But, at this hour, the trees cast their shadows over the façade which was wrapt in gloom. In the courtyard on the other side, the footman had respectfully assisted Renée to alight from the carriage. The stables, with red brick dressings, opened on the right their wide doors of polished oak, at the end of a glass-roofed yard. On the left, as though to counterbalance, was a richly ornamented recess in the wall of the adjoining house, with a fountain of water perpetually flowing from a shell which two cupids supported in their outstretched arms. The young woman stood a moment at the foot of the steps, gently tapping her skirt to get it to hang right. The courtyard, through which the noise of the return had just passed, resumed its solitude, its aristocratic silence, broken by the eternal sing-song of the dripping water. And as yet, amidst the great black mass of the mansion--the chandeliers of which were so soon to be illuminated on the occasion of the first of the grand dinner parties of the autumn--only the lower windows were lighted up, all aglow and casting the bright reflection of a conflagration on the small paving-stones of the courtyard, as neat and regular as a draught-board. As Renée pushed open the hall door, she found herself face to face with her husband's valet, who was on his way to the servants' quarters and carrying a silver kettle. Dressed all in black, tall, strong, pale-faced, this man looked superb, with the whiskers of an English diplomatist, and the grave and dignified air of a magistrate. "Baptiste," inquired the young woman, "has your master come in?" "Yes, madame, he is dressing," replied the valet with a bow worthy of a prince acknowledging the plaudits of the crowd. Renée slowly ascended the staircase, withdrawing her gloves the while. The hall was fitted up most luxuriously. On entering, one experienced a slightly suffocating sensation. The thick carpets, which covered the floor and the stairs, the broad red velvet hangings which hid the walls and the doors, made the atmosphere heavy with the silence and the warm fragrance of a chapel. The draperies hung from on high, and the lofty ceiling was ornamented with salient arabesques on a golden trellis. The staircase, with its double balustrade of white marble and handrail covered with red velvet, opened out into two slightly winding branches between which was placed the entrance to the grand drawing-room right at the back. An immense mirror covered the whole of the wall on the first landing. Down below, at the foot of the branching staircase, two bronze gilt female figures, on marble pedestals and nude down to the waist, supported gigantic lamp-posts carrying five burners, the brilliant light from which was softened by ground glass globes. And on either side was a row of splendid vases in majolica ware in which blossomed the rarest plants.