don't read my riddle too soon, or I shall bore you.- Allow me to ask you a question."

She laid down her brushes and looked at him with the utmost gravity. His heart beat; he bent forward.

"Are you ever hungry, Monsieur David?"

He sprang up, half enraged, half ashamed.

"Where can we get some food?"

"That is my affair," she said, putting up her brushes. humble, monsieur, and take a lesson in Paris."

"Be

And out they went together, he beside himself with delight of accompanying her, and proudly carrying her box and satchel. How her little feet slipped in and out of her pretty dress! how, as they stood on the top of the great flight of stairs leading down into the court of the Louvre, the wind from outside blew back the curls from her brow, and ruffled the violets in her hat, the black lace about her tiny throat! It was an enchantment to follow and to serve her. She led him through the Tuileries Gardens and the Place de la Concorde to the Champs Elysées. The fountains leapt in the sun; the river blazed between the great white buildings of its banks; to the left was the gilded dome of the Invalides and the mass of the Corps Législatif; while in front of them rose the long ascent to the Arc de l'Étoile, set in vivid green on either hand. Everywhere was space, glitter, magnificence. The gayety of Paris entered into the Englishman and took possession.

Presently, as they wandered up the Champs Elysées, they passed a great building to the left. Elise stopped and clasped her hands in front of her with a little nervous spasmodic gest

ure.

"That," she said, "is the Salon. My fate lies there. When we have had some food, I will take you in to see."

She led him a little further up the avenue; then took him aside through cunningly devised labyrinths of green till they came upon a little café restaurant among the trees, where people sat under an awning, and the wind drove the spray of a little fountain hither and thither among the bushes. It was gay, foreign, romantic, unlike anything David had ever seen in his northern world. He sat down, with Barbier's stories running in his head. Mademoiselle Delaunay was George Sand-independent, gifted, on the road to fame like that great déclassée of old; and he was

her friend and comrade,- a humble soldier, a camp follower, in the great army of letters.

Their meal was of the lightest. This descent on the Champs Elysées had been a freak on Elise's part, who wished to do nothing so banal as to take her companion to the Palais Royal. But the restaurant she had chosen, though of a much humbler kind than those which the rich tourist commonly associates with this part of Paris, was still a good deal more expensive than she had rashly supposed. She opened her eyes gravely at the charges; abused herself extravagantly for a lack of savoir vivre: and both with one accord declared that it was too hot to eat. But upon such eggs and such green peas as they did allow themselves—a portion of each, scrupulously shared- David at any rate was prepared to live to the end of the chapter.

Afterwards, over the coffee and the cigarettes,- Elise taking her part in both,- they lingered for one of those hours which make the glamour of youth. Confidences flowed fast between them. His French grew suppler and more docile, answered more truly to the individuality behind it. He told her of his bringingup, of his wandering with the sheep on the mountains, of his reading among the heather, of 'Lias and his visions, of Hannah's cruelties and Louie's tempers, - that same idyl of peasant life to which Dora had listened some months before. But how differently told! Each different listener changes the tale, readjusts the tone. But here also the tale pleased. Elise, for all her leanings towards new schools in art, had the Romantic's imagination, and the Romantic's relish for things foreign and unaccustomed. The English boy and his story seemed to her both charming and original. Her artist's eye followed the lines of the ruffled black head, and noted the red-brown of the skin. She felt a wish to draw him, a wish which had entirely vanished in the case of Louie.

"Your sister has taken a dislike to me," she said to him once, coolly. "And for me, I am afraid of her. Ah! and she broke my glass!»

She shivered, and a look of anxiety and depression invaded her small face. He guessed that she was thinking, of her pictures, and began timidly to speak to her about them. When they returned to the world of art, his fluency left him; he felt crushed beneath the weight of his own ignorance and her accomplishment.

"Come and see them!" she said, springing up. "I am tired of my Infanta. Let her be awhile. Come to the Salon, and I will show you 'Salome.' Or are you sick of pictures? What do you want to see? Ça m'est égal.* I can always go back to my work."

She spoke with a cavalier lightness which teased and piqued him.

"I wish to go where you go," he said flushing; "to see what you see."

She shook her little head.

"No compliments, Monsieur David. We are serious persons, you and I. Well, then, for a couple of hours, soyons camarades!”

"It's all the same to me."