"That would be precious hard work in this place," said a third speaker, who had passed several years of the dreary inactions of prison life. "Well, anyhow, I've had my fling!" remarked the newcomer, drying her eyes. "Scores of admirers crowded around me, willing to ruin themselves for my amusement--" she said in a vivacious manner, as she recalled her past triumphs. "And it all peters down to prison, eating gruel with a wooden spoon," said the cynical old-timer; "then, some day, we shall be treated as those poor creatures were yesterday--hurried off with a guard of soldiers to see us safe on our weary exile--" "Does the idea of exile frighten you?" [Illustration: ONE OF THE BEAUTIES OF THE GARDEN FETE OF BEL-AIR.] "Who would not be frightened at the idea of being led off amid insults and jeers--condemned to a two months' voyage in the vilest company--and at the end of it be landed in a wild country to face the alternatives of slavery or a runaway into the savage swamps?" "Plenty of work to relieve monotony--" "They say women are scarce out there in Louisiana. Perhaps I shall get a husband, and revenge myself on the male creation that way--" Their speculations were cut short by the entry of a squad of troopers literally dragging tiny Henriette Girard within the prison walls. Cold and unfeeling at best, these men had no sympathy with their young charge whom they naturally believed to be one of the harpies or half-wits caught in the police dragnet. They thrust her mid the crowd in the courtyard and departed. The great iron doors clanged shut. The gatekeeper turned the massive key. Henriette--without a friend in the world to appeal to--was an inmate of dread La Salpetriere! Like a flock of magpies the imprisoned demi-mondaines, petty thieves, and grosser criminals for love or for hate, crowded around the girl, inquiring what offence had brought her amongst them. "I am innocent!" Her little sobbing cry of self-justification was received with jibes and winks. Was not such the formula of every prisoner? They pressed her for her story. Looking at these ignoble spirits, the girl could not bear to acquaint them with her pure and holy romance. As she turned away, a new shock met her gaze. Faugh! What was this physical weakness, this nausea-like repulsion, but the bodily reaction from the tense spiritual agony she had suffered? Courage! She must look again. That wild woman--hair down, breath gasping, arms weaving threateningly--was coming at her like a murderess. Momentarily Henriette expected the long arms to seize her, the steel-like hands and wrists to choke her. She looked yet a third time. The crazy "murderess" had veered her course, but what was that other object nearby? A Niobe weeping for her own and the world's sorrows! Or this one over here--a shrieking maniac calling on all Hell's legions for vengeance on fancied enemies! Beyond, gibbering victims of paresis, white-haired idiots, wasted sufferers from senile dementia.