Part 63

When he asked me my age, he said, insinuatingly, "Vous êtes bien jeune, Madame, pour circuler seule ainsi dans Paris."

I answered, "Je ne suis pas seule, Monsieur. Mon mari [I thought it best to tell this lie] m'attend dans la voiture de Monsieur Washburn et il doit être bien étonné de ma longue absence."

I considered this extremely diplomatic.

Turning to the man at the mantelpiece, he said, "Grousset, do you think we ought to allow the citoyenne to leave Paris?"

Grousset (the man addressed) stepped forward and looked at Mr. Washburn's card, saying something in an undertone to Rigault, which caused him instantly to change his manner toward me (I don't know which was worse, his overbearing or his fawning manner).

"You must forgive me," he said, "if I linger over your visit here. We don't often have such luck, do we, Grousset?"

I thought I should faint!

Probably the man Grousset noticed my emotion, for he came to my rescue and said, politely, "Madame Moulton, j'ai eu l'honneur de vous voir à un bal à l'Hôtel de Ville l'année dernière."

I looked up with surprise. He was a very handsome fellow, and I remembered quite well having seen him somewhere; but did not remember where. I was happy indeed to find any one who knew me and could vouch for me, and told him so. He smiled. "I venture to present myself to you, Madame. I am Pascal Grousset. Can I be of any service to you?"

"Indeed you can," I answered, eagerly. "Please tell Monsieur Rigault to give me my passport; it seems to have been a colossal undertaking to get it." I preferred the Pascal G. to the Rascal R.

Grousset and Rigault had a little conversation together, and presto! my longed-for passport lay before me to sign. No Elsa ever welcomed her Lohengrin coming out of the clouds as I did my Lohengrin coming from the mantelpiece.

I signed my name quickly enough; Rigault put the official seal on it, and, rising from his chair, politely handed it to me.

Before taking my leave of the now over-polite Prefect, I asked him how much there was to pay.

He courteously replied, "Rien, absolument rien," and added he was glad to be of any service to me; and if there was anything more he could do, I had only to command.

I did not say that I thought he had done enough for one day, but I bowed him good-by and turned to go out.

Mr. Pascal Grousset offered me his arm, begging to take me to my carriage. The gendarmes threw open doors, and we retraced our steps through all the different rooms until we reached the one where I had left Mademoiselle W----, whom I expected to find waiting for me in agonizing anxiety.

But what did I see?

Mademoiselle sound asleep on the bench, bag, smile, and all, gazed at and guarded by the dreaded soldiers.

"I am afraid," said Pascal Grousset, "that you have been greatly annoyed this morning. Your interview with the Prefect must have been most painful to you!"

"I confess," I said, "it has never been my fate to have been placed in just such a situation, and I thank you, de tout mon coeur, for your assistance. You certainly saved my life, for I doubt if I could have lived another moment in that room."

"Perhaps more than your life, Madame; more than you imagine, at any rate."

As he put us in the carriage, he looked puzzled when he saw le mari I had said was waiting for me; but a smile of comprehension swept over his face as he met my guilty glance. He apparently understood my reasons.

On reaching home, tired, exhausted, and oh! so hungry, we found Mr. Washburn. He and Mr. Moulton had been very anxious about me, picturing to themselves all sorts of horrors, and when I told them what really had happened they felt that their anxieties had not been far from the truth. Mr. Washburn laughed at the subterfuges I had used and the lie I had told. They examined my passport as a great curiosity, and noticed it had Valable pour un an.

Mr. Washburn said, "Evidently they intend this sort of thing to go on forever."

23d of April.

Mrs. Moulton has decided to leave for Dinard, and starts the day after to- morrow.

We have been assured that the train would make connections as far at least as Rennes; beyond that no one could tell whether they went regularly or not.

Mrs. Moulton had procured a red billet de circulation with a date, a white one without a date, Mr. Washburn's card, and different passes. She was certainly well prepared for any emergency. As there was only one day train, she was obliged to take that (it left al seven o'clock A.M.).