venture to think, be recompensed by a story which even the
greatest familiarity and long pondering has not robbed of all its interest
for me. But then I must admit that I have reasons which no one else can
have for following with avidity every stage and every development in the
drama, and for seeking to discern now what at the time was dark and
puzzling to me.

The thing began in the most ordinary way in the world--or perhaps that is
too strongly put. The beginning was ordinary indeed, and tame, compared
with the sequel. Yet even the beginning had a flavor of the unusual about
it, strong enough to startle a man so used to a humdrum life and so
unversed in anything out of the common as I. Here, then, is the beginning:

One morning, as I sat smoking my after-breakfast cigar in my rooms in St.
James' Street, my friend Gustave de Berensac rushed in. His bright brown
eyes were sparkling, his mustache seemed twisted up more gayly and
triumphantly than ever, and his manner was redolent of high spirits. Yet
it was a dull, somber, misty morning, for all that the month was July and
another day or two would bring August. But Gustave was a merry fellow,
though always (as I had occasion to remember later on) within the limits
of becoming mirth--as to which, to be sure, there may be much difference
of opinion.

"Shame!" he cried, pointing at me. "You are a man of leisure, nothing
keeps you here; yet you stay in this _bouillon_ of an atmosphere, with
France only twenty miles away over the sea!"

"They have fogs in France too," said I. "But whither tends your
impassioned speech, my good friend? Have you got leave?"

Gustave was at this time an extra secretary at the French Embassy in
London.

"Leave? Yes, I have leave--and, what is more, I have a charming
invitation."

"My congratulations," said I.

"An invitation which includes a friend," he continued, sitting down. "Ah,
you smile! You mean that is less interesting?"

"A man may smile and smile, and not be a villain," said I. "I meant
nothing of the sort. I smiled at your exhilaration--nothing more, on the
word of a moral Englishman."

Gustave grimaced; then he waved his cigarette in the air, exclaiming:

"She is charming, my dear Gilbert!"

"The exhilaration is explained."

"There is not a word to be said against her," he added hastily.

"That does not depress me," said I. "But why should she invite me?"

"She doesn't invite you; she invites me to bring--anybody!"