necessity. Otherwise we should be honoured..."

Madame de Sévénié inclined her head. "It must be as monsieur thinks
best."

"But Monsieur Monk!" madame la comtesse exclaimed with vivacity: "do
you know what I have just discovered? You and Madame de Montalais are
compatriots. She is of your New York. You must know each other."

"I have been wondering," Monk admitted, bowing to Eve, "if it were
possible I could be misled by a strong resemblance."

Eve turned to him with a look of surprise. "Yes, monsieur?"

"It is many years ago, you were a young girl then, if it was truly you,
madame; but I have a keen eye for beauty, I do not soon forget it ... I
was in the private office of my friend, Edmund Anstruther, of
Cottier's, one afternoon, selecting a trinket with his advice, and--"

"That was my father, monsieur."

"Then it was you, madame; I felt sure of it. You came in unannounced,
to see your father. He made me known to you as a friend of his, and
requested you to wait in an adjoining office. But that was not
necessary, I had already made up my mind, I left almost immediately. Do
you by any chance remember?"

The effort of the memory knitted Eve's brows; but in the end she shook
her head. "I am sorry, monsieur--"