to see his happiness reflected in every eye. The
dinner was drawing near its close. The wave of private conversation
flowed around the table. Faces were turned toward one another, black
sleeves stole behind waists adorned with bunches of asclepias, a
childish face laughed over a fruit ice, and the dessert at the level of
the guests' lips encompassed the cloth with animation, bright colors,
and light.

Ah, yes! Risler was very happy.

Except his brother Frantz, everybody he loved was there. First of all,
sitting opposite him, was Sidonie--yesterday little Sidonie, to-day his
wife. For the ceremony of dinner she had laid aside her veil; she had
emerged from her cloud. Now, above the smooth, white silk gown, appeared
a pretty face of a less lustrous and softer white, and the crown of
hair-beneath that other crown so carefully bestowed--would have told you
of a tendency to rebel against life, of little feathers fluttering
for an opportunity to fly away. But husbands do not see such things as
those.

Next to Sidonie and Frantz, the person whom Risler loved best in the
world was Madame Georges Fromont, whom he called "Madame Chorche," the
wife of his partner and the daughter of the late Fromont, his former
employer and his god. He had placed her beside him, and in his manner of
speaking to her one could read affection and deference. She was a very
young woman, of about the same age as Sidonie, but of a more regular,
quiet and placid type of beauty. She talked little, being out of
her element in that conglomerate assemblage; but she tried to appear
affable.

On Risler's other side sat Madame Chebe, the bride's mother, radiant
and gorgeous in her green satin gown, which gleamed like a shield. Ever
since the morning the good woman's every thought had been as brilliant
as that robe of emblematic hue. At every moment she said to herself: "My
daughter is marrying Fromont Jeune and Risler Aine, of Rue des Vieilles
Haudriettes!" For, in her mind, it was not Risler alone whom her
daughter took for her husband, but the whole sign of the establishment,
illustrious in the commercial annals of Paris; and whenever she mentally
announced that glorious event, Madame Chebe sat more erect than ever,
stretching the silk of the bodice until it almost cracked.

What a contrast to the attitude of Monsieur Chebe, who was seated at
a short distance. In different households, as a general rule, the same
causes produce altogether different resul