“Did she not, mother?  But just as I was taking the flower, without daring to raise my eyes (for, notwithstanding the young lady’s kind manner, there was something very imposing about her) another handsome girl, tall and dark, and dressed to the top of fashion, came in and said to the red-haired young lady, ‘He is here, Madame.’  She immediately rose and said to me, ’A thousand pardons, sir.  I shall never forget that I am indebted to you for a moment of much pleasure.  Pray remember, on all occasions, my address and name—­Adrienne de Cardoville.’  Thereupon she disappeared.  I could not find a word to say in reply.  The same young woman showed me to the door, and curtseyed to me very politely.  And there I stood in the Rue de Babylone, as dazzled and astonished as if I had come out of an enchanted palace.”

“Indeed, my child, it is like a fairy tale.  Is it not, my poor girl?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Mother Bunch, in an absent manner that Agricola did not observe.

“What affected me most,” rejoined Agricola, “was, that the young lady, on seeing her little dog, did not forget me for it, as many would have done in her place, and took no notice of it before me.  That shows delicacy and feeling, does it not?  Indeed, I believe this young lady to be so kind and generous, that I should not hesitate to have recourse to her in any important case.”

“Yes, you are right,” replied the sempstress, more and more absent.

The poor girl suffered extremely.  She felt no jealousy, no hatred, towards this young stranger, who, from her beauty, wealth, and delicacy, seemed to belong to a sphere too splendid and elevated to be even within the reach of a work, girl’s vision; but, making an involuntary comparison of this fortunate condition with her own, the poor thing had never felt more cruelly her deformity and poverty.  Yet such were the humility and gentle resignation of this noble creature, that the only thing which made her feel ill-disposed towards Adrienne de Cardoville was the offer of the purse to Agricola; but then the charming way in which the young lady had atoned for her error, affected the sempstress deeply.  Yet her heart was ready to break.  She could not restrain her tears as she contemplated the magnificent flower—­so rich in color and perfume, which, given by a charming hand, was doubtless very precious to Agricola.

“Now, mother,” resumed the young man smilingly, and unaware of the painful emotion of the other bystander, “you have had the cream of my adventures first.  I have told you one of the causes of my delay; and now for the other.  Just now, as I was coming in, I met the dyer at the foot of the stairs, his arms a beautiful pea-green.  Stopping me he said, with an air full of importance, that he thought he had seen a chap sneaking about the house like a spy, ‘Well, what is that to you, Daddy Loriot?’ said I:  ’are you afraid he will nose out the way to make the beautiful green, with which you are dyed up to the very elbows?’”