the whole scene from a distance, saw them talking together with
preoccupied air.

The thing was a failure. The reconciliation, so cunningly planned, would
not take place. Hemerlingue did not desire it. If only the duke, now,
did not fail to keep his engagement with them. This reflection was
prompted by the lateness of the hour. The Wauters who was to sing the
music of the Night from the _Enchanted Flute_, on her way home from her
theatre, had just entered, completely muffled in her hoods of lace.

And there was still no sign of the Minister.

It was, however, a clearly understood, definitely promised arrangement.
Monpavon was to call for him at the club. From time to time the good
Jenkins glanced at his watch, while applauding absently the bouquet of
brilliant notes which the Wauters was pouring forth from her fairy
lips, a bouquet costing three thousand francs, useless, like the other
expenses of the evening, if the duke did not come.

Suddenly the double doors were flung wide open:

"His excellency M. le Duc de Mora!"

A long quiver of excitement welcomed him, a respectful curiosity that
ranged itself in two rows instead of the mobbing crowd that flocked on
the heels of the Nabob.

None better than he knew how to bear himself in society, to walk across
a drawing-room with gravity, to endow futile things with an air of
seriousness, and to treat serious things lightly; that was the epitome