t Hermine might have felt offended, and that I
should find them torn in pieces and thrown down at my door, or that she
would be waiting for me with a severe reprimand for my boldness and
impertinence. But I could find no trace of them, and went to sleep,
soothed by the conviction that they had been carefully put by in a glass
of water, or were occupying a place on her pillow by the side of her
dainty cheek. I feared to meet Therese's sorrowful face again the next
night, and was troubled so much by the thought of it through the day,
that I fairly deserted her that evening and bought my two bouquets
elsewhere. With one of these, which I had taken care should be of a
finer quality than before, I repeated my experiment of the preceding
night and with the same gratifying result. But the day after,
forgetting, until it was too late, that I had given Therese fair cause
to be seriously angry with me, habit carried me to my old resort again,
though I had fully determined to reach home by another way, and to
patronize, for the future, my new _bouquetiere,_ who was not only old
and ugly, but of the masculine gender. Habit--and perhaps wish had
something to do with it--was too strong, however, and I found myself
turning down the Quai Voltaire at the customary hour the next evening.

Much to my surprise, and somewhat to my mortification, Therese greeted
me with her old sunny smile. Her _"Bon jour, Monsieur,"_ was as cordial
as ever; and it even seemed to me--and that didn't in the least tend to
compose me--that her eyes sparkled with an archness which I had never
seen in them before, and that her voice had in it a tinge of malice, as
she held out to me two of her finest bunches, saying,--

_"Est-ce que, Monsieur en desire deux encore ce soir?"_

I was very angry with her for being in such good-humor, and believe I
was anything but aimable or polite with her. Why did she not look
hurt or offended and reproach me for my desertion, instead of almost
disarming my senseless anger by her gentleness?

"It seems that Monsieur forgets his old friends, sometimes," she
continued, as I took the flowers she had been holding towards me, and
was fumbling in my pocket for the change.

"Forget!" I stammered; for the temper I found her in had so completely
ruffled mine, that I was hardly sufficiently master of myself to be able
to answer her at all,--"what makes you think I forget? Am I not here
this evening, as usual?"

"This evening, yes,--bu