Deulin then turned to where Miss Cahere had been standing.  But she had moved away a few paces, nearer to a candelabrum, under which she was now standing, and a young officer in full German uniform was openly admiring her, with a sort of wonder on his foolish, Teutonic face.

“Ah!  I expected you had forgotten me,” she said, when Deulin presented himself.

“Believe me—­I have tried,” he replied, with great earnestness; but the complete innocence of her face clearly showed that she did not attach any deep meaning to his remark.

“You must see so many people that you cannot be expected to remember them all.”

“I do not remember them all, mademoiselle—­only a very, very few.”

“Then tell me, who is that lovely girl you bowed to as you came into the room?”

“Is there another in the room?” inquired Deulin, looking around him with some interest.

“Over there, with the fair hair, dressed in black.”

“Ah! talking to Cartoner.  Yes.  Do you think her beautiful?”

“I think she is perfectly lovely.  But somehow she does not look like one of us, does she?” And Miss Cahere lowered her voice in a rather youthful and inexperienced way.

“She is not like one of us, Miss Cahere,” replied Deulin.

“Why?”

“Because we are plebeians, and she is a princess.”

“Oh, then she is married?” exclaimed Miss Cahere, and her voice fell three semitones on the last word.

“No.  She is a princess in her own right.  She is a Pole.”

Miss Cahere gave a little sigh.

“Poor thing,” she said, looking at the Princess Wanda, with a soft light of sympathy in her gentle eyes.

“Why do you pity her?” asked Deulin, glancing down sharply.

“Because princesses are always obliged to marry royalties, are they not—­for convenience, I mean—­not from . . . from inclination, like other girls?”

And Miss Cahere’s eyelids fluttered, but she did not actually raise her eyes towards her interlocutor.  An odd smile flickered for an instant on Deulin’s lips.

“Ah!” he said, with a sharp sigh—­and that was all.  He bowed, and turned away to speak to a man who had been waiting at his elbow for some minutes.  This also was a Frenchman, who seemed to have something special to report, for they walked aside together.

It was quite late in the evening before Deulin succeeded in his efforts to get a few moments’ speech with Lady Orlay.  He found that unmatched hostess at leisure in the brief space elapsing between the arrival of the latest and the departure of the earliest.

“I was looking for you,” she said; “you, who always know where everybody is.  Where is Mr. Mangles?  An under-secretary was asking for him a moment ago.”

“Mangles is listening to the music in the library—­comparatively happy by himself behind a barricade of flowers.”

“And that preposterous woman?”