Celia did see. She saw it spring out, and then drop into a bank of snow, noiselessly, as if purposely to avoid detection. She made a step forward to pick it up and return it. And then she stopped--a thought went through her like a zigzag of lightning. Cupidity, born of hunger, burst into life in her, and nailed her to the spot, her mouth dry, her eyes vacant of expression. For the first time in her life Temptation gripped her. The traditions of generations of seemly New England forbears cried out upon her and struggled within her. But she stood her ground. The coin lying in the snow seemed of more importance to her than everything else in the world. As the lady passed away, Celia drew near the images. The boy was rearranging them. When his back was turned she bent down and groped in the snow. Then rose with her face red. She crushed down the shame that surged in her, and turned to leave the bridge. There is a Duval on the Boulevard St. Germain, and she almost ran to it, thinking as she went of what she would order. She would spend two francs and a half, allowing a twenty-five centime _pourboire_ for the girl. It was not the crowded hour, and she had no need to hurry. She ate sumptuously and slowly, and began to feel the revivifying tide of life flowing back into her starved body. The Giant began to look dim and distant. The river called no more. In the leisurely French fashion she sat a long time over her meal. The day was darkening to its early twilight as she emerged and fared down the boulevard. She was walking slowly down the great street, her body warmed, the cries of her hunger stilled, when the enormity of her act began to force itself upon her. She refused to acknowledge it at first. Hunger was sufficient excuse. But not so much her conscience as her sense of dainty self-respect insisted on her shame. She was a thief. Her whiteness was stained forever. She had never before done anything for which to blush or to lie. Her poverty, her discouragement, her pitiful, proud struggles, had always been honest. She would as soon have thought of murdering some one as of stealing from them. Now she had done it. One moment’s temptation had marked her forever. As the money had fallen into the snow something in her had fallen, never to rise. Pursued by harassing thoughts, she half-unconsciously wended her way toward the river. Here, unencumbered by houses, daylight still lingered. The gray afternoon was dying with a frosty brilliance. In its death throes it exhaled a sudden, angry red which broke through the clouds in smoldering radiance. Its flush tinted the sky and touched the tops of the wavelets, and Celia felt it on her face like the color of shame.