les flickered in the
little chapels.

As no other light relieved the sombre blackness of the vaulted
edifice, an indefinite ghostliness prevailed, from out of which the
numerous gilded forms of the Virgin and the saints appeared half
intangible, as if hovering about with no fixed support or substance.

The church might have been deserted, so far as any living indications
were visible, though two or three darker splotches on the darkness
could have been taken for as many penitents seeking the peace which
passeth understanding.

Gliding softly down the right, outside of the pews and row of stately
columns, Mlle. Fouchette stopped only at the last pillar, from which
she had a near view of the pretty white altar. She remained there,
leaning against the pillar, her eyes bent upon the altar, motionless,
for a long time.

During that period she had pictured just how the young couple would
look,--how beautiful the bride would appear,--how noble and handsome
Jean Marot would shine at her side.

She supplied all of the details as she had seen them once before,
correcting and rearranging them in her mind with scrupulous care.

All of this dreamily and without emotion, as one lies in the summer
shade idly tracing the fleeting clouds across a summer's sky.

She had grown wonderfully calm, and when she turned away she gently
put the picture behind her as an accomplished material thing.

On her way she paused before the little chapel of Ste. Genevieve.
There were candles burning before the altar, and a delicious, holy
incense filled the air.

Mlle. Fouchette recalled the stories of the intercession of Ste.
Genevieve in behalf of virgin suppliants, and impetuously fell upon
her knees outside the railing and bowed her face in her hands.

She knew absolutely nothing of theological truth and error; religion
was to her only a vague scheme devised for other people--not for her.
She had never in all her life uttered a prayer save on compulsion.
Now, impulsively and without forethought, she was kneeling before the
altar and acknowledging God and the intercession of the Christ.

It was the instinct of poor insignificant humanity--the weakest and
the strongest, the worst and the best--to seek in the hour of
suffering and despair some higher power upon which to unburden the
load of life.

To say now that Mlle. Fouchette prayed would be too much. She did not
know how,--and the few sentences she recalled from Le Bon Pasteur
seemed