e it a point for me to stay through the whole evening?"

"You can settle that with her," Rongier reassured him. "I thought you
wouldn't fail me. She's heard about your blue comet and your yellow
desert, and your new parachute, and has probably mixed them all up; but
the result is that she wants to meet you."

"Very kind. I wish I could do the comet and the desert the same credit
you do the parachute. But who is 'She'?"

"Miss Holbein, the daughter of the yacht's owner. English people here, I
understand, won't know her father because he was once an I. D. B. and is
now a money-lender; but thank heaven we who have Latin blood in our
veins are neither snobs nor hypocrites. By the way, Holbein called some
fellow at the Casino a 'snob' the other night, and the man returned, 'If
I were a snob, I wouldn't know you.' Holbein thought it so smart he goes
about repeating the story against himself, which proves he balances his
millions with a sense of humour. Miss Holbein is handsome. Jewesses can
be the most beautiful women in the world, don't you think? and though
she is snubbed by the _grandes dames_ here and perhaps elsewhere, I
notice that snubs generally come home to roost. She will have all the
millions one day, and she is clever enough to pay people back in their
own coin--not coin that she would miss in spending. And she is clever
enough to be Madame la Baronne Rongier, wife to the idol of the French
people, if she thinks it worth while! Just for the moment, though, I am
on my probation. I dare refuse her nothing she wants, and she wants
Prince Giovanni Della Robbia at her mother's dance."

"That unworthy person is at her service," Vanno said, bored at the
prospect, but willing to please his friend.

* * * * * * *

Mrs. Ernstein and Dodo Wardropp were eagerly looking forward to the
Christmas eve dance on board _White Lady_. Mrs. Collis and Lottie had
been looking forward to it too; and after they went from the villa they
wrote almost humbly to ask Mrs. Holbein if they might still come, though
they were no longer with her friend Lady Dauntrey. To their joy and
surprise she had written back cordially to say she hoped most certainly
they would come, and bring friends. She had seemed far from cordial to
them or anybody else when lunching at the Villa Bella Vista on the
unfortunate occasion of the dish-towel; indeed, she had been lymphatic,
and had scarcely troubled to speak