ttinger, at this hotel'?"

I made a great many copies of this document, always changing something
as I went. I felt the importance of every word, and fastidiously
pondered over each expression I employed. The bright sun of morning
broke in at last upon my labors and found me still at my desk, still
composing. All done, I lay down and slept soundly.

"Is she gone, waiter?" said I, as he entered my room with hot water. "Is
she gone?"

"Who, sir?" asked he, in some astonishment.

"The lady in black, who came over in the last mail-packet from Dover;
the young lady in deep mourning, who arrived all alone."

"No, sir. She has sent all round the hotels this morning to inquire
after some one who was to have met her here, but, apparently, without
success."

"Give her this; place it in her own hand, and, as you are leaving the
room, say, in a gentle voice: 'Is there an answer, mademoiselle?' You
understand?"

"Well, I believe I do," said he, significantly, as he slyly pocketed the
half-Napoleon fee I had tendered for his acceptance.

Now the fellow had thrown into his countenance--a painfully astute and
cunning face it was--one of those expressive looks which actually made
me shudder. It seemed to say, "This is a conspiracy, and we are both in
it."

"You are not for a moment to suppose," said I, hurriedly, "that there
is one syllable in that letter which could compromise me, or wound the
delicacy of the most susceptible."

"I am convinced that monsieur has written it with most consummate
skill," said he, with a supercilious grin, and left the room.

How I detest the familiarity of a foreign waiter! The fellows cannot
respond to the most ordinary question without an affectation of showing
off their immense acuteness and knowledge of life. It is their eternal
boast how they read people, and with what an instinctive subtlety they
can decipher all the various characters that pass before them. Now this
impertinent lackey, who is to say what has he not imputed to me? Utterly
incapable as such a creature must necessarily be of the higher and
nobler motives that sway men of my order, he will doubtless have
ascribed to me the most base and degenerate motives.

I was wrong in speaking one word to the fellow. I might have said, "Take
that note to Number Fourteen, and ask if there be an answer;" or, better
still, if I had never written at all, but merely sent in my card to ask
if the lady would vouchsafe to accord me an audien