A moment later Julia, cleaving her way scornfully through the throng that
parted before her as before an angel of light, raised her superb brow and
made a sign to Lucan.

"I don't see mother," she said.

Lucan informed her in a few words of the arrangement which had just been
settled upon. A sudden flash darted across Julia's eyes; her brows became
contracted; she shrugged her shoulders slightly without replying, and
returned into the ball-room, waltzing through the crowd with the same
tranquil insolence. She betook herself again to the arm of a naval
officer, and seemed to enjoy whirling in all her splendor. And indeed her
ball-dress added a strange luster to her beauty. Her shoulders and throat,
emerging from her dress with a sort of chaste indifference, retained even
in the animation of the dance the cold and lustrous purity of marble.

Lucan asked her to waltz with him; she hesitated, but having consulted her
memory, she discovered that she had not yet exhausted the list of naval
officers who had swooped down in squadrons upon that rich prey. At the end
of an hour she got tired of being admired and called for the carriage. As
she was draping herself in her wrappings in the vestibule, her step-father
volunteered his services.

"No! I beg of you," she said, impatiently; "men don't know--don't know at
all!"

Then she threw herself in the carriage with a wearied look. However, as
the horses were starting:

"Smoke, sir," she said with a better grace.

Lucan thanked her for the permission, but without availing himself of it;
then, while making all his little arrangements of neighborly comfort:

"You were remarkably handsome to-night, my dear child!" he said.

"Monsieur," said Julia, in a nonchalant but affirmative tone, "I forbid
you to think me handsome, and I forbid you to call me 'my dear child!'"

"As you please," said Lucan. "Well, then, you are not handsome, you are
not dear to me, and you are not a child."

"As for being a child, no!" she said, energetically.

She wound her vail around her head, crossed her arms over her bosom, and
settled herself in her corner, where a stray moonbeam came occasionally to
play over her whiteness.

"May I sleep?" she asked.

"Why, most certainly! Shall I close the window?"

"If you please. My flowers will not incommode you?"

"Not in the least."

After a pause:

"Monsieur de Lucan?" resumed Julia.

"Dear madam?"

"Do explain to me in what consist the usa