d you ever see
such a collection of hideous people? And those who were supposed to be
good-looking--the beauties of the past--they're worse than the others.
Ah you may say what you will, _nous sommes mieux que ca_!" Sherringham
suspected him of irritation, of not liking the theatre of the great
rival nation to be thrust down his throat. They returned to Miriam and
Mademoiselle Dunoyer, and Peter asked the actress a question about one
of the portraits to which there was no name attached. She replied, like
a child who had only played about the room, that she was _toute
honteuse_ not to be able to tell him the original: she had forgotten,
she had never asked--"_Vous allez me trouver bien legere_!" She appealed
to the other persons present, who formed a gallery for her, and laughed
in delightful ripples at their suggestions, which she covered with
ridicule. She bestirred herself; she declared she would ascertain, she
shouldn't be happy till she did, and swam out of the room, with the
prettiest paddles, to obtain the information, leaving behind her a
perfume of delicate kindness and gaiety. She seemed above all things
obliging, and Peter pronounced her almost as natural off the stage as
on. She didn't come back.

XXI

Whether he had prearranged it is more than I can say, but Mademoiselle
Voisin delayed so long to show herself that Mrs. Rooth, who wished to
see the rest of the play, though she had sat it out on another occasion,
expressed a returning relish for her corner of the _baignoire_ and gave
her conductor the best pretext he could have desired for asking Basil
Dashwood to be so good as to escort her back. When the young actor, of
whose personal preference Peter was quite aware, had led Mrs. Rooth away
with an absence of moroseness which showed that his striking resemblance
to a gentleman was not kept for the footlights, the two others sat on a
divan in the part of the room furthest from the entrance, so that it
gave them a degree of privacy, and Miriam watched the coming and going
of their fellow-visitors and the indefinite people, attached to the
theatre, hanging about, while her companion gave a name to some of the
figures, Parisian celebrities.

"Fancy poor Dashwood cooped up there with mamma!" the girl exclaimed
whimsically.

"You're awfully cruel to him; but that's of course," said Sherringham.

"It seems to me I'm as kind as you; you sent him off."

"That was for your mother; she was tired."

"O