the months, the days of the year, and the hours, stood on a massive corner bracket near the door.  Long antique mirrors in heavy black frames reached from floor to ceiling between each of the windows; and in the centre of the room, piled all together and festooned with a thick drapery of cobwebs, stood a dozen or so of old carved chairs, screens, and foot-stools, rich with velvet, brocade, and gilded leather, but now looking as if a touch would crumble them to dust.  Over the great carved fireplace, however, hung a painting upon which my attention became riveted as soon as I entered the room—­a painting yellow with age; covered with those minute cracks which are like wrinkles on the face of antique art, coated with dust, and yet so singularly attractive that, having once noticed it, I looked at nothing else.

It was the half-length portrait of a young lady in the costume of the reign of Louis XVI.  One hand rested on a stone urn; the other was raised to her bosom, holding a thin blue scarf that seemed to flutter in the wind.  Her dress was of white satin, cut low and square, with a stomacher of lace and pearls.  She also wore pearls in her hair, on her white arms, and on her whiter neck.  Thus much for the mere adjuncts; as for the face—­ah, how can I ever describe that pale, perfect, tender face, with its waving brown hair and soft brown eyes, and that steadfast perpetual smile that seemed to light the eyes from within, and to dwell in the corners of the lips without parting or moving them?  It was like a face seen in a dream, or the imperfect image which seems to come between us and the page when we read of Imogen asleep.

“Who was this lady?” I asked, eagerly.

The concierge nodded and rubbed her hands.

“Aha!  M’sieur,” said she, “’tis the best painting in the chateau, as folks tell me.  M’sieur is a connoisseur.”

“But do you know whose portrait it is?”

“To be sure I do, M’sieur.  It’s the portrait of the last Marquise—­the one who was guillotined, poor soul, with her husband, in—­let me see—­in 1793!”

“What an exquisite creature!  Look, Josephine, did you ever see anything so beautiful?”

“Beautiful!” repeated the grisette, with a sidelong glance at one of the mirrors.  “Beautiful, with such a coiffure and such a bodice! Ciel! how tastes differ!”

“But her face, Josephine!”

“What of her face?  I’m sure it’s plain enough.”

“Plain!  Good heavens! what...”

But it was not worth while to argue upon it.  I pulled out one of the old chairs, and so climbed near enough to dust the surface of the painting with my handkerchief.

“I wish I could buy it!” I exclaimed.

Josephine burst into a loud laugh.

“Grand Dieu!” said she, half pettishly, “if you are so much in love with it as all that, I dare say it would not be difficult!”

The concierge shook her head.