She loitered in a thousand places, for Cigarette knew everybody; she chatted with a group of Turcos, she emptied her barrel for some Zouaves, she ate sweetmeats with a lot of negro boys, she boxed a little drummer’s ear for slurring over the “r’lin tintin” at his practice, she drank a demi-tasse with some officers at a cafe; she had ten minutes’ pistol-shooting, where she beat hollow a young dandy of the Guides who had come to look at Algiers for a week, and made even points with one of the first shots of the “Cavalry a pied,” as the Algerian antithesis runs.  Finally she paused before the open French window of a snow-white villa, half-buried in tamarisk and orange and pomegranate, with the deep-hued flowers glaring in the sun, and a hedge of wild cactus fencing it in; through the cactus she made her way as easily as a rabbit burrows; it would have been an impossibility to Cigarette to enter by any ordinary means; and balancing herself lightly on the sill for a second, stood looking in at the chamber.

“Ho, M. le Marquis! the Zouaves have drunk all my wine up; fill me my keg with yours for once—­the very best burgundy, mind.  I’m half afraid your cellar will hurt my reputation.”

The chamber was very handsome, hung and furnished in the very best Paris fashion, and all glittering with amber and ormolu and velvets; in it half a dozen men—­officers of the cavalry—­were sitting over their noon breakfast, and playing at lansquenet at the same time.  The table was crowded with dishes of every sort, and wines of every vintage; and the fragrance of their bouquet, the clouds of smoke, and the heavy scent of the orange blossom without, mingled together in an intense perfume.  He whom she addressed, M. le Marquis de Chateauroy, laughed, and looked up.

“Ah, is it thee, my pretty brunette?  Take what thou wantest out of the ice pails.”

“The best growths?” asked Cigarette, with the dubious air and caution of a connoisseur.

“Yes!” said M. le Marquis, amused with the precautions taken with his cellar, one of the finest in Algiers.  “Come in and have some breakfast, ma belle.  Only pay the toll.”

Where he sat between the window and the table he caught her in his arms and drew her pretty face down; Cigarette, with the laugh of a saucy child, whisked her cigar out of her mouth and blew a great cloud of smoke in his eyes.  She had no particular fancy for him, though she had for his wines; shouts of mirth from the other men completed the Marquis’ discomfiture, as she swayed away from him, and went over to the other side of the table, emptying some bottles unceremoniously into her wine-keg; iced, ruby, perfumy claret that she could not have bought anywhere for the barracks.

“Hola!” cried the Marquis, “thou art not generally so coy with thy kisses, petite.”

Cigarette tossed her head.

“I don’t like bad clarets after good!  I’ve just been with your Corporal, ‘Bel-a-faire-peur’; you are no beauty after him, M. le Colonel.”