"Épatante! Comment ça va?" For he prided himself on a slender stock of French slang acquired mostly from a painstaking study of Willy's works.
"You do look nice!" He eased the strain of a conversation begun in French.
"Just one?" He stooped down and lightly kissed her smiling lips. Then he stood back, holding her hands, and, with a comprehensive glance, looked her over from head to foot, touched anew by her feminine charm.
"Only my boots now—and gloves, mon cher."
Her eyes with their half-veiled topaz lights returned his gaze hardily, with an answering pressure of tiny hands. "Go, now—there's a good boy. Mélanie!" she raised her voice—"vite! mes bottines." She sank down on a low chair, her feet outstretched.
"Let me do it," McTaggart begged, "I'm sure I'd make a splendid maid."
"No, no—Mélanie." The sly face of the femme de chambre drove him effectually from the room.
He sauntered across into the salon, where a fire was burning cosily. The wide portière was drawn across the larger room beyond where, on the evenings when they played, the card table was set out.
He warmed his hands before the blaze, glancing at the crowded mantel-piece, covered with many photographs, most of them portraits of men.
He smiled as he recognized the face of a youthful college friend. It was signed in a sprawling hand—"Yours, Archie," and the thought flashed into his mind that no power of blandishment could win from himself a similar trophy.