to ruin to such an extent that it had been
found necessary to prop it up with timber, and to nail some old boards
over the yawning fissures in the walls. "If I lived here, I certainly
shouldn't feel quite at ease on a windy day," continued Chupin, sotto
voce.

The shop itself was of a fair size, but most wretched in its
appointments, and disgustingly dirty. The floor was covered with that
black and glutinous coal-dust which forms the soil of the Quai de la
Seine. An auctioneer would have sold the entire stock and fixtures for
a few shillings. Four stone jars, and a couple of pairs of scales, a
few odd tumblers, filled with pipes and packets of cigarettes, some
wine-glasses, and three or four labelled bottles, five or six boxes of
cigars, and as many packages of musty tobacco, constituted the entire
stock in trade.

As Chupin compared this vile den with the viscount's luxurious abode,
his blood fairly boiled in his veins. "He ought to be shot for this, if
for nothing else," he muttered through his set teeth. "To let his wife
die of starvation here!" For it was M. de Coralth's wife who kept this
shop. Chupin, who had seen her years before, recognized her now as she
sat behind her counter, although she was cruelly changed. "That's her,"
he murmured. "That's certainly Mademoiselle Flavie."

He had used her maiden name in speaking of her. Poor woman! She was
undoubtedly still young--but sorrow, regret, and privations, days
spent in hard work to earn a miserable subsistence, and nights spent in
weeping, had made her old, haggard, and wrinkled before her time. Of
her once remarkable beauty naught remained but her hair, which was still
magnificent, though it was in wild disorder, and looked as if it had not
been touched by a comb for weeks; and her big black eyes, which gleamed
with the phosphorescent and destructive brilliancy of fever. Everything
about her person bespoke terrible reverses, borne without dignity. Even
if she had struggled at first, it was easy to see that she struggled
no longer. Her attire--her torn and soiled silk dress, and her dirty
cap--revealed thorough indolence, and that morbid indifference which at
times follows great misfortunes with weak natures.

"Such is life," thought Chupin, philosophically. "Here's a girl wh