"It's tomorrow. Are you going?"

"Egad, yes."

"At midnight, at her house.

"I know, I know. I'm going with Blanche."

He wanted to escape and return to the ladies in order to urge yet
another reason in M. de Bismarck's favor. But Fauchery detained him.

"You never will guess whom she has charged me to invite."

And with a slight nod he indicated Count Muffat, who was just then
discussing a knotty point in the budget with Steiner and the deputy.

"It's impossible," said Vandeuvres, stupefaction and merriment in his
tones. "My word on it! I had to swear that I would bring him to her.
Indeed, that's one of my reasons for coming here."

Both laughed silently, and Vandeuvres, hurriedly rejoining the circle of
ladies, cried out:

"I declare that on the contrary Monsieur de Bismarck is exceedingly
witty. For instance, one evening he said a charmingly epigrammatic thing
in my presence."

La Faloise meanwhile had heard the few rapid sentences thus whisperingly
interchanged, and he gazed at Fauchery in hopes of an explanation which
was not vouchsafed him. Of whom were they talking, and what were they