Several days later, there was another knock on the door. It was Mademoiselle Édmonde’s coachman. He delivered a sealed envelope, but I told him I could not read. He opened it and read it aloud: it was an invitation requesting the pleasure of my company at four o’clock the following afternoon at an address in the Lorette neighborhood. A coach would be sent to take me there and return me afterward. It was signed Mademoiselle Édmonde de Bressy.

The following day I arrived in front of a hôtel particulier. The coachman assisted me from the buggy and set me in a chair on wheels, which, with the help of a butler, was carried through the doorway and into an entrance hall decorated and furnished in a splendor I had not seen since my youth. I waited in silence, studying my surrounds. Every surface was exquisitely decorated. Every wall bore a work of art. Every object sparkled. Mademoiselle Édmonde and Mademoiselle Adélaïde appeared shortly after, walking side by side, the silks of their dresses whispering conspiratorially as they approached. As on the previous occasion, Mademoiselle Édmonde’s face was veiled. After the usual exchange of formalities, they asked that I join them on a tour of the residence.

With Mademoiselle Adélaïde pushing the chair, we set off to inspect the ground floor of the building, room after room, each one decorated in its own style, each as richly ornamented as its predecessor. As we proceeded, Mademoiselle Édmonde described what it was we were seeing, the rooms on the levels above us and what they contained, as well as the other properties she owned, and a brief description of them. By the time the tour was over we had made a full circle—the residence was built around a courtyard in its center—without having seen the same room twice. I had been given the description of a fortune that included several more buildings like this one, in Paris and in the provinces. Mademoiselle Édmonde’s mother had died in childbirth; her father had inherited a banking fortune and added to it railway interests. He had died only the previous year. There were no other heirs. The fortune was large enough that three men dedicated their lives to overseeing it, leaving Mademoiselle Édmonde free to live as she pleased.

“Madame Jeanne,” she said, “you are no doubt curious as to why we invited you to visit, and why I am telling you about my affairs in such detail. Mademoiselle Adélaïde and I were greatly touched by the story you told us last time we met. In fact, it is fair to say we have spoken of little else since. We would like to make a proposal to you, but in order to do so there is something you ought to see first.”