The Incomplete Amorist

"No, Mademoiselle,--she is not at home; she will never be at home more, the poor lady. She is dead, Mademoiselle--an accident, one of those cursed automobiles ran over her at her very door, Mademoiselle, before our eyes."

Betty felt sick.

"Thank you," she said, "it is very sudden."

"Will Mademoiselle leave her name?" the concierge asked curiously. "The brother of Madame, he is in the commerce at Nantes. A telegramme has been sent--he arrives to-morrow morning. He will give Mademoiselle details."

Again Betty said what she had not intended to say. She said: "Miss Brown." Perhaps the brother in the commerce vaguely suggested the addition, "of Manchester."

Then she turned away, and got out of the light into the friendly dusk of the street.

"Tiens, but it is droll," said the concierge's friend, "a young girl, and all alone like that."

"Oh, it is nothing," said the concierge; "the English are mad--all! Their young girls run the streets at all hours, and the Devil guards them."

Betty stood in the street. She could not go back to that circle of harpy faces, all eagerly tearing to pieces the details of poor old Madame Gautier's death. She must be alone--think. She would have to write home. Her father would come to fetch her. Her aunt was beyond the reach of appeal. Her artist-life would be over. Everything would be over. She would be dragged back to the Parishing and the Mothers' meetings and the black-cotton-covered books and the Sunday School.

And she would never have lived in Paris at all!

She walked down the street.

"I can't think--I must think! I'll have this night to myself to think in, anyway. I'll go to some cheap hotel. I have enough for that."

She hailed a passing carriage, drove to the Hotel Bête, took her luggage to the Gare du Nord, and left it there.

Then as she stood on the station step, she felt something in her hand. It was the fat letter addressed to Madame Gautier. And she knew it was fat with bank notes.

She unfastened her dress and thrust the letter into her bosom, buttoning the dress carefully over it.

"But I won't go to my hotel yet," she said. "I won't even look for one. I'll see Paris a bit first."

She hailed a coachman.

"Go," she said, "to some restaurant in the Latin Quarter--where the art students eat."

"And I'm alone in Paris, and perfectly free," said Betty, leaning back on the cushions. "No, I won't tell my coachman to drive along the Rue Notre Dame des Champs, wherever that is. Oh, it is glorious to be perfectly free. Oh, poor Madame Gautier! Oh dear, oh dear!" She held her breath and wondered why she could feel sorry.