At last, one morning, when it happened, that, just as I had finished dressing myself and was ready to go out, she opened her door and ran down stairs without closing it behind her, carried away by my curiosity, I stepped out into the narrow passage-way and looked into her sanctuary.  The room was a smaller one than mine,—­but how much neater!  The muslin curtains in her window were as white as snow; her wardrobe, which hung against the wall, was protected from the dust by a linen cloth; the floor shone like a mirror.  Her canary hung in the window, and greeted me with a perfect whirlwind of roulades as I stepped into the room.  Her fire was burning briskly under a pot of water, which was just coming to the boiling-point, and singing as gayly and almost as loudly as her bird.  Over the back of a chair was thrown the work she had been busied with; and on the bed, almost hid by the curtains, was a pair of the prettiest little blue garters I ever saw, even in Paris,—­span-new they were, and had evidently been bought no longer ago than the evening before,—­and some other articles of feminine apparel, which I will not attempt to describe.  I looked into her glass, I really believe, with the hope of finding there a faint reflection of her face and figure.  She must have looked into it but a minute before going out.  A book, like a Testament, lay on the table.  I knew I should find her name on the fly-leaf, and was just on the point of satisfying myself with regard to that particular when I heard her feet upon the stairs; and, with a start which nearly carried away the curtains of her bed, I rushed from her room into my own.

How my heart beat, after I had gently closed my door and was sitting on the side of my bed, listening to the movements in the next room!  It didn’t seem to me as though I had been guilty of a high misdemeanor, and yet, though I had been prepared for her return, I was as much discomposed as though I had been caught peeping.

So far from being satisfied with this resolution of my doubts with regard to the sex of my neighbor, I now found myself more uneasy and curious than before.  Was she young and pretty and good? and what did she do? and what was her name?  My thoughts were perpetually running up those six flights and stopping baffled at her close-shut door.  I drew ideal portraits of her, and introduced them into all my pictures as pertinaciously as Rubens did his wives, and would often finish out an accidental face in a study of rocks, much to my instructor’s surprise and my fellow-students’ amusement.  It was very remarkable, however, that all these fancy sketches bore a striking resemblance to another acquaintance of mine, who will shortly be introduced, and in whom, until I moved into my now room, I had been exclusively interested,—­so much so, in fact, that——­But I will not anticipate.