Madame darted a look at her, her lips curling with a very faint, fine smile of derision. Yet for the first time her black eyes dilated and became warm.
“Yellow eyes like Ciccio’s?” she said, with her great watchful eyes and her smiling, subtle mouth. “They are the darkest of all.” And she shook her head roguishly.
“Are they!” said Alvina confusedly, feeling a blush burning up her throat into her face.
“Ha—ha!” laughed Madame. “Ha-ha! I am an old woman, you see. My heart is old enough to be kind, and my head is old enough to be clever. My heart is kind to few people—very few—especially in this England. My young men know that. But perhaps to you it is kind.”
“Thank you,” said Alvina.
“There! From the head Thank you. It is not well done, you see. You see!”
But Alvina ran away in confusion. She felt Madame was having her on a string.
Mr. May enjoyed himself hugely playing Kishwégin. When Madame came downstairs Louis, who was a good satirical mimic, imitated him. Alvina happened to come into their sitting-room in the midst of their bursts of laughter. They all stopped and looked at her cautiously.
“Continuez! Continuez!” said Madame to Louis. And to Alvina: “Sit down, my dear, and see what a good actor we have in our Louis.”
Louis glanced round, laid his head a little on one side and drew in his chin, with Mr. May’s smirk exactly, and wagging his tail slightly, he commenced to play the false Kishwégin. He sidled and bridled and ejaculated with raised hands, and in the dumb show the tall Frenchman made such a ludicrous caricature of Mr. Houghton’s manager that Madame wept again with laughter, whilst Max leaned back against the wall and giggled continuously like some pot involuntarily boiling. Geoffrey spread his shut fists across the table and shouted with laughter, Ciccio threw back his head and showed all his teeth in a loud laugh of delighted derision. Alvina laughed also. But she flushed. There was a certain biting, annihilating quality in Louis’ derision of the absentee. And the others enjoyed it so much. At moments Alvina caught her lip between her teeth, it was so screamingly funny, and so annihilating. She laughed in spite of herself. In spite of herself she was shaken into a convulsion of laughter. Louis was masterful—he mastered her psyche. She laughed till her head lay helpless on the chair, she could not move. Helpless, inert she lay, in her orgasm of laughter. The end of Mr. May. Yet she was hurt.