Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 1.djvu/194

116 She frequently saw her afterward in the street leading to the church, but never at the service. Whenever the stranger passed Madame de Piennes she dropped her head and smiled faintly. That humble smile pleased Madame de Piennes. She would have been glad of an occasion to befriend the poor girl, who at first had aroused her interest, and who now excited her pity; for she noticed that the rose-coloured bonnet was fading and that the cashmere shawl had disappeared. Doubtless it had been returned to the pawnbroker.

It was evident that Saint Roch had not repaid a hundredfold the offering which had been made to him.

One day Madame de Piennes saw a coffin borne into the church, followed by a poorly clad man, with not even a band of crape upon his hat; he was evidently a porter. For more than a month she had not met the young woman of the taper, and the idea came to her that she was assisting at her burial. Nothing was more probable, pale and emaciated as she was the last time that Madame de Piennes had seen her. The beadle being questioned, he interrogated in turn the man who followed the coffin. He replied that he was the porter of a house in Louis le Grand Street; that a tenant had died, one