The guests exclaimed and applauded.  No one, except Olivier Bertin, knew of Annette de Guilleroy’s return, and the appearance of the young girl beside her mother, who at a little distance seemed almost as fresh and even more beautiful—­for, like a flower in full bloom, she had not ceased to be brilliant, while the child, hardly budding, was only beginning to be pretty—­made both appear charming.

The Duchess, delighted, clapped her hands, exclaiming:  “Heavens!  How charming and amusing they are, standing beside each other!  Look, Monsieur de Musadieu, how much they resemble each other!”

The two were compared, and two opinions were formed.  According to Musadieu, the Corbelles, and the Comte de Guilleroy, the Countess and her daughter resembled each other only in coloring, in the hair, and above all in the eyes, which were exactly alike, both showing tiny black points, like minute drops of ink, on the blue iris.  But it was their opinion that when the young girl should have become a woman they would no longer resemble each other.

According to the Duchess, on the contrary, and also Olivier Bertin, they were similar in all respects, and only the difference in age made them appear unlike.

“How much she has changed in three years!” said the painter.  “I should not have recognized her, and I don’t dare to tutoyer the young lady!”

The Countess laughed.  “The idea!  I should like to hear you say ‘you’ to Annette!”

The young girl, whose future gay audacity was already apparent under an air of timid playfulness, replied:  “It is I who shall not dare to say ‘thou’ to Monsieur Bertin.”

Her mother smiled.

“Yes, continue the old habit—­I will allow you to do so,” she said.  “You will soon renew your acquaintance with him.”

But Annette shook her head.

“No, no, it would embarrass me,” she said.

The Duchess embraced her, and examined her with all the interest of a connoisseur.

“Look me in the face, my child,” she said.  “Yes, you have exactly the same expression as your mother; you won’t be so bad by-and-by, when you have acquired more polish.  And you must grow a little plumper—­not very much, but a little.  You are very thin.”

“Oh, don’t say that!” exclaimed the Countess.

“Why not?”

“It is so nice to be slender.  I intend to reduce myself at once.”

But Madame de Mortemain took offense, forgetting in her anger the presence of a young girl.

“Oh, of course, you are all in favor of bones, because you can dress them better than flesh.  For my part, I belong to the generation of fat women!  To-day is the day of thin ones.  They make me think of the lean kine of Egypt.  I cannot understand how men can admire your skeletons.  In my time they demanded more!”

She subsided amid the smiles of the company, but added, turning to Annette: 

“Look at your mamma, little one; she does very well; she has attained the happy medium—­imitate her.”