Louise, if I
seem strange at first, but there is more in it than I can tell you. No
one must know that I am in London to-night. When we reach this place to
which you are taking me, and we are really alone, then we can talk. I
have so much to say."

She looked at him doubtfully. It was indeed a moment of indecision with
her. Then she began to laugh softly.

"Dear one, but you have changed!" she exclaimed, compassionately. "After
all, why not? I must not forget that things have gone so hardly with
you. It seems odd, indeed, to see you sitting there, muffled up like
an old man, afraid to show yourself. You know how foolish you are? With
your black cape and that queer hat, you are so different from all the
others. If you seek to remain unrecognized, why do you not dress as all
the men do? Any one who was suspicious would recognize you from your
clothes."

"It is true," he muttered. "I did not think of it."

She leaned towards him.

"You will not even kiss me?" she murmured.

"Not yet," he answered.

She made a little grimace.

"But you are cold!"

"You do not understand," he answered. "They are watching me--even
to-night they are watching me. Oh, if you only knew, Louise, how I have
longed for this hour that is to come!"

Her vanity was assuaged. She patted his hand but came no nearer.

"You are a foolish man," she said, "very foolish."

"It is not for you to say that," he replied. "If I have been foolish,
were not you often the cause of my folly?" Again she laughed.

"Oh, la, la! It is always the same! It is always you men who accuse! For
that presently I shall reprove you. But now--as for now, behold, we have
arrived!"

"It is a crowded thoroughfare," the man remarked, nervously, looking up
and down Shaftesbury Avenue.

"Stupid!" she cried, stepping out. "I do not recognize you to-night,
little one. Even your voice is different. Follow me quickly across the
pavement and up the stairs. There is only one flight. The flat I have
borrowed is on the second floor. I do not care very much that people
should recognize me either, under the circumstances. There is nothing
they love so much," she added, with a toss of the head, "as finding an
excuse to have my picture in the paper."

He followed her down the dim hall and up the broad, flat stairs, keeping
always some distance behind. On the first landing she drew a key from
her pocket and opened a door. It was the door of Monsieur Guillot's
sitting-room. A rou