rich black silk, with some green about it, and a number of iridescent
beetle-wings serving as a relief. Miss Netty Cahere was a vision of pink
and self-effacing quietness.

"We shall know no one," she said, with a shrinking movement of her
shoulders as they mounted the stairs.

"Not even the waiters," replied Joseph Mangles, in his lugubrious bass,
glancing into a room where tea and coffee were set out. "But they will
soon know us."

They had not been in the room, however, five minutes before an
acquaintance entered it, tall and slim, like a cheerful Don Quixote,
with the ribbon of a great order across his shirt-front. He paused for a
moment near Lord and Lady Orlay, and his entrance caused, as it usually
did, a little stir in the room. Then he turned and greeted Joseph
Mangles. Over the large, firm hand of that gentleman's sister he bowed
in silence.

"I have nothing to say to that great woman," he sometimes said. "She is
so elevated that my voice will not reach her."

Deulin then turned to where Miss Cahere had been standing. But she had
moved away a few paces, nearer to a candelabrum, under which she was now
standing, and a young officer in full German uniform was openly admiring
her, with a sort of wonder on his foolish, Teutonic face.

"Ah! I expected you had forgotten me," she said, when Deulin presented
himself.