f
sweeping-dresses and chairs pushed Lack, the assembly files out, Firmin,
the _maitre d'hotel_, solemn and dignified, is privately doing a sum.
'In any other house this dinner would have been worth to me forty
pounds: with her, I'll warrant, it won't be a dozen;' to which he adds
aloud, as if he would spit his anger upon Her Grace's train, 'Grr! you
hag!'

'With Your Highness's permission--my grandfather, M. Jean Rehu, the
oldest member in the whole Institute.'

The high notes of Madame Astier's voice ring in the great drawing-room,
not nearly filled, though the guests invited to the reception have
already arrived.

She speaks very loud to make grandpapa understand to whom he is being
introduced and answer accordingly. Old Rehu looks grand, drawing up his
tall figure and still carrying high his little Creole face darkened and
cracked with age. Paul, graceful and pleasing, supports him on one side,
his granddaughter on the other; Astier-Rehu is behind. The family makes
a sentimental group in the style of Greuze. It would look well on one
of the pale-coloured tapestries with which the room is decorated,
tapestries--a strange thing to think of--scarcely older than Rehu
himself. The Grand-Duke, much affected, tries to say something happy,
but the author of the Letters to Urania is not upon his cards. He gets
out of it by a few vague complimentary phrases, in answer to which old
Rehu, supposing that he is being asked as usual about his age, says,
'Ninety-eight years in a fortnight, Sir.' His next attempt does not fit
much better with His Highness's gracious congratulations. 'Not since
1803, Sir; the town must be much changed.' During the progress of this
singular dialogue, Paul is whispering to his mother, 'You may see him
home if you like; I won't have anything more to do with him; he's in
an awful temper. In the carriage he was kicking me all the time in the
legs, to work off his fidgets, he said.' The young man himself had an
unpleasant ring in his voice this evening, and in his charming face
something set and hard, which his mother knew well, and noticed
immediately on coming into the room. What is the matter? She watched
him, trying to read the meaning in his light eyes, which, however,
harder and keener than usual, revealed nothing.

But the chill, the ceremonious chill, prevailed here no less than at
the dinner-table. The guests kept apart in groups, the few ladies in a
circle upon low chairs, the gentlemen stan