then unwrapped and displayed. It was of
mousseline de soie, trimmed with English point.

Susy examined it with the eye of a connoisseur and then nodded her head.

"It's fine, my girl, you have the fingers of a fairy, but it must put
your eyes out."

"It is very hard, Madame, especially working by artificial light, and in
winter the days are so short and the work very heavy. That is why I came
to you at this late hour."

Susy smiled.

"Late hour! Why the evening is just beginning for me."

"Our lives are very different, Madame."

"That's right, I begin when you stop, and if your work is hard, mine
isn't always agreeable."

The two women laughed and then Susy took off her wrapper and put on the
new negligee.

"My royal lover is coming this evening."

"Yes, I know," answered Marie Pascal. "Your table looks very pretty."

"You might make me a lace table cloth. We'll talk about it some other
time, not this evening; besides, I can't be too extravagant."

The dressmaker took her leave a few moments later and made her way with
care in the semi-obscurity down the three flights of stairs.

Marie Pascal was a young girl in the early twenties, fair-haired,
blue-eyed and with a graceful figure. Modishly but neatly dressed, she
had a reputation in the neighborhood as a model of discretion and
virtue.

She worked ceaselessly and being clever with her fingers, she had
succeeded in building up so good a trade in the rich and elegant Monceau
quarter, that in the busy season she was obliged to hire one or two
workwomen to help her.

As she was crossing the court to go to her own room, a voice called her
from the porter's lodge.

"Marie Pascal, look here a moment."

A fat woman dressed in her best opened the door of her room which was
lit by one flaring gas jet.

Marie Pascal, in spite of her natural kindliness, could scarcely repress
a smile.

Madame Ceiron, the concierge, or, as she was popularly called, "Mother
Citron," certainly presented a fantastic appearance.

She was large, shapeless, common, and good-natured. Behind her glasses,
her eyes snapped with perpetual sharp humor. She had a mass of gray hair
that curled round her wrinkled face, which, with a last remnant of
coquetry, she made up outrageously. Her hands and feet were enormous,
disproportionate to her figure, although she was well above middle
height. She invariably wore mittens while doing the housework.

Mother Citron, however, did very little