The question was so strange and so impolite, besides being so difficult to answer without being extremely ridiculous, that I bowed respectfully and said at haphazard:
"My star was so favourable, madame la marquise, that I was born the day before your birthday."
Madame de Pënâfiel drew herself up with a haughty expression of impatience, and said, in a lofty way, "I was speaking in earnest, monsieur."
"And it is in all seriousness, madame, that I have the honour of answering; the question that you were so kind as to ask is too flattering a proof of your interest to allow me to answer it in any other way."
"But how do you know my age?" she asked me, with surprise and curiosity.
"It will be many long years from now, madame, before this secret need give you any uneasiness, and, by that time, I hope that I shall have been so long in your good graces that I shall have forgotten all about it."
At this very instant a terrible sneeze, all the more sonorous from having been restrained, was heard in the direction of the young stranger, who, as Lord Falmouth had predicted, had been turning over the pages of the same album for the last hour, in profound silence. The noise caused Madame de Pënâfiel to start with surprise, and she turned her head quickly, when, to her great consternation, she saw M. de Stroll. But she made such profound and gracious excuses to the young baron for her apparent neglect of him, that he found her conduct quite natural, and seemed rather pleased to have sneezed so loud.
It was now late, and I left.
I was waiting for my carriage in one of the entrance salons, when Lord Falmouth and M. de Stroll came to find their servants.
"Well," said Lord Falmouth to me, "what do you think of Madame de Pënâfiel?"