"Yes, you are perhaps right; it would not be the thing, perhaps, if you were the only one who was not in evening dress; but there will be M. de Clagny just as he is now, to pay a call; so you understand."
"Mademoiselle, I caught sight of M. de Clagny just now when he arrived. He is an old gentleman, and as such can take liberties about certain matters which I, particularly in my position, could not."
"As to you, you are just going to obey grandmamma like a good little boy, for it was grandmamma who sent me, you know."
"Ah!" murmured the young man, disappointed, "it was your grandmamma? I was hoping it was you, who—but you are still vexed with me, of course?"
"Vexed with you?" she asked, surprised; "what for?"
"Well—because—oh, you know—the other evening—when, in spite of myself, I——"
Bijou's merry face clouded over as she said very seriously:
"I thought that would never be brought up again. I wish you to forget what you said to me." She stood still a moment, with a pensive look on her beautiful face, and then she added, in a muffled voice: "And, above all, I wish to forget it myself."
Her eyelids were lowered, and her eyelashes were beating quickly against her pink cheeks throwing a strange shadow over her brilliant complexion.
Giraud went up to her, anxious and excited, and in a stammering voice he asked: