“Then you have been in Meylan; by chance, no doubt?” “Oh, madame, can you believe it needed chance to take me there? For how long had I not yearned to see it once more?” Again silence. “Your life has been a stirring one, M. Berlioz.” “How do you know, madame?” “I have read your biography--by Méry, I think. I bought it some years ago.” “Pray, do not think that my friend Méry, an artist and a clever man, is guilty of such a tissue of fables and nonsense as that! I believe I can guess the real author. But I shall soon have a true biography ready, one I have written myself.” “And you write so well!” “Nay, madame, I do not mean to praise the style, but simply to say that at least it will be true. In it, without naming you, I have been able to tell all my feeling for you without restraint.” Silence. “I have also heard of you,” went on Madame F., “from a friend of yours who married my husband’s niece.” “Yes, it is he whom I asked to tell me the fate of a letter I wrote you sixteen years ago. I longed to know whether you received it. I never saw him again, and now he is dead.” Silence. “My life has been very quiet, very sad. I lost some of my children, and my husband died while the others were very young. I did my best alone to bring them up well.” Silence. “I am indeed grateful, M. Berlioz, for the kind thoughts you have kept of me.” At her gentle words my heart beat yet more violently. With hungry eyes I gazed and gazed, clothing her once more in the beauty of long past days. At length I said: “Madame, give me your hand.” Pressing it to my lips, my heart turned to water within me, the world sank away, a long and blessed silence brooded over us. “Dare I hope,” I murmured, “that I may write to you? That, at long distant intervals, I may even see you?” “Oh, certainly; but I am leaving Lyons soon to live with my son who, after his marriage, is to settle in Geneva.” I rose, not daring to stay longer. She came with me to the door, saying, “Good-bye, M. Berlioz, good-bye. I am more grateful than I can tell you for your long and sweet memory of me.” Once more I bent over her hand, pressing it to my burning forehead, then tore myself away but only to wander, aimlessly and feverishly, near her dwelling. As I watched the swirling Rhone rush under the Pont Morand, M. Strakosch, brother-in-law of Adelina Patti, came up to me. “You!” he cried, “Good-luck! Adelina will be so glad to see you. She is singing to-morrow in the _Barbiere_; will you have a box?” “Many thanks, I may be leaving this evening.” “Well, anyway come to dinner with us to-day. You know how much pleasure it gives us.” “I dare not promise--It depends--I am not very well--Where are you staying?” “Grand Hotel.” “So am I. Well, if I am not too unsociable this evening I will come. But don’t wait.”