"Monsieur le capitaine Paz begs Madame la comtesse to excuse him,"
said the footman, returning. "He is at the stables; as soon as he has
changed his dress Comte Paz will present himself to Madame."

"What was he doing at the stables?"

"He was showing them how to groom Madame's horse," said the man. "He
was not pleased with the way Constantin did it."

The countess looked at the footman. He was perfectly serious and did
not add to his words the sort of smile by which servants usually
comment on the actions of a superior who seems to them to derogate
from his position.

"Ah! he was grooming Cora."

"Madame la comtesse intends to ride out this morning?" said the
footman, leaving the room without further answer.

"Is Paz a Pole?" asked Clementine, turning to her husband, who nodded
by way of affirmation.

Madame Laginska was silent, examining Adam. With her feet extended
upon a cushion and her head poised like that of a bird on the edge of
its nest listening to the noises in a grove, she would have seemed
enchanting even to a blase man. Fair and slender, and wearing her hair
in curls, she was not unlike those semi-romantic pictures in the
Keepsakes, especially when dressed, as she was this morning, in a
breakfast gown of Persian silk, the folds of which could not disguise
the beauty of her figure or the slimness of her waist. The silk with