id it," demanded Madame de Guilleroy.

The Baroness explained the method employed by all the fashionable women
of the day. One must never drink while eating; but an hour after the
repast a cup of tea may be taken, boiling hot. This method succeeded
with everyone. She cited astonishing cases of fat women who in three
months had become more slender than the blade of a knife. The Duchess
exclaimed in exasperation:

"Good gracious, how stupid to torture oneself like that! You like
nothing any more--nothing--not even champagne. Bertin, as an artist,
what do you think of this folly?"

"_Mon Dieu_, Madame, I am a painter and I simply arrange the drapery, so
it is all the same to me. If I were a sculptor I might complain."

"But as a man, which do you prefer?"

"I? Oh, a certain rounded slimness--what my cook calls a nice little
corn-fed chicken. It is not fat, but plump and delicate."

The comparison caused a laugh; but the incredulous Countess looked at
her daughter and murmured:

"No, it is very much better to be thin; slender women never grow old."

This point also was discussed by the company; and all agreed that a very
fat person should not grow thin too rapidly.

This observation gave place to a review of women known in society and
to new discussions on their grace, their chic and beauty. Musadieu
pronounced the blonde Marquise de Lochrist incomparably charming,
while Bertin esteemed as a beauty Madame Mandeliere, with her brunette
complexion, low brow, her dusky eyes and somewhat large mouth, in which
her teeth seemed to sparkle.

He was seated beside the young girl, and said suddenly, turning to her:

"Listen to me, Nanette. Everything that we have just been saying you
will hear repeated at least once a week until you are old. In a week you
will know all that society thinks about politics, women, plays, and
all the rest of it. Only an occasional change of names will be
necessary--names of persons and titles of works. When you have heard us
all express and defend our opinions, you will quietly choose your own
among those that one must have, and then you need never trouble yourself
to think of anything more, never. You will only have to rest in that
opinion."

The young girl, without replying, turned upon him her mischievous eyes,
wherein sparkled youthful intelligence, restrained, but ready to escape.

But the Duchess and Musadieu, who played with ideas as one tosses a
ball, without perceiving that they c