"Why, don't you know?"
"What?" asked Gyuri, surprised.
"Why, etiquette, of course," she said shyly.
(Gyuri smiled. Oh, what a little simpleton she was!)
"Yes, yes," she assured them, seeing they were laughing at her, "it says in the book on etiquette: 'You must not accept the arm of a stranger.'"
"But a carriage is not an arm," burst out Mravucsán. "How could it be? If it were, I should have two carriages myself. My dear child, leave etiquette to look after itself. In Bábaszék I decide what is etiquette, not the French mamselles. And I say a carriage is not an arm, so there's an end of it."
"Of course you are right, but all the same, I must speak to madame about it."
"Just as you like, my dear."
Veronica again knelt down by the sofa, and a whispered conversation ensued, the result of which was, as Gyuri understood from the few words he could hear, that madame quite shared Mravucsán's view of the case, that a carriage is not an arm, and that if two people have been introduced to each other, they are not strangers, and consequently, in Madame Krisbay's opinion, they ought to accept the young man's offer. Besides, in times of danger there is no such thing as etiquette. Beautiful Blanche Montmorency on the occasion of a fire was saved by the Marquis Privadière with nothing on but her nightgown, and yet the tower of Notre Dame is still standing!
Gyuri felt as impatient as a card-player when the cards are being dealt, and a large stake has been placed on one of them, until at length Veronica turned round.