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‘That’s just why she wants to see it, I suppose; and I don’t know why her being from California should prevent. At any rate she wants us to have the best. Isn’t the best taste in Paris?’

‘Yes; and the worst.’ It made him gloomy when she defended the old lady, and to change the subject he asked: ‘Aren’t you sorry, this last night, to leave your own country for such an indefinite time?’

It didn’t cheer him up that the girl should answer: ‘Oh, I would go anywhere with mother!’

‘And with her?‘ Raymond demanded, sarcastically, as Mademoiselle Bourde came in sight, emerging from the drawing-room. She approached them; they met her in a moment, and she informed Dora that Mrs. Temperly wished her to come back and play a part of that composition of Saint-Saens–the last one she had been learning–for Mr. and Mrs. Parminter: they wanted to judge whether their daughter could manage it.

‘I don’t believe she can,’ said Dora, smiling; but she was moving away to comply when her companion detained her a moment.

Are you going to bid me good-bye?’

‘Won’t you come back to the drawing-room?’

‘I think not; I don’t like it.’

‘And to mamma–you’ll say nothing?’ the girl went on.

‘Oh, we have made our farewell; we had a special interview this afternoon.’

‘And you won’t come to the ship in the morning?’

Raymond hesitated a moment. ‘Will Mr. and Mrs. Parminter be there?’

‘Oh, surely they will!’ Mademoiselle Bourde declared, surveying the young couple with a certain tactful serenity, but standing very close to them, as if it might be her duty to interpose.

‘Well then, I won’t come.’

‘Well, good-bye then,’ said the girl gently, holding out her hand.

‘Good-bye, Dora.’ He took it, while she smiled at him, but he said nothing more–he was so annoyed at the way Mademoiselle Bourde watched them. He only looked at Dora; she seemed to him beautiful.

‘My dear child–that poor Madame Parminter,’ the governess murmured.

‘I shall come over very soon,’ said Raymond, as his companion turned away.

‘That will be charming.’ And she left him quickly, without looking back.

Mademoiselle Bourde lingered–he didn’t know why, unless it was to make him feel, with her smooth, finished French assurance, which had the manner of extreme benignity, that she was following him up. He sometimes wondered whether she copied Mrs. Temperly or whether Mrs. Temperly tried to copy her. Presently she said, slowly rubbing her hands and smiling at him:

‘You will have plenty of time. We shall be long in Paris.’

‘Perhaps you will be disappointed,’ Raymond suggested.

‘How can we be–unless you disappoint us?’ asked the governess, sweetly.

He left her without ceremony: the imitation was probably on the part of Cousin Maria.

III

‘Only just ourselves,’ her note had said; and he arrived, in his natural impatience, a few moments before the hour. He remembered his Cousin Maria’s habitual punctuality, but when he entered the splendid salon in the quarter of the Parc Monceau–it was there that he had found her established–he saw that he should have it, for a little, to himself. This was pleasing, for he should be able to look round–there were admirable things to look at. Even to-day Raymond Bestwick was not sure that he had learned to paint, but he had no doubt of his judgment of the work of others, and a single glance showed him that Mrs. Temperly had ‘known enough’ to select, for the adornment of her walls, half a dozen immensely valuable specimens of contemporary French art. Her choice of other objects had been equally enlightened, and he remembered what Dora had said to him five years before–that her mother wished them to have the best. Evidently, now they had got it; if five years was a long time for him to have delayed (with his original plan of getting off so soon) to come to Paris, it was a very short one for Cousin Maria to have taken to arrive at the highest good.