to take. The only perceptible eminence in M.
Nioche's horizon is Montmartre, which is not an edifying quarter. You
can't go mountaineering in a flat country."

"He remarked, indeed," said Newman, "that he has not forgiven her. But
she'll never find it out."

"We must do him the justice to suppose he doesn't like the thing,"
Valentin rejoined. "Mademoiselle Nioche is like the great artists whose
biographies we read, who at the beginning of their career have
suffered opposition in the domestic circle. Their vocation has not
been recognized by their families, but the world has done it justice.
Mademoiselle Nioche has a vocation."

"Oh, come," said Newman, impatiently, "you take the little baggage too
seriously."

"I know I do; but when one has nothing to think about, one must think of
little baggages. I suppose it is better to be serious about light things
than not to be serious at all. This little baggage entertains me."

"Oh, she has discovered that. She knows you have been hunting her up
and asking questions about her. She is very much tickled by it. That's
rather annoying."

"Annoying, my dear fellow," laughed Valentin; "not the least!"

"Hanged if I should want to have a greedy little adventuress like that
know I was giving myself such pains about her!" said Newman.

"A pretty woman is always worth one's pains," objected Valentin.
"Mademoiselle Nioche is welcome to be tickled by my curiosity, and to
know that I am tickled that she is tickled. She is not so much tickled,
by the way."

"You had better go and tell her," Newman rejoined. "She gave me a
message for you of some such drift."

"Bless your quiet imagination," said Valentin, "I have been to see
her--three times in five days. She is a charming hostess; we talk of
Shakespeare and the musical glasses. She is extremely clever and a very
curious type; not at all coarse or wanting to be coarse; determined not
to be. She means to take very good care of herself. She is extremely
perfect; she is as hard and clear-cut as some little figure of a
sea-nymph in an antique intaglio, and I will warrant that she has not
a grain more of sentiment or heart than if she was scooped out of a
big amethyst. You can't scratch her even with a diamond.
Extremely pretty,--really, when you know her, she is wonderfully
pretty,--intelligent, determined, ambitious, unscrupulous, capable of
looking at a man strangled without changing color, she is upon my honor,
extremely enterta