ss, and cosy nooks in which one could
hide oneself behind fringes of lofty plants.

"Oh! so it's you, Monsieur Froment," suddenly exclaimed somebody in the
direction of the table allotted to the pewter curios. And thereupon
a tall young man of thirty, whom a screen had hitherto hidden from
Mathieu's view, came forward with outstretched hand.

"Ah!" said Mathieu, after a moment's hesitation, "Monsieur Charles
Santerre."

This was but their second meeting. They had found themselves together
once before in that same room. Charles Santerre, already famous as a
novelist, a young master popular in Parisian drawing-rooms, had a fine
brow, caressing brown eyes, and a large red mouth which his moustache
and beard, cut in the Assyrian style and carefully curled, helped to
conceal. He had made his way, thanks to women, whose society he sought
under pretext of studying them, but whom he was resolved to use as
instruments of fortune. As a matter of calculation and principle he
had remained a bachelor and generally installed himself in the nests of
others. In literature feminine frailty was his stock subject he had made
it his specialty to depict scenes of guilty love amid elegant, refined
surroundings. At first he had no illusions as to the literary value of
his works; he had simply chosen, in a deliberate way, what he deemed to
be a pleasant and lucrative trade. But, duped by his successes, he had
allowed pride to persuade him that he was really a writer. And nowadays
he posed as the painter of an expiring society, professing the greatest
pessimism, and basing a new religion on the annihilation of human
passion, which annihilation would insure the final happiness of the
world.

"Seguin will be here in a moment," he resumed in an amiable way. "It
occurred to me to take him and his wife to dine at a restaurant this
evening, before going to a certain first performance where there will
probably be some fisticuffs and a rumpus to-night."

Mathieu then for the first time noticed that Santerre was in evening
dress. They continued chatting for a moment, and the novelist called
attention to a new pewter treasure among Seguin's collection. It
represented a long, thin woman, stretched full-length, with her hair
streaming around her. She seemed to be sobbing as she lay there,
and Santerre declared the conception to be a masterpiece. The figure
symbolized the end of woman, reduced to despair and solitude when man
should finally have made