lks, beside the antique houses, now closed and silent, which
exhaled the evaporated perfume of the loves of other days. But it was
the old quarter, more especially, that promptly received them with
cordiality, this quarter of which the common people, instinctively
touched, felt the grace of the legend, the profound myth of the couple,
the beautiful young girl supporting the royal and rejuvenated master.
The doctor was adored here for his goodness, and his companion quickly
became popular, and was greeted with tokens of admiration and approval
as soon as she appeared. They, meantime, if they had seemed ignorant
of the former hostility, now divined easily the forgiveness and the
indulgent tenderness which surrounded them, and this made them more
beautiful; their happiness charmed the entire town.

One afternoon, as Pascal and Clotilde turned the corner of the Rue de la
Banne, they perceived Dr. Ramond on the opposite side of the street. It
had chanced that they had learned the day before that he had asked and
had obtained the hand of Mlle. Leveque, the advocate's daughter. It was
certainly the most sensible course he could have taken, for his business
interests made it advisable that he should marry, and the young girl,
who was very pretty and very rich, loved him. He, too, would certainly
love her in time. Therefore Clotilde joyfully smiled her congratulations
to him as a sincere friend. Pascal saluted him with an affectionate
gesture. For a moment Ramond, a little moved by the meeting, stood
perplexed. His first impulse seemed to have been to cross over to them.
But a feeling of delicacy must have prevented him, the thought that it
would be brutal to interrupt their dream, to break in upon this solitude
_a deux_, in which they moved, even amid the elbowings of the street.
And he contented himself with a friendly salutation, a smile in which he
forgave them their happiness. This was very pleasant for all three.

At this time Clotilde amused herself for several days by painting
a large pastel representing the tender scene of old King David and
Abishag, the young Shunammite. It was a dream picture, one of those
fantastic compositions into which her other self, her romantic self, put
her love of the mysterious. Against a background of flowers thrown on
the canvas, flowers that looked like a shower of stars, of barbaric
richness, the old king stood facing the spectator, his hand resting on
the bare shoulder of Abishag. He wa