"What are we waiting for, Thérèse?" the master of the house interrupts the flow of his wife's eloquence, in a rather impatient tone.
"For Zino."
"He excused himself. I put his note on your dressing-table. When he received your invitation he was unfortunately--very unfortunately, underscored--engaged; but he hopes to be here soon after ten," Rohritz explains, having rung the bell meanwhile, whereupon the maître-d'hôtel, throwing open the folding-doors, announces,--
"Madame la Baronne est Servie."
CHAPTER XXII.
[FRENCH INFERIORITY.]
One observation Stella makes during the dinner,--namely, that married people apparently living happily together in Paris suffer quite as much from a chronic difference of opinion as those in Austria. Baron Rohritz and Thérèse do not quarrel one iota less than Jack Leskjewitsch and his wife.
Although Rohritz, as a former diplomatist,--a career which he abandoned five years ago on account of a difference with his chief and an absolute lack of ambition,--and from long residence in Paris, speaks perfect French, the conversation at his special request is carried on in German.
During dinner he incessantly makes all kinds of comparisons between Austria and France, of course to the disadvantage of the latter country. Nothing suits him in Paris; he abuses everything, from the perfect cooking, as it appears at his own table, to the exquisite troop of actors at the Français.
"I have no objection to make to the fish," he says, condescendingly. "I am entirely without prejudice; and when there is anything to be praised in France I always do it justice. But look at the game: French game is deplorable,--marshy, tasteless, without flavour. Even the Strasburg pie can be had better in Vienna. Do you not think so?"