xecute the measures of
a polka in the presence of a client, or I would indeed have jumped up
and danced with glee. The happy thoughts were hammering away in my
mind: "The old one is much too old--the young one she never sees!" and
I could have knelt down and kissed the hem of her gown for the
exquisite indifference with which she had uttered those magic words:
"Oh! I hardly ever see him!"--words which converted my brightest hopes
into glowing possibilities.

But, as it was, I held my emotions marvellously in check, and with
perfect sang-froid once more asked the beauteous creature how I could
be of service to her in her need.

"Of late, Monsieur," she said, as she raised a pair of limpid, candid
blue eyes to mine, "my position in Mr. Farewell's house has become
intolerable. He pursues me with his attentions, and he has become
insanely jealous. He will not allow me to speak to anyone, and has
even forbidden M. Cazales, his own nephew, the house. Not that I care
about that," she added with an expressive shrug of the shoulders.

"He has forbidden M. Cazales the house," rang like a paean in my ear.
"Not that she cares about that! Tra la, la, la, la, la!" What I
actually contrived to say with a measured and judicial air was:

"If you deign to entrust me with the conduct of your affairs, I would
at once communicate with the English lawyers in your name and suggest
to them the advisability of appointing another guardian. . . . I would
suggest, for instance . . . er . . . that I . . ."

"How can you do that, Monsieur?" she broke in somewhat impatiently,
"seeing that I cannot possibly tell you who these lawyers are?"

"Eh?" I queried, gasping.

"I neither know their names nor their residence in England."

Once more I gasped. "Will you explain?" I murmured.

"It seems, Monsieur, that while my dear mother lived she always
refused to take a single sou from my father, who had so basely
deserted her. Of course, she did not know that he was making a fortune
over in England, nor that he was making diligent inquiries as to her
whereabouts when he felt that he was going to die. Thus, he discovered
that she had died the previous year and that I was working in the
atelier of Madame Cecile, the well-known milliner. When the English
lawyers wrote to me at that address they, of course, said that they
would require all my papers of identification before they paid any
money over to me, and so, when Mr. Farewell went over to England, h