“No, I will remain here.  But I—­I want to see you soon again.  May I?”

“May you?  Say the word!  To-morrow?  To-night?” The cab was snorting impatience; Blake opened the door and stepped inside.

The boy colored.  “To-night?”

“Right!  To-night it shall be!  To-night we’ll scale the heights.”  He held out his hand.

Max took it smilingly.  “You have not asked me where I live.”

“Never thought of it!  Where is it?”

“The Hotel Railleux, in the rue de Dunkerque.”

“Not a very festive locality!  But sufficient for the day, eh?  Well, I’ll be outside the door of the Hotel Railleux at nine o’clock.”

“At nine o’clock.  I shall be awaiting you.”

“Right again!  Good-bye!  It’s been a good morning.”

Max smiled, a smile that seemed to have caught something of the sun’s brightness, something of the promise of spring trembling in the pale sky.

“It has been a good morning.  I shall never forget it.”

Blake laughed.  “Don’t say that, boy!  We’ll oust it with many a better.”

He released the boy’s hand and gave the address to the chauffeur.  There was a moment’s pause, a rasp and wrench of machinery, and the willing little cab flew off toward the nearest bridge.

Max stood watching it, obsessed by a strange sensation.  This morning he had been utterly alone; this morning the fair, cold face of Paris had been immobile and speculative.  Now a miracle had come to pass; the coldness had been swept aside and the beauty, the warm, palpitating humanity had shone into his eyes, dazzling him—­fascinating him.

CHAPTER VIII

Nine o’clock found Max waiting in the rue de Dunkerque.  Paris, consummate actress that she is, was already arraying herself for the nightly appeal to her audience of pleasure-seekers.  Like a dancer in her dressing-room, she but awaited the signal to step forth into the glamour of the footlights; the rouge was on her lips, the stars shone in her hair, the jewelled slippers caressed her light feet.  Even here, in the colorless region of the Gare du Nord, the perfumed breath of the courtesan city crept like the fumes of wine; the insidious sense of nocturnal energy swept the brain, as the traffic jingled by and the crowds upon the footpaths thronged into the cafes and overflowed into the roadway.

To the boy, walking slowly up and down, with eager eyes that sought the one face among the many, the scene came as a joyous revelation that called inevitably to his youth and his vitality.  He made no pretence of analyzing his sensations:  he was stirred, intoxicated by the movement, the lights, the naturalness and artificiality that walked hand-in-hand in so strange a fellowship.  A new excitement, unlike the excitement of the morning, was at work within him; his blood danced, his brain answered to every fleeting picture.