en's small blue eyes, and possibly even
staggered the hot faith of his young champion. Pauline de Melusine was
as good as her word--she did call on the Gordons--and Brutus, stoic
though he was, was well pleased; for the baronne, though her nobility
only dated from the Restoration, and was not received by the exclusive
Legitimists of the old Faubourg St. Germain, had a very pleasant set of
her own, and figured among the nouvelle noblesse and bourgeois decores
who fill the vacant places of the De Rochefoucauld, the De Rohan, and
the Montmorency, in the "imperial" salons of the Tuileries, where once
the noblest blood in Europe was gathered.

"It is painful to me to frequent Ernest's society," the Warden was wont
to say, "for every word he utters impresses me but more sadly with the
conviction of his lost state. But we are commanded to be in the world
though not of it, and, if I shun him, how can I hope to benefit him?"

"True; and, as your cousin, it would scarcely be charitable to avoid
him entirely, terrible as we know his habits to be. But there is no
necessity to be too intimate, and I do not wish Nina to be too much with
him," the banker was accustomed to answer.

"_Anglice_, Vaughan gets us good introductions, and makes Paris pleasant
to us; we'll use him while we want him: when we don't, we will give him
his conge."

That's the reading of most of our dear friends' compliments and
caresses, isn't it?

Vaughan knew perfectly well that they would like to make a cat's-paw of
him, and was the last man likely to play that simple and certainly not
agreeable role unless it suited him. But he had reasons of his own for
forcing Gordon to be civil and obliged to him, despite the prejudices of
that English, and therefore, of course, opinionated gentleman. It amused
him to mortify Eusebius, whom he saw at a glance was bewitched with the
prospect of Nina's _dot_, and it amused him very much to see Nina's
joyous laughter as he leaned over her chair at the Opera Comique, to
hear her animated satire on Madame de Melusine, for whom, knowing
nothing of her, the young lady had conceived hot aversion, and to listen
to her enthusiasm when she poured out to him her vivid imaginings.

Gradually the cafes, and the Boulevards, and the boudoirs missed Ernest
while he accompanied Nina through the glades of St. Cloud, or down the
Seine to Asnieres, or up the slopes of Pere la Chaise, in his new
pursuit; and often at night he would leave t