"Come and try the Rue Strelitz," she answered, smiling.
I glanced down at her. She was gowned even more perfectly than usual—Parisienne to the finger-tips. She had too all the delightful confidence of a woman who knows that she is looking her best.
I smiled back at her. It was impossible to take her seriously.
"Your invitation," I said, "sounds most attractive. But I am curious to know what would happen to me in the Rue Strelitz. Should I be offered poison in a jewelled cup, or disposed of in a cruder fashion? Let me make my will first, and I will come. I am really curious!"
"Arnold," she said, looking up at me with very bright eyes, "you are brutal."
"Not quite that, I hope," I protested.
"Let me tell you something," she continued.
We were in rather a conspicuous position. Lady Delahaye seemed suddenly to realize it.
"May I beg for your escort a little way?" she said. "I am not comfortable upon the Boulevard alone."
"You could scarcely fail," I remarked, throwing away my cigarette, "to be an object of attention from the Frenchman, who is above all things a judge of your sex. I will accompany you a little way with pleasure. Shall we take a fiacre?"