even finishing her Tristan, the first part of which had inspired in Burne-Jones dreamy aquarelles, she wrote Provencal verses and French poems expressing Italian ideas.  She had sent her ‘Yseult la Blonde’ to “Darling,” with a letter inviting her to spend a month with her at Fiesole.  She had written:  “Come; you will see the most beautiful things in the world, and you will embellish them.”

And “darling” was saying to herself that she would not go, that she must remain in Paris.  But the idea of seeing Miss Bell in Italy was not indifferent to her.  And turning the leaves of the book, she stopped by chance at this line: 

          Love and gentle heart are one.

And she asked herself, with gentle irony, whether Miss Bell had ever been in love, and what manner of man could be the ideal of Miss Bell.  The poetess had at Fiesole an escort, Prince Albertinelli.  He was very handsome, but rather coarse and vulgar; too much so to please an aesthete who blended with the desire for love the mysticism of an Annunciation.

“Good-evening, Therese.  I am positively worn out.”

The Princess Seniavine had entered, supple in her furs, which almost seemed to form a part of her dark beauty.  She seated herself brusquely, and, in a voice at once harsh yet caressing, said: 

“This morning I walked through the park with General Lariviere.  I met him in an alley and made him go with me to the bridge, where he wished to buy from the guardian a learned magpie which performs the manual of arms with a gun.  Oh!  I am so tired!”

“But why did you drag the General to the bridge?”

“Because he had gout in his toe.”

Therese shrugged her shoulders, smiling: 

“You squander your wickedness.  You spoil things.”

“And you wish me, dear, to save my kindness and my wickedness for a serious investment?”

Therese made her drink some Tokay.

Preceded by the sound of his powerful breathing, General Lariviere approached with heavy state and sat between the two women, looking stubborn and self-satisfied, laughing in every wrinkle of his face.

“How is Monsieur Martin-Belleme?  Always busy?”

Therese thought he was at the Chamber, and even that he was making a speech there.

Princess Seniavine, who was eating caviare sandwiches, asked Madame Martin why she had not gone to Madame Meillan’s the day before.  They had played a comedy there.

“A Scandinavian play?  Was it a success?”

“Yes—­I don’t know.  I was in the little green room, under the portrait of the Duc d’Orleans.  Monsieur Le Menil came to me and did me one of those good turns that one never forgets.  He saved me from Monsieur Garain.”

The General, who knew the Annual Register, and stored away all useful information, pricked up his ears.

“Garain,” he asked, “the minister who was in the Cabinet when the princes were exiled?”