"I know it," he replied, impatiently. "She has a pretty, sentimental Madonna face; a sweet voice; a gentle manner--_et voilà tout_. I'm not the least bit in love with her now. I might have been. I might have committed some great folly for her sake; but that danger is past, _Dieu merci!_ I couldn't love a girl I couldn't trust, and that girl is a flirt. A flirt of the worst sort, too--demure, serious, conventional. No, no; my fancy for the fair Marie has evaporated; but, for all that, I don't relish the thought of what her fate might be if linked for life to an unscrupulous scoundrel like Lenoir. I must do what I can, my dear fellow--I must do what I can." We had by this time rounded the Halles, and were threading our way through one gloomy by-street after another. The air was chill, the sky low and rainy; and already the yellow glow of an oil-lamp might be seen gleaming through the inner darkness of some of the smaller shops. Meanwhile, the dusk seemed to gather at our heels, and to thicken at every step. "You are sure you know your way?" I asked presently, seeing Müller look up at the name at the corner of the street. "Why, yes; I think I do," he answered, doubtfully. "Why not inquire of that man just ahead?" I suggested. He was a square-built, burly, shabby-looking fellow, and was striding along so fast that we had to quicken our pace in order to come up with him. All at once Müller fell back, laid his hand on my arm, and said:-- "Stop! It is Guichet himself. Let him go on, and we'll follow." So we dropped into the rear and followed him. He turned presently to the right, and preceded us down a long and horribly ill-favored street, full of mean cabarets and lodging-houses of the poorest class, where, painted in red letters on broken lamps above the doors, or printed on cards wafered against the window-panes, one saw at almost every other house, the words, "_Ici on loge la nuit_." At the end of this thoroughfare our unconscious guide plunged into a still darker and fouler _impasse_, hung across from side to side with rows of dingy linen, and ornamented in the centre with a mound of decaying cabbage-leaves, potato-parings, oyster-shells, and the like. Here he made for a large tumble-down house that closed the alley at the farther end, and, still followed by ourselves, went in at an open doorway, and up a public staircase dimly lighted by a flickering oil-lamp at every landing. At his own door he paused, and just as he had turned the key, Müller accosted him. "Is that you, Guichet?" he said. "Why, you are the very man I want! If I had come ten minutes sooner, I should have missed you." "Is it M'sieur Müller?" said Guichet, bending his heavy brows and staring at us in the gloom of the landing. "Ay, and with me the friend you saw the other day. So, this is your den? May we come in?"