d not reply: "Well, come tell me what is it."

He murmured, hesitatingly: "Well, you see--but I really dare not--I was
working last night very late and quite early this morning on the article
upon Algeria, upon which Monsieur Walter asked me to write, and I could
not get on with it--I tore up all my attempts. I am not accustomed to
this kind of work, and I came to ask Forestier to help me this once--"

She interrupted him, laughing heartily. "And he told you to come and see
me? That is a nice thing."

"Yes, madame. He said that you will get me out of my difficulty better
than himself, but I did not dare, I did not wish to--you understand."

She rose, saying: "It will be delightful to work in collaboration with
you like that. I am charmed at the notion. Come, sit down in my place,
for they know my hand-writing at the office. And we will knock you off
an article; oh, but a good one."

He sat down, took a pen, spread a sheet of paper before him, and waited.

Madame Forestier, standing by, watched him make these preparations, then
took a cigarette from the mantel-shelf, and lit it.

"I cannot work without smoking," said she. "Come, what are you going to
say?"

He lifted his head towards her with astonishment.

"But that is just what I don't know, since it is that I came to see you
about."

She replied: "Oh, I will put it in order for you. I will make the sauce,
but then I want the materials of the dish."

He remained embarrassed before her. At length he said, hesitatingly: "I
should like to relate my journey, then, from the beginning."

Then she sat down before him on the other side of the table, and looking
him in the eyes:

"Well, tell it me first; for myself alone, you understand, slowly and
without forgetting anything, and I will select what is to be used of
it."

But as he did not know where to commence, she began to question him as a
priest would have done in the confessional, putting precise questions
which recalled to him forgotten details, people encountered and faces
merely caught sight of.

When she had made him speak thus for about a quarter of an hour, she
suddenly interrupted him with: "Now we will begin. In the first place,
we will imagine that you are narrating your impressions to a friend,
which will allow you to write a lot of tom-foolery, to make remarks of
all kinds, to be natural and funny if we can. Begin:

"'My Dear Henry,--You want to know what Algeria is like, and you shall.
I wi