indulgence. In an
instant I knew it to be that of the young man whom I had seen on the
levee.

"Monsieur Auguste?" stammered Madame.

"Bon soir, Madame," he cried gayly, with a bow; "diable, they are
already at it, I see, and the punch in the bowl. I will win back
to-night what I have lost by a week of accursed luck."

"Monsieur your father has relented, perhaps," said Madame,
deferentially.

"Relented!" cried the young man, "not a sou. C'est egal! I have the
means here," and he tapped his pocket, "I have the means here to set me
on my feet again, Madame."

He spoke with a note of triumph, and Madame took a curious step towards
him.

"Qu'est-ce-que c'est, Monsieur Auguste?" she inquired.

He drew something that glittered from his pocket and beckoned to her to
follow him down the room, which she did with alacrity.

"Ha, Adolphe," he cried to the young man of the puffy face, "I will have
my revenge to-night. Voila!!" and he held up the shining thing, "this
goes to the highest bidder, and you will agree that it is worth a pretty
sum."

They rose from their chairs and clustered around him at the table,
Madame in their midst, staring with bent heads at the trinket which he
held to the light. It was Madame's voice I heard first, in a kind of
frightened cry.

"Mon Dieu, Monsieur Auguste, you will not part with that!" she
exclaimed.

"Why not?" demanded the young man, indifferently. "It was painted by
Boze, the back is solid gold, and the Jew in the Rue Toulouse will give
me four hundred livres for it to-morrow morning."

There followed immediately such a chorus of questions, exclamations,
and shrill protests from Madame Bouvet, that I (being such a laborious
French scholar) could distinguish but little of what they said. I looked
in wonderment at the gesticulating figures grouped against the light,
Madame imploring, the youthful profile of the newcomer marked with a
cynical and scornful refusal. More than once I was for rising out of
my chair to go over and see for myself what the object was, and then,
suddenly, I perceived Madame Bouvet coming towards me in evident
agitation. She sank into the chair beside me.

"If I had four hundred livres," she said, "if I had four hundred
livres!"

"And what then?" I asked.

"Monsieur," she said, "a terrible thing has happened. Auguste de
Saint-Gre--"

"Auguste de Saint-Gre!" I exclaimed.

"He is the son of that Monsieur de Saint-Gre of whom we spoke," she
answere