very clever journal, which has become a power."

"So, so--that is the journal in which Mademoiselle Cicogna's roman first
appeared. So, so--Victor de Mauleon one of her associates, her
counsellor and friend--ah!"

"No, I didn't say that; on the contrary, he was presented to her the
first time the evening I was at the house. I saw that young silk-haired
coxcomb, Gustave Rameau, introduce him to her. You don't perhaps know
Rameau, editor of the Sens Commun--writes poems and criticisms. They say
he is a Red Republican, but De Mauleon keeps truculent French politics
subdued if not suppressed in his cynical journal. Somebody told me that
the Cicogna is very much in love with Rameau; certainly he has a handsome
face of his own, and that is the reason why she was so rude to the
Russian Prince X-----."

"How rude! Did the Prince propose to her?"

"Propose! you forget--he is married. Don't you know the Princess? Still
there are other kinds of proposals than those of marriage which a rich
Russian prince may venture to make to a pretty novelist brought up for
the stage."

"Bevil!" cried Graham, grasping the man's arm fiercely, "how dare you?"

"My dear boy," said Bevil, very much astonished, "I really did not know
that your interest in the young lady was so great. If I have wounded you
in relating a mere _on dit_ picked up at the Jockey Club, I beg you a
thousand pardons. I dare say there was not a word of truth in it."