ut he has gone to the bottom of the
Seine with something like six ounces of lead in his skull."

CHAPTER XL

THE ENIGMA OF THE THIRD STORY.

Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?--MARLOWE.

In Paris, a lodging-house (or, as they prefer to style it, a _hotel
meuble_) is a little town in itself; a beehive swarming from basement to
attic; a miniature model of the great world beyond, with all its loves
and hatreds, jealousies, aspirations, and struggles. Like that world, it
contains several grades of society, but with this difference, that those
who therein occupy the loftiest position are held in the lowest
estimation. Thus, the fifth-floor lodgers turn up their noses at the
inhabitants of the attics; while the fifth-floor is in its turn scorned
by the fourth, and the fourth is despised by the third, and the third by
the second, down to the magnificent dwellers on _the premier etage_, who
live in majestic disdain of everybody above or beneath them, from the
grisettes in the garret, to the _concierge_ who has care of the cellars.

The house in which I lived in the Cite Bergere was, in fact, a double
house, and contained no fewer than thirty tenants, some of whom had
wives, children, and servants. It consisted of six floors, and each
floor contained from eight to ten rooms. These were let in single
chambers, or in suites, as the case might be; and on the outer doors
opening round the landings were painted the names, or affixed the
visiting-cards, of the dwellers within. My own third-floor neighbors
were four in number. To my left lived a certain Monsieur and Madame
Lemercier, a retired couple from Alsace. Opposite their door, on the
other side of the well staircase, dwelt one Monsieur Cliquot, an elderly
_employe_ in some public office; next to him, Signor Milanesi, an
Italian refugee who played in the orchestra at the _Varietes_ every
night, was given to practising the violoncello by day, and wore as much
hair about his face as a Skye-terrier. Lastly, in the apartment to my
right, resided a lady, upon whose door was nailed a small visiting-card
engraved with these words:--

MLLE. HORTENSE DUFRESNOY.

_Teacher of Languages_.

I had resided in the house for months before I ever beheld this
Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy. When I did at last encounter her upon
the stairs one dusk autumnal evening, she wore a thick black veil, and,
darting past me like a bird on the wing, disappeared down the staircas