"'Well, well?' said Dupont, impatiently.
"'But you were a shrewd man; you saw your luck and leapt at it—and when she entered with her party, you received her like a queen. You had even hired a piano, you said, in case Little-Flower-of-the-Wood might wish to play. I notice that a piano is in the corner now—no doubt you soon saved the money to buy one.'
"'How do you know all this, you?' Dupont's gaze was curious.
"'Her freak pleased her, and she came again and again—and others came, just to see her here. Then you recognized that your clients from the neighbourhood were out of place among the spendthrifts, who yielded more profit in a night than all the two-franc dinners in a month; you said, "At twelve o'clock there shall be no more bocks, only champagne!" I had made your restaurant famous—and you introduced the great rule that you now command me to obey.'
"'You? You are Little-Flower-of-the-Wood?'
"'Yes, it was I who did it for you,' she said quietly. 'And the restaurant flourished after Little-Flower-of-the-Wood had faded. Well, to-night I want to spend an hour here again, for the sake of what I used to be. Time brings changes, you understand, and I cannot conform with the great rule.' She opened the opera-cloak, trembling, and he saw that beneath it Little-Flower-of-the-Wood was in rags.
"'I am very poor and ill,' she went on. 'I have been away in the South for more than two years; they told me I ought to stop there, but I had to see Paris once more! What does it matter? I shall finish here a little sooner, that is all. I lodge close by, in a garret. The garret is very dirty, but I hear the muisc from the Bal Tabarin across the way. I like that—I persuade myself I am living the happy life I used to have. When I am tossing sleepless, I hear the noise and laughter of the crowd coming out, and blow kisses to them in the dark. You see, although one is forgotten, one cannot forget. I pray that their laughter will come up to me right at the end, before I die.'
"'You cannot afford to enter Tabarin's?' faltered Dupont; 'you are so stony as that?'
"'So stony as that!' she said. 'And I repeat that to-night I want to pass an hour in the midst of the life I loved. Monsieur, remember how you came to make your rule! Break it for me once! Let me stay here to-night for a bock!'
"Dupont is a restaurateur, but he is also a man. He took both her hands, and the waiters were astonished to perceive that the patron was crying.