could not beg from her tyrant. Conti and Mademoiselle des Touches had
spared Beatrix all the petty worries of material life, and her mother
had frequently send her considerable sums of money. Finding herself
now on her own resources, she was forced to an economy that was rather
severe for a woman accustomed to every luxury. She had therefore gone
to the summit of the hill on which lies the Parc de Monceaux, and
there she had taken refuge in a "little house" formerly belonging to a
great seigneur, standing on the street, but possessed of a charming
garden, the rent of which did not exceed eighteen hundred francs.
Still served by an old footman, a maid, and a cook from Alencon, who
were faithful to her throughout her vicissitudes, her penury, as she
thought it, would have been opulence to many an ambitious bourgeoise.

Calyste went up a staircase the steps of which were well pumiced and
the landings filled with flowering plants. On the first floor the old
servant opened, in order to admit the baron into the apartment, a
double door of red velvet with lozenges of red silk studded with gilt
nails. Silk and velvet furnished the rooms through which Calyste
passed. Carpets in grave colors, curtains crossing each other before
the windows, portieres, in short all things within contrasted with the
mean external appearance of the house, which was ill-kept by the
proprietor. Calyste awaited Beatrix in a salon of sober character,
where all the luxury was simple in style. This room, hung with garnet
velvet heightened here and there with dead-gold silken trimmings, the
floor covered with a dark red carpet, the windows resembling
conservatories, with abundant flowers in the jardinieres, was lighted
so faintly that Calyste could scarcely see on a mantel-shelf two cases
of old celadon, between which gleamed a silver cup attributed to
Benvenuto Cellini, and brought from Italy by Beatrix. The furniture of
gilded wood with velvet coverings, the magnificent consoles, on one of