"With delight, Monsieur. And three days after, I came to this house. My young mistress had taken the third floor for five years. The landlord put the rooms in order for her; and she furnished them very modestly, scantily even, partly out of her little savings since she had been at the theatre, partly on credit. She was to pay so many francs a week to the upholsterer till all was paid for. She had no extravagant tastes, no craving for finery or luxurious living. If you had seen her rooms in those days, you might have thought them the rooms of a nun--all things so simple, so neat, so pure." "But there came a change afterwards, I suppose?" "There came a time when Monsieur Georges loaded her with presents, and the apartment changed gradually under his influence. He sent her easy-chairs, velvet-coloured tables, a bookcase, an escritoire, satin curtains, rich carpets, pictures, china, hothouse flowers. He showered his gifts upon her; but I knew that she would have been better pleased to live in her own simple way. She had a horror of seeming like those other ladies of the theatre, with their luxurious houses and fine clothes. She spent very little money on herself; she lived almost as plainly as a workman's wife." "Was she called Madame Georges when she first came to this house?" "No, Monsieur; she did not even know the name of Monsieur Georges at that time. She only knew that she had a mysterious admirer, who came to the theatre every night, who used to sit in a dark corner of a small private box close to the stage, who never showed himself to the audience, and who was always alone. This was all she knew of Monsieur Georges in those days." "Do you know how their acquaintance advanced from this point?" "No, Monsieur. I hardly know anything of the progress of their attachment. There were letters--gifts--which came to the house. And I know that, in the spring nights of that first year, my mistress used to walk home from the theatre, escorted by Monsieur Georges. But he never entered our apartment till after Madame's return from England, where she went during the summer vacation. She had been very silent about her strange admirer--she had told me nothing--but she had shed many tears on his account. That was a secret which she could not hide from me. She had spent many wakeful nights, breathed many sighs. When she told me she was going to England, I thought all was over. She had fought hard to be true to herself, poor girl: she had struggled against her fate: but this man's love had conquered her." "She did not tell you that she was going away to be married?" "No, Monsieur; but when she came back, after a fortnight's absence, she showed me her wedding-ring, and she told me that she was to be called Madame Georges henceforward. This I took to mean that Monsieur Georges had married her while in England, and I believe it still. He loved her too well to degrade her by making her his mistress."