It was an unfamiliar Paris that she returned to! She
had quitted the Paris of the frivolous and feted; she came back to the
Paris of the outcast poor. The world that she had remembered gave her
no welcome--she peered through its shut windows, friendless in the
streets.
"Gentlemen, last night all the customers had gone from the little Cafe
du Bon Vieux Temps but a woman in a shabby opera-cloak--a woman with
tragic eyes, and half a lung. She sat fingering her glass of beer
absently, though the clock over the desk pointed to a quarter to
midnight, and at midnight beer-drinkers are no longer desired in the
Bon Vieux Temps. But she was a stranger; it was concluded that she
didn't know.
"Adolphe approached to enlighten her; 'Madame wishes to order supper?'
he asked.
"The stranger shook her head.
"'Madame will have champagne?'
"'Don't bother me!' said the woman.
"Adolphe nodded toward the bock contemptuously. 'After midnight, only
champagne is served here,' he said; 'it is the rule of the house,'
"'A fig for the rule!' scoffed the woman; 'I am going to stop.'
"Adolphe retired and sought the _patron_, and Dupont advanced to
her with dignity.
"'Madame is plainly ignorant of our arrangements,' he began; 'at twelve
o'clock one cannot remain here for the cost of a bock--the restaurant
becomes very gay,'
"'So I believe,' she said; 'I want to see the gaiety,'
"'It also becomes expensive.
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