a smile. He approached her, and leaning over the back of the chair on which she was seated, congratulated her on her playing and singing, duly performing a kiss at the end of every compliment. She did not let him escape thus, and with reiterated enquiries, pressing solicitations, feigned incredulity, obliged him to repeat his stock panegyrics three or four times over, and when he stopped she seemed so disappointed that he was forced to take up the strain again immediately. He found it trying, for he was no connoisseur, but he had the pleasure of kissing her plump curved shoulders all golden in the light, and of catching glimpses of her pretty face in the mirror over the toilet-table.
“You were delicious.”
“Really? . . . you think so?”
“Adorable . . . div——”
Suddenly he gave a loud cry. His eyes had seen in the mirror a face appear at the back of the dressing-room. He turned swiftly round, flung his arms about Arcade, and drew him into the corridor.
“What manners!” exclaimed Bouchotte, gasping.
But, pushing his way through a troop of performing dogs, and a family of American acrobats, young d’Esparvieu dragged his angel towards the exit.
He hurried him forth into the cool darkness of the boulevard, delirious with joy and wondering whether it was all too good to be true.
