s. And even when he was spending his time at
Verdayne Place he always had tea ready to drink between sets of
tennis.

The Verdayne tea was famous all over the countryside. It was a Russian
variety. Paul always steadfastly refused to divulge to anyone--ever
the Vicar's wife--the place where he bought it, and he always had it
prepared in a Russian _samovar_.

Once in the library, a great sombre room to which an open coal fire
lent a cheerful touch, Paul's companion seated herself at a low
tea-table and busied herself with the _samovar_.

"This is Russian tea," she said, smiling. "You may not care for it."

"On the contrary," Paul replied, sipping the steaming amber fluid--"I
always use this same kind at home. One can't fail to detect the
peculiar aromatic flavour which tea retains when it has travelled
overland, but which most of the leaves sold in England lose in coming
by sea."

"This is my own--which I always carry with me," Mademoiselle
Vseslavitch remarked. "We have used no other in our family for many
years."

"And where, Mademoiselle, if I may ask, does this highly
discriminating family reside? Perhaps, in the course of my wanderings
there might come a time when it would be a most important matter for
me to obtain a cup of this truly remarkable brew."

Mademoiselle Vseslavitch laughed mischievously at Paul. She had
motioned him to a chair where the firelight reached his face, whereas
her own was more in shadow. He did not see the amusement in her eyes
when she replied:

"Oh! You can find tea like that in many houses east of the Balkans. It
is really not wonderful at all."

Paul saw that the lady did not care to tell him much of herself, and
he did not venture to press her further just then. But now that the
Countess was not there to question, he felt that he must make some
effort later.

As they sat there the lady talked to him of things in Paris, of the
Luxembourg, the Louvre, Notre Dame, the boulevards, and then she
wickedly mentioned the _Bois de Boulogne_. But Paul did not prove very
responsive on that subject. The remembrance of the spectacle he had
presented the afternoon before did not please him.

He knew right well that she was teasing him, though she did not
mention the incident. He almost wished she would--it might give him an
opportunity to say to her the words that he longed to say.

As for Lucerne--or Langres--Mademoiselle nimbly avoided those
spots--it was as if they had no place on