s cap," said Fred, trying to laugh.

"Bah!" replied Giselle, gayly, "but we can get over it by calling him
Gue-gue or Ra-ra. What do you think? The difficulty is that names of
that kind are apt to stick to a boy for fifty years, and then they seem
ridiculous. Now a pretty abbreviation like Fred is another matter. But
I forget they have brought up my chocolate. Please ring, and let them
bring you a cup. We will take our luncheon together, as we used to do."

"Thank you, I have no appetite. I have just come from a certain buffet
where I lost it all."

"Oh! I suppose you have been to the Bazaar--the famous Charity Fair! You
must have made a sensation there on your return, for I am told that the
gentlemen who are expected to spend the most are likely to send their
money, and not to show themselves. There are many complaints of it."

"There were plenty of men round certain persons," replied Fred, dryly.
"Madame de Villegry's table was literally besieged."

"Really! What, hers! You surprise me! So it was the good things she gave
you that make you despise my poor chocolate," said Giselle, rising on
her elbow, to receive the smoking cup that a servant brought her on a
little silver salver.

"I didn't take much at her table," said Fred, ready to enter on his
grievances. "If you wish to know the reason why, I was too indignant to
eat or drink."

"Indignant?"

"Yes, the word is not at all too strong. When one has passed whole
months away from what is unwholesome and artificial, such things as
make up life in Paris, one becomes a little like Alceste, Moliere's
misanthrope, when one gets back to them. It is ridiculous at my age, and
yet if I were to tell you--"

"What?--you puzzle me. What can there be that is unwholesome in selling
things for the poor?"

"The poor! A pretty pretext! Was it to benefit the poor that that odious
Countess Strahlberg made all those disreputable grimaces? I have seen
kermesses got up by actresses, and, upon my word, they were good form in
comparison."

"Oh! Countess Strahlberg! People have heard about her doings until they
are tired of them," said Giselle, with that air of knowing everything
assumed by a young wife whose husband has told her all the current
scandals, as a sort of initiation.

"And her sister seems likely to be as bad as herself before long."

"Poor Colette! She has been so badly brought up. It is not her fault."

"But there's Jacqueline," cried Fred, in a sudden outburst