"I should think so. Arrange things as you please."

"But, my dear, it is not becoming. You can go another time."

"Ah, that is very good, another time. It is an old acquaintance, Marcel,
who invites me to dinner, and that is sufficiently extraordinary for me
to go and have a look at it. Another time! But real dinners in that
house are as rare as eclipses."

"What, you would break your pledge to us to go and see this
individual," said the young man, "and you tell me so--"

"Whom do you want me to tell it to, then? To the Grand Turk? It does not
concern him."

"This is strange frankness."

"You know very well that I do nothing like other people."

"But what would you think of me if I let you go, knowing where you are
going to? Think a bit, Musette, it is very unbecoming both to you and
myself; you must ask this young fellow to excuse you--"

"My dear Monsieur Maurice," said Mademoiselle Musette, in very firm
tones, "you knew me before you took up with me, you knew that I was full
of whims and fancies, and that no living soul can boast of ever having
made me give one up."

"Ask of me whatever you like," said Maurice, "but this! There are