vility.

"Oh, no; I am too jealous, I should make you unhappy; but I will gladly
be a sort of comrade," replied Lisbeth.

"Ah, if only you knew how I longed for some fellow-creature, even a
tyrant, who would have something to say to me when I was struggling in
the vast solitude of Paris!" exclaimed Wenceslas. "I regretted
Siberia, whither I should be sent by the Emperor if I went home.--Be my
Providence!--I will work; I will be a better man than I am, though I am
not such a bad fellow!"

"Will you do whatever I bid you?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Well, then, I will adopt you as my child," said she lightly. "Here I am
with a son risen from the grave. Come! we will begin at once. I will go
out and get what I want; you can dress, and come down to breakfast with
me when I knock on the ceiling with the broomstick."

That day, Mademoiselle Fischer made some inquiries, at the houses to
which she carried her work home, as to the business of a sculptor.
By dint of many questions she ended by hearing of the studio kept by
Florent and Chanor, a house that made a special business of casting and
finishing decorative bronzes and handsome silver plate. Thither she went
with Steinbock, recommending him as an apprentice in sculpture, an idea
that was regarded as too eccentric. Their business was to copy the
works of the greatest artists, but they did not teach the craft. The old
maid's persistent obstinacy so far succeeded that Steinbock was taken on
to design ornament. He very soon learned to model ornament, and invented
novelties; he had a gift for it.

Five months after he was out of his apprenticeship as a finisher, he
made acquaintance with Stidmann, the famous head of Florent's studios.
Within twenty months Wenceslas was ahead of his master; but in thirty
months the old maid's savings of sixteen years had melted entirely. Two
thousand five hundred francs in gold!--a sum with which she had intended
to purchase an annuity; and what was there to show for it? A Pole's
receipt! And at this moment Lisbeth was working as hard as in her young
days to supply the needs of her Livonian.

When she found herself the possessor of a piece of paper instead of her
gold louis, she lost her head, and went to consult Monsieur Rivet,
who for fifteen years had been his clever head-worker's friend and
counselor. On hearing her story, Monsieur and Madame Rivet scolded
Lisbeth, told her she was crazy, abused all refugees whose plots for
reconstructin