embarrassed to hand to such an irreproachable gentleman the paltry
stipend so laboriously earned.

On those evenings, by the way, the actor did not return home to dinner.
The women were forewarned.

He always met some old comrade on the boulevard, some unlucky devil like
himself--there are so many of them in that sacred profession!--whom he
entertained at a restaurant or cafe. Then, with scrupulous fidelity--and
very grateful they were to him--he would carry the rest of the money
home, sometimes with a bouquet for his wife or a little present for
Desiree, a nothing, a mere trifle. What would you have? Those are the
customs of the stage. It is such a simple matter in a melodrama to toss
a handful of louis through the window!

"Ho! varlet, take this purse and hie thee hence to tell thy mistress I
await her coming."

And so, notwithstanding their marvellous courage, and although their
trade was quite lucrative, the Delobelles often found themselves in
straitened circumstances, especially in the dull season of the 'Articles
de Paris.'

Luckily the excellent Risler was at hand, always ready to accommodate his
friends.

Guillaume Risler, the third tenant on the landing, lived with his brother
Frantz, who was fifteen years his junior. The two young Swiss, tall and
fair, strong and ruddy, brought into the dismal, hard-working house
glimpses of the country and of health. The elder was a draughtsman at