CHAPTER XXIV.
An Explanation "La discretion defend de questionner, la delicatesse defend meme de deviner." We were a quiet party that evening, Madame having decided to ask no one to meet us.

It was like a piece of the old Paris life, for all had met for better or worse in that city, and spoke the language of the once brilliant capital.
Madame insisted that I should take the head of the table, she herself occupying a chair at the foot, which had remained vacant as long as I could remember.

So I sat for the first time in the seat of my ancestors, whence my father had issued his choleric mandates, only, I fear, to be answered as hotly.
"You are quiet, Monsieur," said Lucille, who sat at my right hand, and I thought her glance searched my face in a way that was new.
"Say he is dull," put in Alphonse, whose gaiety was at high-water mark.

"_Ce cher_ Dick--he is naturally so." And he laughed at me with his old look of affection.
"Mademoiselle means that I am duller than usual," I suggested.
"No," said Lucille, "I meant what I said." "As always ?" inquired Alphonse, in a low voice aside.
"As always," she answered, gravely.

And I think she only spoke the truth.
We did not sit long over our wine, and John Turner reserved his cigar until a later opportunity.
"I'll play you a game of billiards," he said, looking at me.
In the drawing-room we found Lucille already; at the piano.
"I have some new songs," she said, "from the Basque country.