'The poor of England,' he whispered back.

'Indeed!'

Adèle elevated her eyebrows, and cast a shrinking, timid glance at the
stranger. She had suddenly lost much of her interest in him.

De Silvis's dinners were excellent. The party had sat long at table, and
when Monsieur Anatole thought of the oysters with which the feast had
begun, they appeared to him like a beautiful dream. On the contrary, he
had a somewhat too lively recollection of the truffles.

Dinner was over; hands were reaching out for glasses, or trifling with
fruit or biscuits.

That sentimental blonde, Mademoiselle Louison, fell into meditation over
a grape that she had dropped in her champagne glass. Tiny bright
air-bubbles gathered all round the coating of the fruit, and when it was
quite covered with these shining white pearls, they lifted the heavy
grape up through the wine to the surface.

'Look!' said Mademoiselle Louison, turning her large, swimming eyes upon
the journalist, 'look, white angels are bearing a sinner to heaven!'

'Ah! _charmant_, mademoiselle! What a sublime thought!' exclaimed the
journalist, enraptured.

Mademoiselle Louison's sublime thought passed round the table, and was
much admired. Only the frivolous Adèle whispered to her obese admirer,
'It would take a good many angels to bear you, Anatole.'