“As you please, sir!”
“Now, at once?”
“At once!”
A laughing group had gathered round, finding a new and piquant diversion in this altercation between the two masquers, each defending with apparent seriousness his title to be the true Fantômas.
“The vanquished,” cried Sonia, merrily, “shall take off his cowl for the rest of the evening.”
At this one of the disputants wheeled round, and in answer to the gibe:
“No, madam,” he said, “the vanquished will not appear again, for one good reason—he will be dead.”
“Madam, I will use no empty words of compliment to thank you for granting me this interview. Words are incapable of translating my feelings, and between us they would be yet more vain than with others.”
The “Fantômas” who uttered the words bowed low with infinite respect before the Grand Duchess Alexandra, whom he had just come upon in one of the little nooks of greenery, so quiet and retired, so convenient for flirtations or confidential talks, which the great lady had contrived in the superb winter garden, opening out of her drawing rooms. The masquer went on:
“I will not thank you, madam, for on us, alas! weighs a past too heavy to allow soft words to do aught but call up sad memories in our hearts. That past you do not disown any more than I do, but I ask your permission to remember in speaking to you two facts, that you, you, the Grand Duchess Alexandra, are Lady Beltham, and that I, under this travesty of Fantômas, am Jérôme Fandor.”