worse places even, were there my chance it would be attended to. Madame Mila, have I been so unhappy as to have offended you?"
"I am a top leaf that may rot! I was never told anything so rude in my life—from you too! the very soul of ceremonious courtesy."
Della Rocca made his peace with her in flowery flattery.
"Well, I shall play baccarat to-night in this hotel, just because the Prefect has been so odious and done that," said Madame Mila. "You will all come home with me after the Roubleskoff's dinner? Promise!"
"Of course," said the Princess Olga.
"Of course," said Lady Featherleigh.
"Of course," said everybody else.
"And if the gendarmes come in?"
"We will shoot them!"
"No; we will give them champagne—surer and more humane."
"I wish the Prefect would come himself—I should like to tell him my mind," continued Madame Mila. "So impudent of the man!—when all the Royal Highnesses and Grand Dukes and
