RY HE BROUGHT THE BIG BLUE CAR TO
A STOP 70

HE CRUSHED THEM IN HIS, THEN BENT HIS HEAD AND KISSED THEM 102

THEY CAME NEARER, NEAR ENOUGH FOR MADEMOISELLE TO RECOGNISE
THE MAN WITH THEM 124

THEIR FLUFFY LACES BURNT AND BLACKENED. CHIFFON FICHUS TORN
IN RIBBONS STREWED THE CARPET 138

[Illustration: CHAPTER ONE]

THE WHITE GIRL ON THE TERRACE: THE ROSE GIRL AT THE CASINO

[Illustration: T]

There was a young man in Monte Carlo. He had come in a motor car, and he
had come a long way, but he hardly knew why he had come. He hardly knew
in these days why he did anything. But then, one must do something.

It would be Christmas soon, and he thought that he would rather get it
over on the Riviera than anywhere else, because the blue and gold
weather would not remind him of other Christmases which were gone--pure,
white, cold Christmases, musical with joy-bells and sweet with aromatic
pine, the scent of trees born to be Christmas trees.

There had been a time when he had fancied it would be a wonderful thing
to see the Riviera. He had thought what it would be like to be a rich
man, and bring a certain girl here for a moon of honey and roses.

She was the most beautiful girl in the world, or he believed her so,
which is exactly the same thing; and he had imagined the joy of walking
with her on just such a terrace as this Casino terrace where he was
walking now, alone. She would be in white, with one of those long ermine
things that women call stoles; an ermine muff (the big, "granny" kind
that swallows girlish arms up to the dimples in their elbows) and a hat
which they would have bought together in Paris.

They would have bought jewels, too, in the same street where they found
the hat; the Rue de la Paix, which she had told him she longed to see.
And she would be wearing some of the jewels with the white dress--just a
few, not many, of course. A string of pearls (she loved pearls) a
swallow brooch (he had heard her say she admired those swallow brooches,
and he never forgot anything she said); with perhaps a sapphire-studded
buckle on her white suede belt. Yes, that would be all, except the
rings, which would lie hidden under her gloves, on the dear little hands
whose nails were like enamelled rose leaves.

When she moved, walking beside him on the terrac