"Five thousand francs! Ridiculous," says Rohritz. "The picture is really lovely. But it was not the Watteau alone that attracted my attention, but----" He points to two or three pictures which are turned with their faces to the wall.
"Ah! ah!" the Prince laughs. "You wish to know what led to that prudential measure? Well, I have had a visit from ladies."
"From whom?" Rohritz asks, absently.
"Unasked I should probably have told you, but in view of such ill-bred curiosity I am mute," Zino replies, still laughing.
"Hm!--evidently a woman of character," Rohritz observes, indifferently.
"Of course: 'tis the only kind with whom I can endure of late to associate. If you but knew how bored I was at the opera ball the other night! I was made ill by the bad air. The feminine element must always play a large part in my life; but, you see, of late I can tolerate none but the most refined, the most distinguished of the species. We are strange creatures, we men of the world: in the matter of cigars, wine, horses, we always require the best, while with regard to women we are sometimes satisfied with what----"
The arrival of a fresh caller, one of Capito's sporting friends, interrupts these interesting reflections. Rohritz takes his leave.
The same day he is driving by chance through the Rue d'Anjou, when his attention is attracted by a slender, graceful, girlish figure hurrying along, evidently anxious to reach her destination.
Is not that Stella? He leans out of the carriage window, but it is dark, and she is closely veiled. And yet he could swear that it is she. She vanishes in the Hôtel ----, in the house where he called upon Zino Capito this very day.
For one brief moment all the evil that Stasy said of Stella confuses his brain; then he compresses his lips: he cannot believe evil of her. A malicious chance has maligned her. She must have a double in Paris.