degrees higher after
the guests were settled in soft easy-chairs in the cool drawing-room.

There was no other light than the fire in the grate. Its red glimmer
crept over the English carpet and up the gold borders in the tapestry;
it shone upon a gilt picture-frame, on the piano that stood opposite,
and, here and there, on a face further away in the gloom. Nothing else
was visible except the red ends of cigars and cigarettes.

The conversation died away. The silence was broken only by an occasional
whisper or the sound of a coffee-cup being put aside; each seemed
disposed to enjoy, undisturbed, his genial mood and the quiet gladness
of digestion. Even Monsieur Anatole forgot his truffles, as he reclined
in a low chair close to the sofa, on which Mademoiselle Adele had taken
her seat.

'Is there no one who will give us a little music?' asked Senhor de
Silvis from his chair. 'You are always so kind, Mademoiselle Adele.'

'Oh no, no!' cried Mademoiselle; 'I am too tired.'

But the foreigner--the Irishman--rose from his corner and walked towards
the instrument.

'Ah, you will play for us! A thousand thanks, Monsieur--.' Senhor de
Silvis had forgotten the name--a thing that often happened to him with
his guests.

'He is a musician,' said Mademoiselle Adele to her friend. Anatole
grunted admiringly.

Indeed, all were similarly impressed by the mere way in which he sat
down and, without any preparation, struck a few chords here and there,
as if to wake the instrument.

Then he began to play--lightly, sportively, frivolously, as befitted the
situation. The melodies of the day were intermingled with fragments of
waltzes and ballads; all the ephemeral trifles that Paris hums over for
eight days he blended together with brilliantly fluent execution.

The ladies uttered exclamations of admiration, and sang a few bars,
keeping time with their feet. The whole party followed the music with
intense interest; the strange artist had hit their mood, and drawn them
all with him from the beginning. 'Der liebe Doctor' alone listened with
the Sedan smile on his face; the pieces were too easy for him.

But soon there came something for the German too; he nodded now and then
with a sort of appreciation.

It was a strange situation: the piquant fragrance that filled the air,
the pleasure-loving women--these people, so free and unconstrained, all
strangers to one another, hidden in the elegant, half-dark salon, each
following his