“My married sister, Monsieur.  She is on her way to France.  I will tell you a little romance about her.  Last year she came to Montreal with our father, and they were delighted with it.  She used to say she would not marry a Frenchman; nor a blonde.  Above all she detested Paris, and declared she would never live there.  While she was here she left her portrait with Mde.  De Rheims as a souvenir.  Soon a young officer in the army of France comes out and visits Mde.  De Rheims and sees the picture of my sister.  He was struck with it, declared he would see the original, travelled straight to New Orleans, and has married my sister.  See him there—­he is a blonde and he is taking her to Paris.”

“How strange that is!  Montreal is a dangerous place for the ladies of your family.”

She glanced at me with sly pleasure.

“But we are not dangerous to Montreal, sir.”

“Ah non, ma’m’selle.”

Then this was my first type to begin on, of our French society world.  Were they all like her?  I watched the ladies and gentlemen who stood and sat chatting about, and saw that everyone else too made an art of charming.  Grace also.  She frequently passed, and I could catch her silvery French sentences and cheerful laugh.

As a partner now took away my little Southern friend, I caught Chinic on the wing, got introduced once more, and found myself careering in a galop down the room with a large-looking girl—­Mlle. Sylphe—­whose activity was out of proportion to her figure, though in more harmony with her name.  Her build was commanding, she was of dark complexion and hair, in manner demure, alluring with great power by the instrumentality of lustrous eyes, though secretly, I felt, like the tigress itself in cruelty to her victims.  She was a magnificent figure, and gave me a merry dance.  After it, she set about explaining the meaning of her garland decorations and the language of flowers, the Convent school at Sault-au-Recollet, dinner parties, and the young men of her acquaintance.

“You seem very fond of society?” I advanced.

“I adore society—­it is my dream.  I waltz, you see.  I know it is wrong, and the church forbids it; but—­I do not dance in Lent.  After all,” shrugging her shoulders, “we can confess, you know, and when we are old it will suffice to repent and be devout.  I shall begin to be excessively devout,” (toying with a jet cross on her necklace)—­“the day I find my first grey hair.”

“You have then a number of years to waltz.”

Her dark eyes looked over my face as a possible conquest.

“I tremble when I think it is not for ever.  But look at my aunt’s and that of Madame de Rheims!”

These ladies were indeed distinguished by their hair; but I suspect that it was not the mere fact of its greyness to which she wished to draw my attention—­rather it was to the manner in which they wore it, brushed up high and away from their foreheads, like dowagers of yore.  Standing in a corner together very much each other’s counterpart, both a trifle too dignified, they were obviously proud leaders of society.  She watched my shades of expression, and cried: