"I see," she went on, "I do very well for balls and great banquets, but when people wish to have a cosy, friendly, comfortable evening, they leave me out, with the big flower-pots and the gilt candlesticks." "I 'm sure you 're welcome to stay, my dear," said Madame Grandoni, "and at the risk of displeasing you I must confess that if I did n't invite you, it was because you 're too grand.

Your dress will do very well, with its fifty flounces, and there is no need of your going into a corner.

Indeed, since you 're here, I propose to have the glory of it.
You must remain where my people can see you." "They are evidently determined to do that by the way they stare.

Do they think I intend to dance a tarantella?
Who are they all; do I know them ?" And lingering in the middle of the room, with her arm passed into Madame Grandoni's, she let her eyes wander slowly from group to group.
They were of course observing her.

Standing in the little circle of lamplight, with the hood of an Eastern burnous, shot with silver threads, falling back from her beautiful head, one hand gathering together its voluminous, shimmering folds, and the other playing with the silken top-knot on the uplifted head of her poodle, she was a figure of radiant picturesqueness.