usual pity and reverence,—and I, pressing in with the rest of the morbid spectators, saw the fair, soft, white body of the woman I had loved and hated and maddened and driven to her death, laid out on the dull hard slab of stone like a beautiful figure of frozen snow. The river had used her tenderly—poor little Pauline!—it had caressed her gently and had not disfigured her delicate limbs or spoilt her pretty face;—she looked so wise, so sweet and calm, that I fancied the cold and muddy Seine must have warmed and brightened to the touch of her drowned beauty!
"Yes!—the river had fondled her!—had stroked her cheeks and left them pale and pure,—had kissed her lips and closed them in a childlike, happy smile,—had swept all her soft hair back from the smooth white brow just to show how prettily the blue veins were penciled under the soft transparent skin,—had closed the gentle eyes and deftly pointed the long dark lashes in a downward sleepy fringe,—and had made of one little dead girl so wondrous and piteous a picture, that otherwise hard-hearted women sobbed at sight of it, and strong men turned away with hushed footsteps and moistened eyes."
And that, practically, is the end of the story, for
Gaston Beauvais, having revenged himself on his
sweetheart and her betrayer, has nought to do now
save drink absinthe. Delirium tremens ensues,
Beauvais is laid up for a month, and at the end of
that period the doctor speaks plain words of wisdom
and warning to him:
"You must give it up," he said decisively, "at
