At three o’clock Stenson informed me that the cab was at the door.

“Go up and call Mademoiselle,” said I.

In two or three minutes she came down.  I have not had such a shock in my life.  I uttered exclamations of amazement in several languages.  I have never seen on the stage or off such a figure as she presented.  Her cheeks were white with powder, her lips dyed a pomegranate scarlet, her eyebrows and lashes blackened.  In her ears she wore large silver-gilt earrings.  She entered the room with an air of triumph, as who should say:  “See how captivatingly beautiful I am!”

At my stare of horror her face fell.  At my command to go upstairs and wash herself clean, she wept.

“For heaven’s sake, don’t cry,” I exclaimed, “or you will look like a rainbow.”

“I did it to please you,” she sobbed.

“It is only the lowest class of dancing-women who paint their faces in England,” said I, splendide mendax. “And you know what they are in Alexandretta.”

“They came to Aziza-Zaza’s wedding,” said Carlotta, behind her handkerchief.  “But all our ladies do this when they want to make themselves look nice.  And I have put on this nasty thing that hurts me, just to please Seer Marcous.”

I felt I had been brutal.  She must have spent hours over her adornment.  Yet I could not have taken her out into the street.  She looked like Jezebel, who without her paint must have been, like Carlotta, a remarkably handsome person.

“It strikes me, Carlotta,” said I, “that you will find England is Alexandretta upside down.  What is wrong there is right here, and vice versa.  Now if you want to please me run away and clean yourself and take off those barbaric and Brummagem earrings.”

She went and was absent a short while.  She returned in dismay.  Water would not get it off.  I rang for Antoinette, but Antoinette had gone out.  It being too delicate a matter for Stenson, I fetched a pot of vaseline from my own room, and as Carlotta did not know what to make of it, I with my own hands cleansed Carlotta.  She screamed with delight, thinking it vastly amusing.  Her emotions are facile.  I cannot deny that it amused me too.  But I am in a responsible position, and I am wondering what the deuce I shall be doing next.

I enjoyed the drive to Richmond, where I gave her tea at the Star and Garter and was relieved to see her drink normally from the cup, instead of lapping from the saucer like a kitten.  She was much more intelligent than during our first drive on Tuesday.  The streets have grown more familiar, and the traffic does not make her head ache.  She asks me the ingenuous questions of a child of ten.  The tall guardsmen we passed particularly aroused her enthusiasm.  She had never seen anything so beautiful.  I asked her if she would like me to buy one and give it her to play with.

“Oh, would you, Seer Marcous?” she exclaimed, seizing my hand rapturously.  I verily believe she thought I was in earnest, for when I turned aside my jest, she pouted in disappointment and declared that it was wrong to tell lies.