"But she fades away immediately. It is strange, strange! I have a confused impression of some vague form, a being that I cannot define," and having assured herself by a hurried glance that, this time, her words were going down, she expatiated on the vagueness of the person and on the mist that enveloped him. However, the vision grew clearer to Madame Mira, who was following a clue step by step. "A wide street ... a square with a statue ... a deserted street,--stairs. He is there in a bluish room--he is a young man, with pale and careworn face. There are things he seems to regret, and which he would not do again did they still remain undone." But the effort at divination had been too great. Fatigue prevented the clairvoyante from continuing her transcendental researches. She spent her remaining strength in impressively recommending him who consulted her to remain in intimate union with God if he wished to regain what he had lost and succeed in his attempts. On leaving Maurice placed a louis on the mantelpiece and went away moved and troubled, persuaded that Madame Mira possessed supernatural faculties, but unfortunately insufficient ones. At the bottom of the stairs he remembered he had left the little _Lucretius_ on the table of the pythoness, and, thinking that the old maniac Sariette would never get over its loss, went up to recover possession of it. On re-entering the paternal abode his gaze lighted upon a shadowy and grief-stricken figure. It was old Sariette, who in tones as plaintive as the wail of the November wind began to beg for his _Lucretius_. Maurice pulled it carelessly out of his great-coat pocket. "Don't flurry yourself, Monsieur Sariette," said he. "There the thing is."