at me in his kind, sad way and shook his head.

"My wonder-headed little Asticot," said he, "within those gewgaw Wonder
Houses----" Then he stopped abruptly and waved me away, "No. It's a
devilish good thing for you to have something your imagination boggles
at. Stick to the Ideal, my son, and hug the Unexplained. The people who
have solved the Riddle of the Universe at fifteen are bowled over by the
Enigma of their cook at fifty. Plug your life as full as it can hold
with fantasy and fairy-tale, and thank God that your soul is baulked by
the Mysteries of the Casinos of Aix-les-Bains."

"But what do they do there, Master?" I persisted.

"The men worship strange goddesses and the women run after false gods,
and all practice fascinating idolatries."

I did not in the least know what he meant, which was what he intended.
When I consulted Blanquette one morning, as she and I alone were
sauntering down the long shady avenue which connects the town with the
little-port of the lake, she said that people went into the Cercle and
the Villa des Fleurs, the two Wonder Houses aforesaid, merely to gamble.
I pooh-poohed the notion.

"The Master says they are Temples of great strange gods, where people
worship."

"Gods! What an idea! _Il n'y a que le bon Dieu_," quoth Blanquette.

"You have evidently not heard of the gods of Greece and Rome, Jupiter
and Apollo and Venus and Bacchus."

"_Ah, tiens_," said Blanquette. "I have heard Italians swear 'Corpo di
Bacco.' That is why?"

"Of course," said I in my grandest manner, "and there are heaps of other
gods besides."

"All the same," she objected, "I always thought the Italians were good
Catholics."

"So they may be," said I, "but that doesn't prove that there are not
beautiful gods and goddesses and idols and shrines in the Cercle and the
Villa des Fleurs."

As this was unanswerable Blanquette diverted the conversation to the
less transcendental topic of the premature baldness of Monsieur Laripet.

* * * * *

If the doings of the bright happy beings were hidden from me while they
worshipped in the Casinos, I at least met them at close quarters in the
garden of the Restaurant du Lac. In some respects this garden resembled
that of the Restaurant du Soleil at Chambery. There was a verandah round
the restaurant itself, there were trees in joyous leafage, there were
little tables, and there were waiters hurrying to and fro with napkins
under th