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Nevertheless, she let him accompany her to her own apartments without a word, and it was only when the door of the salon d’entrée had shut behind them that she at last opened her mouth.

“It was abominably warm at the Hôtel Plenhöel,” she said, disengaging her hand and walking ahead of him into the adjoining boudoir, where she sat herself down in closest possible proximity to the brightly burning pine-cone fire.

Basil did not comment upon this curious inconsequence, but, bending, he deftly unfastened the clasp of her long blue-fox cloak, and let it fall in a heap on the back of her arm-chair. In spite of herself Laurence was ill at ease. She gave a little laugh, and began to unbutton her left glove.

“They are so old-fashioned, the Plenhöels,” she said, without looking up. “One really thinks one is attending a reception at Versailles under Louis-Seize. Did you see the way that Duchesse de Montemare wears her hair? I really believe it must be rolled upon a cushion, like our great-grandmothers’, and I’d swear it was powdered!”