“Ah!” said Mr. Firkin.
“Oh! yes, certainly,” said Mr. Boosey; and the corners of his eyelids twitched.
“Perhaps you might suggest that you have some friends staying in town,” said Mrs. P. “You know we’re all intimate enough for that.”
“Yes—oh yes,” said Mr. Firkin, slowly; “but the truth is, it’s a little awkward. These ladies are kind enough to receive us; but to ask favors of them, is, you see, different.”
“Oh! yes,” interrupted Mr. Boosey; “to ask favors of them is a very different thing,” and his eyes really glistened.
“These are ladies, you see, dear Mrs. Potiphar,” said Kurz Pacha, “who don’t grant favors.”
“But still,” continued Mr. Firkin, “if you only wanted to see them, you know, and be able to say at home that you knew Madame la Marquise So-and-so, and Madame la Comtesse So-and-so, and describe their dresses, why, we can manage it well enough; for we are engaged to a little party at the opera this evening with the Countess de Papillon and Madame Casta Diva, two of the best known ladies in Paris. But they never visit.”
“How superbly exclusive!” said Mrs. Potiphar; “I wonder how that would do at home! However, I should be glad to see the general air and the toilette, you know. If we were going to pass the whole winter I would know them of course. But things are different where you stay so short a time. Eh, Kurz Pacha?”
“Very different, Madame. But you are quite right. Make hay while the sun shines; use your eyes if you can’t use your tongue. Eyes are great auxiliaries, you can use the tongue afterward. You’ve no idea how well you can talk about French society if you only go to the opera with a friend who knows people, and to your banker’s soirées. If you chose to read a little of Balzac, beside, your knowledge will be complete.”
So we agreed to go to the opera. We passed the days shopping, and driving in the Bois de Boulogne. Sometimes the young men went with us, and D’Orsay Firkin confided to me one of his adventures, which was very romantic. You know how handsome he is, and how excessively gentlemanly, and how the girls were all in love with him last winter at home. Now you needn’t say that I was, for you know better. I liked him as a friend. But he told me that he had often seen a girl in one of the shops on the Boulevards watching him very closely. He never passed by, but she always saw him, and looked so earnestly at him, that at length he thought he would saunter carelessly into the shop, and ask for some trifle. The moment he entered she fixed her eyes full upon him, and he says they were large and lustrous, and a little mournful in expression. But he scarcely looked at her, and asked at the opposite counter for a pair of gloves. He tried them on, and in the mirror behind the counter he saw the girl still watching him. After lingering for some time, and looking at everything but the girl, he sauntered slowly out again while her eyes, he said, grew evidently more mournful as she saw him leave without looking at her. Daily, for a week afterwards, he walked by the door, and she was always watching and looking after him with the most eager interest. Mr. Firkin did not say he was sorry for the little French girl, but I know that he really felt so. These men, that every woman falls in love with, are generous, I have always found. And I am sure he would never have confided this little affair to me, except for the very intimate terms upon which we are; for I have heard him say (speaking of other men) that nothing was meaner than for a man to tell of his conquests.