He ordered the bearers to stop before the artist's little house, but was obliged to ring the bell at the gate of the timber-yard a long time, before any one moved. How terribly long the moments were! Who could tell whether a hundred seconds more or less might not decide whether that motionless breast would ever again be heaved by the breath of life? At last a door behind the wood pile opened, a flickering light appeared, and the zaunkönig's voice was heard asking: "what's the matter?" A very few words were enough to urge the kind-hearted little man to breathless haste. His trembling hands instantly opened the little door beside the gate, and without another syllable being uttered, the sad procession moved along the dark path to the little house. CHAPTER X. At this same late hour the boudoir of the singer, whose acquaintance we made at the Pagoda, looked very bright and cheerful. A candelabrum with five candles was burning on the daintily spread table, at which the gay beauty sat with her friend, resting on her laurels after the first night of a new opera. "You were charming to-night, Adèle," said Marquard, as he pushed back a plate filled with oyster shells and rose to light a cigar at the candelabrum. "Really, loveliest of witches, you improve in each new part, and I shan't be surprised if one day you outgrow even me. But you've one talent that compels my highest esteem: I admire it even more than your acting, your singing, or the black art by which you make a whole audience madly in love with you." "And that is?" "Your talent for eating oysters. You laugh, Adelina. But I'm perfectly serious, believe me. I would engage to describe the mind and heart of any woman with whom I had been ten minutes without any other knowledge of her than eating oysters together, and never make a mistake--with the sole stipulation that it's not her first essay in the noble art, when even the most gifted person may set about it awkwardly." "Well, and wherein does my merit in this direction consist?" "First call Jenny and let her carry away the bouquets which have been thrown to you to-day. The odor of champagne, Havanas, oysters and roses all at once, are too much of a good thing and we shall have the headache. Besides, I'm far from being vain enough to think the couch of a beautiful girl softer, because it's strewn with rose leaves bestowed by less fortunate admirers." "You're terribly _blasé_!" laughed the singer. "If you were not so amusing, I'd have discarded you long ago. But be quick, tell me your oyster theory."