'Ami Fritz is going to make us some good coffee! After we 'ave 'ad it
you shall go away if so is your wish, but my 'usband will certainly
accompany you--"

"Most certainly I will do so; you will not move--no, not a single
step--without me," said Monsieur Wachner solemnly.

And then Madame Wachner burst out into a sudden peal of
laughter--laughter which was infectious.

Sylvia smiled too, and sat down again. After all, as Paul de Virieu had
truly said, not once, but many times, the Wachners were not refined
people--but they were kind and very good-natured. And then she, Sylvia,
was tired and low-spirited to-night--no doubt she had imagined the change
in their manner, which had so surprised and hurt her.

Madame Wachner was quite her old self again; just now she was engaged in
heaping all the cherries which were in the dessert dish on her guest's
plate, in spite of Sylvia's eager protest.

L'Ami Fritz got up and left the room. He was going into the kitchen to
make the coffee.

"Mr. Chester was telling me of your valuable pearls," said Madame Wachner
pleasantly. "I _was_ surprised! What a lot of money to 'ang round one's
neck! But it is worth it if one 'as so lovely a neck as 'as the beautiful
Sylvia! May I look at your pearls, dear friend? Or do you never take them
off?"

Sylvia unclasped the string of pearls and laid it on the table.

"Yes, they are rather nice," she said modestly. "I always wear them, even
at night. Many people have a knot made between each pearl, for that, of
course, makes the danger of losing them much less should the string
break. But mine are not knotted, for a lady once told me that it made the
pearls hang much less prettily; she said it would be quite safe if I had
them restrung every six months. So that is what I do. I had them restrung
just before coming to France."

Madame Wachner reverentially took up the pearls in her large hand; she
seemed to be weighing them.

"How heavy they are," she said at length, and now she spoke French.

"Yes," said Sylvia, "you can always tell a real pearl by its weight."

"And to think," went on her hostess musingly, "that each of these tiny
balls is worth--how much is it worth?--at least five or six hundred
francs, I suppose?"

"Yes," said Sylvia again, "I'm glad to say they have increased in value
during the last few years. You see, pearls are the only really
fashionable gems just now."

"And they cannot be identified like other fine jewels," obs