The Vicomte did whisper a lot of things; he said just for one evening I might make him happy and pretend I loved him, and let him call me “cherie.”  So I said “all right;” I did not think it could matter, as I am coming home to-morrow, Mamma, and shall probably never see him again, and you said one ought always to be kind-hearted and do little things for people.  When I said “all right,” his forehead got pink, and the veins showed just like the Marquis’s had done at dinner, and he said, “Cherie—­ma cherie, ma bien-aimee” in such a voice!  It made me feel quite as if I wanted to listen to some more, only, unfortunately at that moment, Godmamma came up; she brushed the Baron aside, and said I should certainly catch cold by the window, and must come with her, while she annihilated the Vicomte with a look.

There I was, taken off to a sofa at the other side of the room, and stuffed down between Godmamma and the Marquis’s mother.  You can think I was cross.  However, I paid her out, for I just looked at the Marquis, who was seated by his Victorine almost silent and like a dummy (they are allowed to talk together now, as long as they are not alone in the room).  It made him fidget so, he could not attend to what she was saying.  And when finally he got up and came over to us and said, had I seen the new “Nattier” the Comte had just bought, which was in the other salon, and would I come and look at it?—­I think Godmamma wished she had left me safe with the Vicomte.  She could not say anything, as half the party had already gone to look at the picture, so I got up at once and went with him.  His mother is years older than the Baronne, and not a bit gay like her.  I saw them—­her and Godmamma—­nodding their heads anxiously as we left; no doubt they were deploring the bad bringing-up of the English.

[Sidenote:  The Fiances Together]

The Marquis said it was awful what he was going through; and when the dancing began presently would I give him the first valse?  I said Certainly, and by that time we were in the other salon, and beside the Marquise.  She smiled her dear little smile, which always seems to mock at everything, and put her tongue into her gap and whispered:  “Quelle comedie! c’est bien petite espiegle, amusez-vous!” And so I did! I can’t tell you what fun it was, Mamma.  I was in wild spirits, and the Marquis answered back, and we were as gay as larks, until I overheard the Marquis’s mother, who had followed us, say to him, in an acid voice, that he seemed to have forgotten that it was arranged for him to give Victorine the engagement ring that evening and say a few appropriate words to her, and he must take her to see the flowers in the conservatory, and get it over there.  So off he had to go, looking black and peevish, and supervised by the two mothers—­who stood at the risk of catching their deaths of cold by the door—­he and Victorine went arm-in-arm into the conservatory, and disappeared behind some pots of palms.