Decidedly it was the best to go back, thought the maid--that was, if her mistress still had her heart set on that silly boy. For herself, she thought it all folly; she would not have given a snap of her fingers for Norman de Vere. “A penniless, smooth-faced boy!” she thought, contemptuously. “Pah! why did not madame make him turn out a mustache? How could she bear to kiss him? There could be no more flavor to it than a girl’s or a baby’s kiss!” But madame was going to make her rich when by her help she became reconciled to her angry husband, so Finette swallowed her disgust and set her crafty brain to work. “To leave Paree and go back to dat hateful America--it is hard, but ‘needs must when the devil drives,’” she sighed; so they set their faces homeward. They went to New York and settled down quietly in a flat, taking care to keep their presence a secret from Norman de Vere; but his mother was duly informed, and by collusion with her, Camille had many opportunities of seeing her beloved, herself unseen, and every furtive glance at the pale, stern, yet darkly handsome face only deepened Camille’s passion for her husband. She would have given all her wealth now--all the world, if it had been hers to bestow--for the love she had prized so lightly when it was all her own. “For just one kiss that your lips have given In the lost and beautiful past to me, I would gladly barter my hopes of heaven And all the bliss of eternity.” Poor, guilty soul! It seemed to her that she could have forgiven her husband a sin as terrible as her own had been. She could not understand the absolute horror with which he shrunk from her, the abhorrence of her guilt that filled his soul. She could not believe that his love was dead. “I will throw myself in his way--I will make him remember me. Perhaps the embers of the old love will leap into flame again,” she thought with a passionate yearning; and she resolved to throw off all disguise and let him know that she was near him. He was living with his mother in a small flat where they played at keeping house in a sort of doll fashion. He came home one winter afternoon tired and cold from one of the great newspaper offices to his tea, and found her there in the tiny parlor, a great basket of hot-house flowers on the cozy tea-table, and behind it her face. Camille’s face--colorless, yet dazzling as ever, with the feverish fire of hope shining in the wine-dark eyes, the red mouth trembling with a smile of hope and love, about her the sheen of silk and velvet and lace, the glitter of diamonds, the seductive breath of some rare perfume. She was all alone, and when he entered, she flung herself wildly at his feet. “Oh, my beloved! my beloved! I could not stay away from you any longer. Forgive me, take me back!” she pleaded, wildly. The young man grew pale as death, but he drew back from her; he pushed away the white, jeweled hands that would have clung to him.