“Pretty? Well, that is assurance as to sex,” remarked Madame Choudey, with a glance towards one of the others of the party.
“And if you will watch that door you will be enlightened as to the individual,” said the Marquise.
Three pair of eyes turned with alertness to the door. At that moment it opened, and Kora appeared. The lace veil no longer hid her beautiful eyes––all the more lovely for that swift bath of tears. She saw the Marquise and her friends, but passed as if she had never seen one of them before; Kora had her own code.
“Are you serious, Judithe de Caron?” gasped the Countess Helene. “Were you actually––conversing––with that––demi-mondaine?”
“My dear Marquise!” purred Madame Choudey, “when she does not even pretend to be respectable!”
“It is because she does not pretend that I spoke with her. Honesty should receive some notice.”
“Honesty! Good heavens!” cried Madame Ampere, who had not yet spoken, but who expressed horror by her eyes, 90 “where then do you find your standards for such judgment?”
“Now, listen!” and the Marquise turned to the three with a quizzical smile, “if Kora lived exactly the same life morally, but was a ruler of the fashionable world, instead of the other one; if she wore a crown of state instead of the tinsel of the varieties, you would not exclaim if she addressed me.”
“Oh, I must protest, Marquise,” began Madame Ampere in shocked remonstrance, but the Marquise smiled and stopped her.
“Yesterday,” she said slowly, “I saw you in conversation with a man who has the panels of his carriage emblazoned with the Hydrangea––also called the Hortensia.”