However, here it was that the formerly celebrated girl, who awoke storms of applause when she danced beside Cerrito at the Opera, now lived buried in silence,--a cab going to the Villa Montmorency seemed an event in her eyes,--forgotten, her windows shut, and as a diversion looking through the shutters at the high chimneys of some factory in the neighboring Rue Gras that belched forth their ruddy or bluish fumes, or yellow like sulphuric acid, or again red like the reflection of fire. Marianne rang several times when she arrived at the garden railing of the little house. The bells sounded as if they were coated with rust. An ancient maid-servant, astonished and morose, came to open the door. She conducted the young woman into the salon where Claire Dujarrier sat alone, eating cakes, with her terrier on her lap. The dog almost leaped at Marianne's throat while Claire, rising, threw herself on her neck. "Ah! dear little one!--How pleased I am! What chance brings you?" Marianne looked at the Dujarrier. She might still be called almost lovely, although she was a little painted and her eyes were swollen, and her cheeks withered; but she knew so perfectly well all the secrets for rejuvenating, the eyebrow preparation, the labial wash, that she was a walking pharmaceutical painting done on finely sculptured features. The statue, although burdened with fat, was still superb. She listened to Marianne, smiled, frowned and, love-broker and advisory courtesan that she was, ended by saying to the "little one" that she had a devilish good chance and that she had arrived like March in Lent. "It is true, it has purposely happened. Vanda, you know her well?" "No!" answered Marianne. "What! Vanda, whom that big viper Guy called the Walking Rain?" "I do not remember--" "Well! Vanda has gone to Russia, she left a month ago. She will be there all the winter and summer, and part of next winter. Her _general_ requires her. He is appointed to keep an eye on the Nihilists. So she wishes to rent her house in Rue Prony. That is very natural. A charming house. Very _chic_. In admirable taste. You have the chance. And not dear." "Too dear for me, who have nothing!" "Little silly! You have yourself," said Claire Dujarrier. "Then you have me, I have always liked you. I will lend you the ready cash to set yourself up, you can give me bills of exchange, little documents that your minister--pest! you are going on well, you are, ministers!--that His Excellency will endorse. Vanda will not expect anything after the first quarter. Provided that her house is well-rented to someone who does not spoil it, she will be satisfied. If she should claim all, why, at a pinch I can make up the amount. But, my dear,"--and the old woman lowered her voice,--"on no account say anything to Adolphe." "Adolphe?" "Yes, my _husband_. You do not know him?"