he rencontre was a most affecting one, conducted in
voluble French in the full blaze of publicity in a crowded hotel
lounge. The English audience was impressed and honestly sympathetic;
our insular reserve has been melted in the fires of war. "It is a
French lady, poor thing, who has lost her husband," they whispered,
the one to another, "and that handsome fellow in ordinary
evening-dress is her man's brother officer, who was with him at the
last, and who brought the sad news to her. How sweet she looks, and
how tenderly sympathetic he is!" The eyes of the men had already been
drawn to Madame's royal beauty and those of the women to her dress, a
masterpiece of Paquin. Now that she had met Rust the men were
sorrowful, regretting a vanished opportunity of making her
acquaintance, and the women were relieved. She was too formidable a
rival to be at large, alone and unattended, but now she would be
monopolised naturally and properly by her good-looking compatriot. So
when Madame and Rust slipped away to a corner of the lounge, kindly
eyes followed them, and the voices of the censorious had no excuse to
be raised. "You are a wonder, madame," whispered Rust. "And you, my
friend, did not so badly," replied Madame in frank approval.

They separated early that evening, for Madame, who knew not what it
was to feel really tired, shammed fatigue as a reason for retiring
betimes. To her came Marie, a little dark French _femme de chambre_ of
the second floor, imploring to be allowed to assist at the night
toilet of a desolate widow of France. While Marie brushed out the
long, rich, copper hair the two chattered unceasingly of France and
the Army of steel-hearted poilus which held the frontiers of
civilisation away yonder in Picardy, Artois, Champagne, and the
Vosges. Marie herself had a man out there of whose welfare she had
heard nothing since the war began. She had received no letters, and
the French publish no casualty lists. "_Mon cher petit homme est mort,
madame. C'est certain, mais j'espere toujours_." There are many, many
Frenchwomen to whom the death of their loved ones is certain, though
they hope always. "I felt rather a pig talking fibs to the poor girl,"
confessed Madame.

Madame Gilbert had made her plans with thoughtful care, and proposed
to carry them out with hardihood. She had determined to work so
adroitly on the Saturday upon the curiosity and "poor strained heart"
of Rust that he would be speeded up to run big