“And the lady?” sneered Mother Bonneton.  “Do you mean to tell us you haven’t had anything to do with her for six months?”

“I haven’t even seen her,” he declared, “for more than six months.”

“A likely story!  Besides, what we know is enough.  I shall write M. Groener to-night and tell him the facts.  Meantime—­” She rose and pointed to the door.

Alice and Kittredge rose also, the one indignant and aggrieved at this wanton affront to her lover, the other gloomily resigned to what seemed to be his fate.

“Well,” said he, facing Alice with a discouraged gesture, “things are against us.  I’m grateful to you for believing in me and I—­I’d like to know why you turned me down this afternoon.  But I probably never shall.  I—­I’ll be going now.”

He was actually moving toward the door, and she, almost fainting with emotion, was rallying her strength for a last appeal when the bell in the hall tinkled sharply.  Mother Bonneton answered the call and returned a moment later followed by the doorkeeper from below, a cheery little woman who bustled in carrying a note.

“It’s for the gentleman,” she explained, “from a lady waiting in a carriage.  It’s very important.”  With this she delivered a note to Kittredge and added in an exultant whisper to the sacristan’s wife that the lady had given her a franc for her trouble.

“A lady waiting in a carriage!” chuckled Mother Bonneton.  “What kind of a lady?”

“Oh, very swell,” replied the doorkeeper mysteriously “Grande toilette, bare shoulders, and no hat.  I should think she’d take cold.”

“Poor thing!” jeered the other.  And then to Kittredge:  “I suppose this is another one you haven’t seen for six months.”

Kittredge stood as if in a daze staring at the note.  He read it, then read it again, then he crumpled it in his hand, muttering:  “O God!” And his face was white.

“Good-by!” he said to Alice in extreme agitation.  “I don’t know what you think of this, I can’t stop to explain, I—­I must go at once!” And taking up his hat and cane he started away.

“But you’ll come back?” cried the girl.

“No, no!  This is the end!”

She went to him swiftly and laid a hand on his arm.  “Lloyd, you must come back.  You must come back to-night.  It’s the last thing I’ll ever ask you.  You need never see me again but—­you must come back to-night.”

She stood transformed as she spoke, not pleading but commanding and beautiful beyond words.

“It may be very late,” he stammered.

“I’ll wait until you come,” she said simply, “no matter what time.  I’ll wait.  But you’ll surely come, Lloyd?”

He hesitated a moment and then, before the power of her eyes:  “I’ll surely come,” he promised, and a moment later he was gone.

Then the hours passed, anxious, ominous hours!  Ten, eleven, twelve!  And still Alice waited for her lover, silencing Mother Bonneton’s grumblings with a look that this hard old woman had once or twice seen in the girl’s face and had learned to respect.  At half past twelve a carriage sounded in the quiet street, then a quick step on the stairs.  Kittredge had kept his word.