Page:The fortunes of Fifi (IA fortunesoffifi00seawiala).pdf/213

 of virtue. But at least after you made him jilt me—"

"I made him jilt you!"

"Certainly you did. How many times shall I have to prove to you that it was you who put it into my head to give the money away? And now, I want to ask, having caused me to lose the chance of marrying the most correct young man in Paris, you—you—ought to marry me yourself!"

Fifi said this last in a very low, sweet voice, her cheek resting upon Toto's sleek, black head, her elbow on the sill of the half-door. Cartouche walked quite to the other end of the room and stood with his back to Fifi, and said not one word.

Fifi waited a minute or two, Cartouche maintaining his strange silence. Then, Fifi, glancing down, saw on a little table within the room, and close to the half-door, a stick of chalk. With that she wrote in large white letters on Toto's black back:

Cartouche, I love you—

and tossed Toto into the room. He trotted up to Cartouche and lay down at his feet.

Fifi saw Cartouche give a great start when he