and evaporates amid new
surroundings.

The heavy sky of a summer evening hung over the city and over the great
avenue where, under the trees, the gay refrains of open-air concerts
were beginning to sound. The two men, seated on the balcony of the Cafe
des Ambassadeurs, looked down upon the still empty benches and chairs of
the inclosure up to the little stage, where the singers, in the mingled
light of electric globes and fading day, displayed their striking
costumes and their rosy complexions. Odors of frying, of sauces, of hot
food, floated in the slight breezes from the chestnut-trees, and when
a woman passed, seeing her reserved chair, followed by a man in a black
coat, she diffused on her way the fresh perfume of her dress and her
person.

Guilleroy, who was radiant, murmured:

"Oh, I like to be here much better than in the country!"

"And I," Bertin replied, "should like it much better to be there than
here."

"Nonsense!"

"Heavens, yes! I find Paris tainted this summer."

"Oh, well, my dear fellow, it is always Paris, after all."

The Deputy seemed to be enjoying his day, one of those rare days of
effervescence and gaiety in which grave men do foolish things. He looked
at two cocottes dining at a neighboring table with three thin young men,
superlatively correct, and he slyly questioned Olivier about all the
well-known girls, whose names were heard every day. Then he murmured in
a tone of deep regret:

"You were lucky to have remained a bachelor. You can do and see many
things."

But the painter did not agree with him, and, as a man will do when
haunted by a persistent idea, he took Guilleroy into his confidence on
the subject of his sadness and isolation. When he had said everything,
had recited to the end of his litany of melancholy, and, urged by the
longing to relieve his heart, had confessed naively how much he would
have enjoyed the love and companionship of a woman installed in his
home, the Count, in his turn, admitted that marriage had its advantages.
Recovering his parliamentary eloquence in order to sing the praises of
his domestic happiness, he eulogized the Countess in the highest terms,
to which Olivier listened gravely with frequent nods of approval.

Happy to hear her spoken of, but jealous of that intimate happiness
which Guilleroy praised as a matter of duty, the painter finally
murmured, with sincere conviction:

"Yes, indeed, you were the lucky one!"

The Deputy, flattered,