And the good lady defended him against the mute hostility which was apparent to her.  His father, held in high esteem by Louis Philippe, had been a PREFET up to the time of his death.  The son had been a little dissipated, perhaps; they said he was ruined, but in any case, one of his uncles, who was a great landowner, was bound to leave him his fortune.  The ladies, however, shook their heads, while Mme Hugon, herself somewhat embarrassed, kept harking back to the extreme respectability of his family.  She was very much fatigued and complained of her feet.  For some months she had been occupying her house in the Rue Richelieu, having, as she said, a whole lot of things on hand.  A look of sorrow overshadowed her smiling, motherly face.

“Never mind,” Mme Chantereau concluded.  “Estelle could have aimed at something much better.”

There was a flourish.  A quadrille was about to begin, and the crowd flowed back to the sides of the drawing room in order to leave the floor clear.  Bright dresses flitted by and mingled together amid the dark evening coats, while the intense light set jewels flashing and white plumes quivering and lilacs and roses gleaming and flowering amid the sea of many heads.  It was already very warm, and a penetrating perfume was exhaled from light tulles and crumpled silks and satins, from which bare shoulders glimmered white, while the orchestra played its lively airs.  Through open doors ranges of seated ladies were visible in the background of adjoining rooms; they flashed a discreet smile; their eyes glowed, and they made pretty mouths as the breath of their fans caressed their faces.  And guests still kept arriving, and a footman announced their names while gentlemen advanced slowly amid the surrounding groups, striving to find places for ladies, who hung with difficulty on their arms, and stretching forward in quest of some far-off vacant armchair.  The house kept filling, and crinolined skirts got jammed together with a little rustling sound.  There were corners where an amalgam of laces, bunches and puffs would completely bar the way, while all the other ladies stood waiting, politely resigned and imperturbably graceful, as became people who were made to take part in these dazzling crushes.  Meanwhile across the garden couples, who had been glad to escape from the close air of the great drawing room, were wandering away under the roseate gleam of the Venetian lamps, and shadowy dresses kept flitting along the edge of the lawn, as though in rhythmic time to the music of the quadrille, which sounded sweet and distant behind the trees.

Steiner had just met with Foucarmont and La Faloise, who were drinking a glass of champagne in front of the buffet.

“It’s beastly smart,” said La Faloise as he took a survey of the purple tent, which was supported by gilded lances.  “You might fancy yourself at the Gingerbread Fair.  That’s it—­the Gingerbread Fair!”

In these days he continually affected a bantering tone, posing as the young man who has abused every mortal thing and now finds nothing worth taking seriously.