Although he was not leaving the widow’s lodgings, Maitre Quennebert took up his hat and cloak and the blessed bag of crown pieces, and followed Madame Rapally on tiptoe, who on her side moved as slowly as a tortoise and as lightly as she could.  They succeeded in turning the handle of the door into the next room without making much noise.

“’Sh!” breathed the widow softly; “listen, they are speaking.”

She pointed to the place where he would find a peep-hole in one corner of the room, and crept herself towards the corresponding corner.  Quennebert, who was by no means anxious to have her at his side, motioned to her to blow out the light.  This being done, he felt secure, for he knew that in the intense darkness which now enveloped them she could not move from her place without knocking against the furniture between them, so he glued his face to the partition.  An opening just large enough for one eye allowed him to see everything that was going on in the next room.  Just as he began his observations, the treasurer at Mademoiselle de Guerchi’s invitation was about to take a seat near her, but not too near for perfect respect.  Both of them were silent, and appeared to labour under great embarrassment at finding themselves together, and explanations did not readily begin.  The lady had not an idea of the motive of the visit, and her quondam lover feigned the emotion necessary to the success of his undertaking.  Thus Maitre Quennebert had full time to examine both, and especially Angelique.  The reader will doubtless desire to know what was the result of the notary’s observation.

CHAPTER III

Angelique-Louise de Guerchi was a woman of about twenty-eight years of age, tall, dark, and well made.  The loose life she had led had, it is true, somewhat staled her beauty, marred the delicacy of her complexion, and coarsened the naturally elegant curves of her figure; but it is such women who from time immemorial have had the strongest attraction for profligate men.  It seems as if dissipation destroyed the power to perceive true beauty, and the man of pleasure must be aroused to admiration by a bold glance and a meaning smile, and will only seek satisfaction along the trail left by vice.  Louise-Angelique was admirably adapted for her way of life; not that her features wore an expression of shameless effrontery, or that the words that passed her lips bore habitual testimony to the disorders of her existence, but that under a calm and sedate demeanour there lurked a secret and indefinable charm.  Many other women possessed more regular features, but none of them had a greater power of seduction.  We must add that she owed that power entirely to her physical perfections, for except in regard to the devices necessary to her calling, she showed no cleverness, being ignorant, dull and without inner resources of any kind.  As her temperament led her to share