farewell!"

"Here, take your shaving paper with you!" cried monsieur Gouge,
flinging the Spanish novel down the stairs. And the next moment the man
of letters stood dejected on the pavement, with the fatal manuscript
under his arm.

"Ah, Miranda, Miranda, thou little knowest what mischief thou hast
done!" he murmured, unconsciously plagiarising. "She brought bad
tidings indeed, with her disastrous mien," he added. "What is to become
of me now?"

The moon, to which he had naturally addressed this query, made no
answer; and, fingering the sou in his trouser-pocket, he trudged in the
direction of the rue Ravignan. "The situation would look well in
print," he reflected, "but the load under my arm should, dramatically,
be a bundle of my own poems. Doubtless the matter will be put right by
my biographer. I wonder if I can get half a bed from Goujaud?"

Encouraged by the thought of the painter's hospitality, he proceeded to
the studio; but he was informed in sour tones that monsieur Goujaud
would not sleep there that night.

"So much the better," he remarked, "for I can have all his bed, instead
of half of it! Believe me, I shall put you to no trouble, madame."

"I believe it fully," answered the woman, "for you will not come
inside--not monsieur Goujaud, nor you, nor any other of his vagabond
friends. So, there!"