As he was going out one morning to his office, he met on the very landing a rather tall and very dark girl, who had just come running up stairs. She passed before him like a flash, opened the opposite door, and disappeared. But, rapid as the apparition had been, it had left in Maxence’s mind one of those impressions which are never obliterated. He could not think of any thing else the whole day; and after business-hours, instead of going to dine in Rue St. Gilles, as usual, he sent a despatch to his mother to tell her not to wait for him, and bravely went home.
But it was in vain, that, during the whole evening, he kept watch behind his door, left slyly ajar: he did not get a glimpse of the neighbor. Neither did she show herself on the next or the three following days; and Maxence was beginning to despair, when at last, on Sunday, as he was going down stairs, he met her again face to face. He had thought her quite pretty at the first glance: this time he was dazzled to that extent, that he remained for over a minute, standing like a statue against the wall.
And certainly it was not her dress that helped setting off her beauty. She wore a poor dress of black merino, a narrow collar, and plain cuffs, and a bonnet of the utmost simplicity. She had nevertheless an air of incomparable dignity, a grace that charmed, and yet inspired respect, and the carriage of a queen. This was on the 30th of July. As he was handing in his key, before leaving,
“My apartment suits me well enough,” said Maxence to Mme. Fortin: “I shall keep it. And here are fifty francs for the month of August.”
And, while the landlady was making out a receipt,
“You never told me,” he began with his most indifferent look, “that I had a neighbor.”
Mme. Fortin straightened herself up like an old warhorse that hears the sound of the bugle.
“Yes, yes!” she said,—“Mademoiselle Lucienne.”
“Lucienne,” repeated Maxence: “that’s a pretty name.”
“Have you seen her?”