"Good-day! Is mamma upstairs?"
"No. Mamma has gone bicycling with M. de Sinten."
Silence followed.
"Ah! mamma has gone bicycling with De Sinten?" repeated Svirski. "Well!"
And after a while he added,—
"True! she expected me only at four o'clock."
Then he began to laugh.
"The tragedy ends in a farce. But this, however, is the Riviera! Still what an ass I am!"
"Will you wait for mamma?" asked Romulus.
"No. Listen, my boys. Tell your mamma that I came to say good-bye to her, and that I am sorry not to find her, because I am going on a journey to-day."