Blushing like a school-boy, and stammering some unintelligible excuse, I pulled out a handful of francs and half-francs, and produced the coin required.

“Dame!” said the concierge.  “This comes of using one’s eyes too well, my young Monsieur.  Hem!  I’m not so blind but that I can see as far as my neighbors.”

Mademoiselle Hortense had fortunately gone back to settle with the porter, so this observation passed unheard.  The man being dismissed, she came back, carrying the parcel.  It was evidently heavy, and she put it down on the nearest chair.

“I fear, Madame Bouisse,” she said, “that I must ask you to help me with this.  I am not strong enough to carry it upstairs.”

More alert this time, I took a step in advance, and offered my services.

“Will Mademoiselle permit me to take it?” I said.  “I am going upstairs.”

She hesitated.

“Many thanks,” she said, reluctantly, “but....”

“But Madame Bouisse is busy,” I urged, “and the pot au feu will spoil if she leaves it on the fire.”

The fat concierge nodded, and patted me on the shoulder.

“Let him carry the parcel, Mam’selle Hortense,” she chuckled.  “Let him carry it.  M’sieur is your neighbor, and neighbors should be neighborly.  Besides,” she added, in an audible aside, “he is a bon garcon—­an Englishman—­and a book-student like yourself.”

The young lady bent her head, civilly, but proudly.  Compelled, as it seemed, to accept my help, she evidently wished to show me that I must nevertheless put forward no claim to further intercourse—­not even on the plea of neighborhood.  I understood her, and taking up the parcel, followed her in silence to her door on the third story.  Here she paused and thanked me.

“Pray let me carry it in for you,” I said.

Again she hesitated; but only for an instant.  Too well-bred not to see that a refusal would now be a discourtesy, she unlocked the door, and held it open.

The first room was an ante-chamber; the second a salon somewhat larger than my own, with a door to the right, leading into what I supposed would be her bedroom.  At a glance, I took in all the details of her home.  There was her writing-table laden with books and papers, her desk, and her pile of manuscripts.  At one end of the room stood a piano doing duty as a side-board, and looking as if it were seldom opened.  Some water-color drawings were pinned against the walls, and a well-filled bookcase stood in a recess beside the fireplace.  Nothing escaped me —­not even the shaded reading-lamp, nor the plain ebony time-piece, nor the bronze Apollo on the bracket above the piano, nor the sword over the mantelpiece, which seemed a strange ornament in the study of a gentle lady.  Besides all this, there were books everywhere, heaped upon the tables, ranged on shelves, piled in corners, and scattered hither and thither in most admired disorder.  It was, however, the only disorder there.