Turning towards Madame de Gabry, I perceived that she was not alone.
A young girl dressed in black was standing beside her. She had
large intelligent eyes, of a grey as sweet as that of the sky of the
Isle of France, and at once artless and characteristic in their
expression. At the extremities of her rather thin arms were
fidgeting uneasily two slender hands, supple but slightly red, as it
becomes the hands of young girls to be. Sheathed in her closely
fitting merino robe, she had the slim grace of a young tree; and her
large mouth bespoke frankness. I could not describe how much the
child pleased me at first sight! She was not beautiful; but the
three dimples of her cheeks and chin seemed to laugh, and her whole
person, which revealed the awkwardness of innocence, had something
in it indescribably good and sincere.

My gaze alternated from the statuette to the young girl; and I saw
her blush--so frankly and fully!--the crimson passing over her face
as by waves.

"Well," said my hostess, who had become sufficiently accustomed to
my distracted moods to put the same question to me twice, "is that
the very same lady who came in to see you through the window that
you left open? She was very saucy, but then you were quite
imprudent! Anyhow, do you recognise her?"

"It is her very self," I replied; "I see her now on that pier-table
precisely as I saw her on the table in the library."

"Then, if that be so," replied Madame de Gabry, "you have to blame
for it, in the first place, yourself, as a man who, although devoid
of all imagination, to use your own words, knew how to depict your