-one of those very tiresome specimens
who wander about and pretend to be outlaws. However, she soon perceived
that she had made a mistake, and this piqued Mademoiselle Adele. For one
of her many specialties was the ability to immediately 'assort' all the
foreigners with whom she mingled, and she used to declare that she could
guess a man's nationality as soon as she had spoken ten words with him.

But this taciturn stranger caused her much perplexed cogitation. If he
had only been fair-haired, she would at once have set him down as an
Englishman, for he talked like one. But he had dark hair, a thick black
moustache, and a nice little figure. His fingers were remarkably long,
and he had a peculiar way of trifling with his bread and playing with
his dessert-fork.

'He is a musician,' whispered Mademoiselle Adele to her stout friend.

'Ah!' replied Monsieur Anatole. 'I am afraid I have eaten too many
truffles.'

Mademoiselle Adele whispered in his ear some words of good counsel, upon
which he laughed and looked very affectionate.

However, she could not relinquish her hold of the interesting foreigner.
After she had coaxed him to drink several glasses of champagne, he
became livelier, and talked more.

'Ah!' cried she suddenly; 'I hear it in your speech. You are an
Englishman!'

The stranger grew quite red in the face, and answered quickly, 'No,
madame.'

Mademoiselle Adele laughed. 'I beg your pardon. I know that Americans
feel angry when they are taken for Englishmen.'

'Neither am I an American,' replied the stranger.

This was too much for Mademoiselle Adele. She bent over her plate and
looked sulky, for she saw that Mademoiselle Louison opposite was
enjoying her defeat.

The foreign gentleman understood the situation, and added, half aloud:
'I am an Irishman, madame.'

'Ah!' said Mademoiselle Adele, with a grateful smile, for she was easily
reconciled.

'Anatole! Irishman--what is that?' she asked in a whisper.

'The poor of England,' he whispered back.

'Indeed!'

Adele elevated her eyebrows, and cast a shrinking, timid glance at the
stranger. She had suddenly lost much of her interest in him.

De Silvis's dinners were excellent. The party had sat long at table, and
when Monsieur Anatole thought of the oysters with which the feast had
begun, they appeared to him like a beautiful dream. On the contrary, he
had a somewhat too lively recollection of the truffles.

Dinner was over; hands were reac