p. But I've liked you, Francie, I've believed
in you, and I don't wish you to be able to say that in spite of
the thunderbolt you've drawn down on us I've not treated you with
tenderness. It's a thunderbolt indeed, my poor and innocent but
disastrous little friend! We're hearing more of it already--the horrible
Republican papers here have (AS WE KNOW) already got hold of the
unspeakable sheet and are preparing to reproduce the article: that
is such parts of it as they may put forward (with innuendoes and
sous-entendus to eke out the rest) without exposing themselves to a suit
for defamation. Poor Leonie de Villepreux has been with us constantly
and Jeanne and her husband have telegraphed that we may expect them
day after to-morrow. They are evidently immensely emotionnes, for
they almost never telegraph. They wish so to receive Gaston. We have
determined all the same to be intensely QUIET, and that will be sure to
be his view. Alphonse and Maxime now recognise that it's best to leave
Mr. Flack alone, hard as it is to keep one's hands off him. Have you
anything to lui faire dire--to my precious brother when he arrives? But
it's foolish of me to ask you that, for you had much better not answer
this. You will no doubt have an opportunity to say to him--whatever, my
dear Francie, you CAN say! It will matter comparatively little that you
may never be able to say it to your friend with every allowance SUZANNE
DE BRECOURT.

Francie looked at this letter and tossed it away without reading it.
Delia picked it up, read it to her father, who didn't understand it, and
kept it in her possession, poring over it as Mr. Flack had seen her pore
over the cards that were left while she was out or over the registers of
American travellers. They knew of Gaston's arrival by his telegraphing
from Havre (he came back by the French line) and he mentioned the
hour--"about dinner-time"--at which he should reach Paris. Delia, after
dinner, made her father take her to the circus so that Francie should be
left alone to receive her intended, who would be sure to hurry round
in the course of the evening. The girl herself expressed no preference
whatever on this point, and the idea was one of Delia's masterly
ones, her flashes of inspiration. There was never any difficulty about
imposing such conceptions on poppa. But at half-past ten, when they
returned, the young man had not appeared, and Francie remained only long
enough to say "I told you so!" with