Mademoiselle Clarisse took a week to think over all that Pierre had said to her before coming to any decision. Her ambition had increased with her success, and she had long since ceased to think very highly of the patronage of the theatrical ladies, to obtain which at one time she would have made any sacrifice. For some time she had been in business on her own account; Mademoiselle Anatole, so soon as she realised a sufficiency, having retired to Lyons, there to weep and grizzle and sniff, and make herself as uncomfortable and unpleasant-looking as the vast majority of French old maids. And Clarisse was fully aware of M. Pierre's talent, and believed in his fortune; and verging towards middle age, and having lost sight of Rupert Robinson, and others for whom she had had her _caprices_ after him, and having lost her zest for rollicking suppers and fun of that kind, thought she could not do better than settle herself in life, and accordingly accepted M. Pierre's proposal. She soon found she had done rightly. Many of her husband's old patronesses consented to give her a trial for his sake, and were so pleased that they recommended her to all their friends. The establishment in George Street was then first opened, and M. Pierre not only did all he promised but a great deal more. For, being always a man of great taste, he turned his attention to the devising of special articles of millinery, then employed his manual dexterity in carrying out his ideas; and not suffering in any way from a sense of the ridiculous, he might be seen hour after hour in his sanctum, with his glasses on his nose and an embroidered skull-cap on his head, singing away some pastoral _chanson_ or drinking couplet, while his nimble fingers were busily engaged in stitching at a novel kind of headdress or in sketching out a design for an artistic bonnet. He was proud of his wife's appearance and pleased with her industry and success, and he enjoyed his married life very much for a couple of years, making a point of going to St. James's Street on drawing-room days, and to the Opera on great nights, to admire the results of his handiwork, but otherwise living very domestically and quietly; and then he died, leaving all his worldly possessions to his widow.