"Ah, bah, M'sieur, I am no judge of age," said she.
"Well--is she pretty?"
"I am no judge of beauty, either," grinned Madame Bouïsse.
"But, my dear soul," I expostulated, "you have eyes!"
"Yours are younger than mine, mon enfant," retorted the fat concierge; "and, as I see Mam'selle Hortense coming up to the door, I'd advise you to make use of them for yourself."
And there, sure enough, was a tall and slender girl, dressed all in black, pausing to close up her umbrella at the threshold of the outer doorway. A porter followed her, carrying a heavy parcel. Having deposited this in the passage, he touched his cap and stated his charge. The young lady took out her purse, turned over the coins, shook her head, and finally came up to Madame's little sanctuary.
"Will you be so obliging, Madame Bouïsse," she said, "as to lend me a piece of ten sous? I have no small change left in my purse."
How shall I describe her? If I say that she was not particularly beautiful, I do her less than justice; for she was beautiful, with a pale, grave, serious beauty, unlike the ordinary beauty of woman. But even this, her beauty of feature, and color, and form, was eclipsed and overborne by that "true beauty of the soul" which outshines all other, as the sun puts out the stars.
There was in her face--or, perhaps, rather in her expression--an indefinable something that came upon me almost like a memory. Had I seen that face in some forgotten dream of long ago? Brown-haired was she, and pale, with a brow "as chaste ice, as pure as snow," and eyes--
"In whose orb a shadow lies,
Like the dusk in evening skies!"