lleries, carrying your box of
pastels? The long, lanky girl in the Salon Carre, who affects the English
ways, the one who will never finish copying the "Vierge au coussin vert,"
has followed you into the Louvre court. Take care! She has noticed,
envious creature, that you are very much moved as you take leave of your
companion, and that you let your hand remain for a second in his! This
old maid 'a l'anglaise' has a viper's tongue. To-morrow you will be the
talk of the Louvre, and the gossip will spread to the 'Ecole des
Beaux-Arts', even to Signol's studio, where the two daubers, your
respectful admirers, who think of cutting their throats in your honor,
will accost each other with a "Well, the pretty pastellist! Yes, I know,
she has a lover."

If it was only a lover! But the pretty pastellist has been very careless,
more foolish than the old maid or the two young fellows dream of. It is
so sweet to hear him say: "I love you!" and so delicious to listen for
the question: "And you, do you love me a little?" when she is dying to
say, "Yes!" Bending her head and blushing with confusion under Maurice's
ardent gaze, the pretty Maria ends by murmuring the fatal "Yes." Then she
sees Maurice turn pale with joy, and he says to her, "I must talk to you
alone; not before these bores." She replies: "But how? It is impossible!"
Then he asks whether she does not trust him, whether she does not believe
him to be an honest man, and the young girl's looks say more than any
protestation would.

"Well! to-morrow morning at ten o'clock--instead of coming to the
Louvre--will you? I will wait for you on the Quai d'Orsay, before the
Saint-Cloud pier."

She was there at the appointed hour, overwhelmed with emotion and ready
to faint. He took her by the arm and led her aboard the boat.

"Do you see, now we are almost alone. Give me the pleasure of wandering
through the fields with you. It is such beautiful weather. Be tranquil,
we shall return early."

Oh, the happy day! Maria sees pass before her, as she is seated beside
Maurice, who is whispering in her ear loving words and whose glances
cover her with caresses, as if in a dream, views of Paris that were not
familiar to her, high walls, arches of bridges, then the bare suburbs,
the smoking manufactories of Grenelle, the Bas Meudon, with its boats and
public-houses. At last, on the borders of the stream, the park with its
extensive verdure appeared.

They wandered there for a long time