outright, disclosing two exquisite rows of pearls, her soft,
dark eyes half closing mischievously as she entered my door--eyes as
black as her hair, which she wore in a bandeau. The tonneau growled to
its improvised garage under the wood-shed.

She was standing now in the hall at the foot of the narrow stone stairs,
and as I slipped the long opera-cloak of dove-gray from her shoulders as
white as ivory, she glided out of it, and into the living room--a room
which serves as gun room, dining room and salon.

"Stand where you are," I said, as madame approached the fire. "What a
portrait!"

She stopped, the dancing light from the flames playing over her lithe,
exquisite figure, moulded in a gown of scintillating scales of black
jet. Then, seeing I had finished my mental note of line and composition,
she half turned her pretty head and caught sight of the ruby, cobwebbed
row of old Burgundy.

"Ah! Tanrade's Burgundy!" she exclaimed with a little cry of delight.

"How did you guess?"

"Guess! One does not have to guess when one sees as good Burgundy as
that. You see I know it." She stretched forth her firm white arms to the
blaze.

"Where is he, that good-for-nothing fellow?" she asked.

"In the garden after some astragon for the salad."

She tripped to the half-open door leading to the tangled maze of paths.

"Tanrade! Tanrade! _Bonsoir, ami!_" she called.

"_Bonsoir_, Madame Punctual," echoed his great voice from the end of the
garden, and again he broke forth in song as he came hurrying back to the
house with his lantern and his bunch of seasoning. Following at his
heels trotted the Essence of Selfishness.

"Oh, you beauty!" cried Alice. She nodded mischievously to Tanrade, who
rushed to the piano, and before the Essence of Selfishness had time to
elude her she was picked up bodily, held by her fore paws and forced to
dance upon her hind legs, her sleek head turned aside in hate, her
velvety ears flattened to her skull.

"Dance! Dance!" laughed Alice. "One--two, one--two! _Voila!_" The next
instant Miquette was caught up and hugged to a soft neck encircled with
jewels. "There, go! Do what you like, Mademoiselle Independent!"

And as Miquette regained her liberty upon her four paws, the Marquis and
Marquise de Clamard announced their arrival by tapping on the window, so
that for the moment the cozy room was deserted save by Miquette, who
profited during the interval by stealing a whole sardine from the
hor