ed upon the house, and she
got up and left her room, leaving the key unturned in the lock.
"To-morrow, or the day after, perhaps," she said, "they will wish to
go in." Then she went up the stairs for the last time.

Since she had heard the heavy feet lumbering with their burden past
her door, a singular calm had settled upon her. It was not apathy so
much as a repose born of the knowledge that there was nothing more to
bear--no future to be feared.

But when she opened the door of the little room this calmness was for
a moment lost.

It was so cold, so still, so bare in the moonlight which streamed
through the window and flooded it. There were left in it only two
things--the narrow, vacant bed covered with its white sheet, and the
easel on which the picture rested, gazing out at her from the canvas
with serene, mysterious eyes.

She staggered forward and sank down before it, uttering a low,
terrible cry.

"Do not reproach me!" she cried. "There is no longer need. Do you not
see? This is my expiation!"

For a while there was dead silence again. She crouched before the
easel with bowed head and her face veiled upon her arms, making no
stir or sound. But at length she rose again, numbly and stiffly. She
stood up and glanced slowly about her--at the bareness, at the
moonlight, at the narrow, white-draped bed.

"It will be--very cold," she whispered as she moved toward the door.
"It will be--very cold."

And then the little room was empty, and the face upon the easel turned
toward the entrance seemed to listen to her stealthily descending
feet.

* * * * *

The next morning the two artists who had visited the dead man's room
together, were walking--together again--upon the banks of the Seine,
when they found themselves drawing near a crowd of men and women who
were gathered at the water's edge.

"What has happened?" they asked, as they approached the group. "What
has been found?"

A cheerful fellow in a blue blouse, standing with his hands in his
pockets, answered.

"A woman. _Ma foi!_ what a night to drown oneself in! Imagine the
discomfort!"

The older man pushed his way into the centre, and a moment later
uttered an exclamation.

"_Mon Dieu!_"

"What is it?" cried his companion.

His friend turned to him, breathlessly pointing to what lay upon the
frozen earth.

"We asked each other who the original of the picture was," he said.
"We did not know. The face lies ther