of green vines drooped from the balconies, as if to attract attention from the passers-by.  Madame Strahlberg, with her ostentatious and undulating walk, which caused men to turn and notice her as she went by, went swiftly up the stairs to the second story.  She put one finger on the electric bell, which caused two or three little dogs inside to begin barking, and pushed Jacqueline in before her, crying:  “Colette!  Mamma!  See whom I have brought back to you!” Meantime doors were hurriedly opened, quick steps resounded in the antechamber, and the newcomer found herself received with a torrent of affectionate and delighted exclamations, pressed to the ample bosom of Madame Odinska, covered with kisses by Colette, and fawned upon by the three toy terriers, the most sociable of their kind in all Paris, their mistresses declared.

Jacqueline was passing through one of those moments when one is at the mercy of chance, when the heart which has been closed by sorrow suddenly revives, expands, and softens under the influence of a ray of sunshine.  Tears came into her eyes, and she murmured: 

“My friends—­my kind friends!”

“Yes, your friends, whatever happens, now and always,” said Colette, eagerly, though she had probably barely given a thought to Jacqueline for eighteen months.  Nevertheless, on seeing her, Colette really thought she had not for a moment ceased to be fond of her.  “How you have suffered, you poor pussy!  We must set to work and make you feel a little gay, at any price.  You see, it is our duty.  How lucky you came to-day—­”

A sign from her sister stopped her.

They carried Jacqueline into a large and handsome salon, full of dust and without curtains, with all the furniture covered up as if the family were on the eve of going to the country.  Madame Strahlberg, nevertheless, was not about to leave Paris, her habit being to remain there in the summer, sometimes for months, picnicking as it were, in her own apartment.  What was curious, too, was that the chandelier and all the side-lights had fresh wax candles, and seats were arranged as if in preparation for a play, while near the grand piano was a sort of stage, shut off from the rest of the room by screens.

Colette sat down on one of the front row of chairs and cried:  “I am the audience—­I am all ears.”  Her sister hurriedly explained all this to Jacqueline, with out waiting to be questioned:  “We have been giving some little summer entertainments of late, of which you see the remains.”  She went at once to the piano, and incited Jacqueline to sing by beginning one of their favorite duets, and Jacqueline, once more in her native element, followed her lead.  They went on from one song to another, from the light to the severe, from scientific music to mere tunes and airs, turning over the old music-books together.