"You remember that funny little chap with the crafty eye, his talent for gambling, and his admiration for the girl of 'La Prunelle'? A queer little mixture this child who has himself alone to look to for livelihood and care, the typical race of the Paris streets, the modified gamin from 'Les Miserables.'
"About a month after the appearance of my book I lay on the divan one day,--your favorite place, you remember?--and lost myself in idle reasonings on the same old subject that never left my mind day or night, when the bell rang and Adolphe appeared, to call for the essay on 'Le Boulevarde.' There was an unusually nervous gleam in his eyes that day. I gave him an anisette and tried to find out what his trouble was. I did find it out, and I found out a good deal more besides.
"Thanks to his good fortune as a gambler, Virginie came to look upon him with favor. Pierre was quite out of the race and Adolphe's affection was reciprocated as much as his heart could desire. But with his good fortune in love came all the suffering, all the torture, the suspicions that tear the hearts of us men when we set our hopes upon a woman's truth. Young as he was he went through them all, and now he was torturing himself with the thought that she did not really love him and was only pretending, while she gave her heart to another. Perhaps he was right--why not?
"I talked to Adolphe as man to man, and managed to bring back a gleam of his usual jollity and sly humor. He took another glass of anisette, and said suddenly:
"'M. Lucien--I did something--'
"'Did what?' I asked.
"'Something I should have told you long ago--it was wrong, and you've always been so nice to me--'
"You remember the day, two months ago, when we had such a sudden wind and rain storm, a regular cloud-burst? I was down here in this neighborhood fetching manuscripts from M. Labouchere and M.
Laroy. I was to have come up here for copy from you, too. But then--you'll understand after all I've been telling you,--I came around past 'La Prunelle' and Virginie stood in the doorway, and she'd promised to go out with me that evening. So I ran up to speak to her. And then when I went on again, I saw a sheet with your writing lying in the street. You know I know all the gentlemen's writing, whose copy I fetch. Then I was frightened. Ithought to myself, 'The devil,' I thought, 'here I've lost M.
Lucien's manuscript.' I couldn't remember calling for it, but Ithought I must have done so before I got M. Laroy's. I can't remember much except Virginie these days. I took up the sheet and saw three others a little further on. And I saw a lot more shining just behind the railing of the Luxembourg Garden. You know how hard it rained. The water held the paper down, so the wind couldn't carry it any further. I ran into the Garden and picked up all the sheets, thirty-two of them. All of them, except the first four I found in the street, had blown in behind the railing. And Ican tell you I was precious glad that I had them all together. Iran back to the office, told them I had dropped the manuscript in the street, but asked them not to say anything to you about it.
But the sheets were all there,--you always number them so clearly, and 'handsome August,' the compositer, promised he wouldn't tell on me. I knew if the foreman heard of it, he'd put me out, for he had a grudge against me. So nobody knew anything about it. But Ithought I ought to tell you, 'cause you've been so nice to me.
Maybe you'll understand how one gets queer at times, when a girl like Virginie tells you she likes you better than Pierre, and yet you think she might deceive you for his sake--that big, stupid animal-- But now I'll be going. Much obliged for your kindness, M. Lucien, and for the anisette--' And he left me.
"There you have the explanation, the very simple and natural explanation of the phenomenon that almost drove me crazy.
"The entire 'supernatural' occurrence was caused by a careless boy's love affairs, by a gust of southwest wind, by a sudden heavy rain, and by the chance that I had used English ink, the kind that water cannot blur. All these simple natural things made me act so foolishly toward a good friend, the sort of friend I have always known you to be. Let me hear from you, and tell me what you people up North think of my book. I give you my word that the 'Unknown Powers' shall never again make me foolish enough to risk losing your friendship!
"Yours"LUCIEN."
"So this is my story. Yes, 'there are more things in heaven and earth--' But the workings of Chance are the strangest of all. And this whisky is really very good. Here's to you."
