The interest of his mission flowed back, sharpened by the momentary break, and it was with very swift steps that he ran up the Escalier de Sainte-Marie to the rue Mueller; there, in the rue Mueller, he paused, his back to the green plantation, his face to the row of houses rising one above the other, each with its open doorway, each with its front of brick and plaster, its iron balcony from which hung the inevitable array of blankets, rugs, and mattresses absorbing the morning air.

To say that, in the mystic silence of the previous night and restless hours of the dawn, Max had vowed to himself that here in the rue Mueller he would make a home, and to add that, coming in the light of day, he found a door open to him, sounds at the least fabulous; yet, as he stood there—­eager, alert, with face lifted expectantly, and bright gaze winging to right and left—­fable was made fact:  the legend ’Appartement a louer’ caught his glance like a pronouncement of fate.

It sounds fabulous, it sounds preposterous, and yet it obtains, to be accounted for only by the fact that in this curious world there are certain beings to whom it is given to say of all things with naive faith, not ‘I shall seek,’ but ‘I shall find.’

Max had never doubted that, if courage were high enough to undertake the quest, absolute success awaited him.  He read the legend again, ’Appartement a louer 5ieme etage.  Gaz:  l’eau,’ and without hesitation crossed the rue Mueller and passed through the open door.

The difference was vast between his nervous entry thirty-six hours ago into the Hotel Railleux and the boldness of his step now.  The difference between secret night and candid morning lay in the two proceedings—­the difference between self-distrust and self-confidence.  Then he had been a creature newly created, looking upon himself and all the world with a sensitive distrust; now he was an individual accepted of others, assured of himself, already beginning to move and have his being in happy self-forgetfulness.

He stepped into the hallway of the strange house and paused to look about him, his only emotion a keen interest that kept every nerve alert.  The hallway round which he looked displayed no original features:  it was a lofty, rather narrow space, the walls of which—­painted to resemble marble—­were defaced by time, by the passing of many skirts and the rubbing of many shoulders.  In the rear was a second door, composed of glass, and beyond it the suggestion of a staircase of polished oak that sprang upward from the dingy floor in a surprising beauty of panelled dado and fine old banister.

Max’s eyes rested upon this staircase:  in renewed excitement he hurried down the hall and, regardless of the consequence, beat a quick tattoo with his knuckles upon the glass door.

Silence greeted his imperative summons, and as he waited, listening intently, he became aware of the monotonous hum of a sewing-machine coming through a closed door upon his left.