Every where her bright eyes fall softly, but every where upon quiet, elegance, and luxury.  There is the Madonna; but there are also the last winner at the Newmarket, the profile of Mr. Bulwer, and a French landscape.  The books are good, but not too good.  There is an air of candor and honesty in the room, united with the luxury and elegance, that greatly pleased Miss Grace Plumer.  The apartment leads naturally up to that handsome, graceful, dark-haired, dark-eyed gentleman whose eye is following hers, while she does not know it; but whose mind has preceded hers in the very journey around the room it has now taken.

Sligo Moultrie sits beyond Miss Plumer, who is at the left of Mr. Newt.  Upon his right sits Mrs. Plumer.  The friendly relations of Abel and Sligo have not been disturbed.  They seem, indeed, of late to have become even strengthened.  At least the young men meet oftener; not infrequently in Mrs. Plumer’s parlor.  Somehow they are aware of each other’s movements; somehow, if one calls upon the Plumers, or drives with them, or walks with them alone, the other knows it.  And they talk together freely of all people in the world, except the Plumers of New Orleans.  In Abel’s room of an evening, at a late hour, when a party of youth are smoking, there are many allusions to the pretty Plumer—­to which it happens that Newt and Moultrie make only a general reply.

As the dinner proceeds from delicate course to course, and the wines of varying hue sparkle and flow, so the conversation purls along—­a gentle, continuous stream.  Good things are said, and there is that kind of happy appreciation which makes the generally silent speak and the clever more witty.

Mrs. Godefroi Plumer has traveled much, and enjoys the world.  She is a Creole, with the Tropics in her hair and complexion, and Spain in her eyes.  She wears a Parisian headdress, a brocade upon her ample person, and diamonds around her complacent neck and arms.  Diamonds also flash in the fan which she sways gently, admiring Prince Abel.  Diamonds—­huge solitaires—­glitter likewise in the ears of Miss Grace.  She wears also a remarkable bracelet of the same precious stones; for the rest, her dress is a cloud of Mechlin lace.  She has quick, dark eyes, and an olive skin.  Her hands and feet are small.  She has filbert nails and an arched instep.  Prince Abel, who hangs upon his wall the portrait of the last Newmarket victor, has not omitted to observe these details.  He thinks how they would grace a larger house, a more splendid table.

Sligo Moultrie remembers a spacious country mansion, surrounded by a silent plantation, somewhat fallen from its state, whom such a mistress would superbly restore.  He looks a man too refined to wed for money, perhaps too indolently luxurious to love without it.

Half hidden under the muslin drapery by the window hangs a cage with a canary.  The bird sits silent; but as the feast proceeds he pours a shrill strain into the murmur of the guests.  For the noise of the golden-breasted bird Sligo Moultrie can not hear something that is said to him by the ripe mouth between the solitaires.  He asks pardon, and it is repeated.