er of
confetti. The girl laughingly shook it out of her beautiful blonde
hair.

"Allons donc! She has my hair, too!" thought Mlle. Fouchette. It is
impossible not to admire ourselves in others.

With the excitement of an unaccustomed pleasure mantling her neck and
cheeks the girl was certainly a pretty picture. The plain and simple
costume was of the cut of the provinces rather than that of Paris, but
it set off the lithe and graceful figure that needed no artificiality
of the dressmaker to enforce its petite perfection.

"That must be Lerouge," thought Mlle. Fouchette. "He does look
something like--no; it is imagination. He is not nearly so handsome as
Monsieur Marot. But she is sweet!"

The couple were forced over against the chairs by the crowd and Mlle.
Fouchette got a good look at them. The eyes of Mlle. Remy met
hers,--they sought the face of her companion, and returned and rested
curiously upon Mlle. Fouchette. The glance of her escort followed in
the same direction. And even after they had passed he half turned
again and looked back at the girl sitting alone amid the crowd under
the awning.

Jean Marot had plunged into the throng to try and shake off the
unpleasant suggestions of Mlle. Fouchette. While he felt instinctively
the feminine malice, it was none the less bitter to his taste. It was
opening a wound afresh and salting it. He felt that the idea suggested
by "La Savatiere" was intolerable,--impossible. He paced up and down
alone in the Luxembourg gardens until retreat was sounded. Then he
re-entered the boulevard by the Place de Medicis, dodged a bevy of
singing grisettes in male attire, to suddenly find himself face to
face with the object of his thoughts.

How beautiful, and sweet and pure and innocent she looked! The
laughing eyes, the profusion of hair with its tint of gold, now
sparkling with confetti, the two rows of pearls between their rich
rims of red,--it surely was an angel from the skies and not a woman
who stood before him! And his knees trembled with the desire to let
him to the earth at her feet.

The young girl regarded him first in semi-recognition, then with blank
astonishment,--as well she might. She shrank closer to her protector.

Henri Lerouge had at first looked at his former friend with a dark and
scowling face; but Jean had seen only the girl, and therefore failed
to note the expression of satisfaction that swiftly succeeded.

"Pardon! but, monsieur, even Mardi Gras do