And Renée, raising her eyes, looked at the vast expanse of soaring sky of a pale blue, fading little by little in the obliteration of twilight. She thought of the accomplice city, of the blazing nights of the Boulevard, of the hot afternoons of the Bois, of the pallid, crude day, of the grand new mansions. Then, when she lowered her head, when she again saw at a glance the peaceful horizon of her childhood, this corner of a city, inhabited by the middle and working classes, where she had dreamt of a life of peace, a final bitterness mounted to her lips. With her hands clasped, she sobbed in the gathering night. The following winter, when Renée died of acute meningitis, it was her father who paid her debts. Worms's bill amounted to two hundred and fifty-seven thousand francs. THE END.