conquest."
"She would suit you wonderfully well, M. le duc," laughed Olivier, "wonderfully well, for she is a duchess."
"A duchess?" queried Gerald.
"A duchess here!" exclaimed the commander. "The locality is indeed honoured, to-day. This is something new."
"I was only trying to gratify your vanity a little, – the vanity of a Batignollais, you know. My conquest, as that harebrained Gerald is pleased to call it, is no conquest at all; besides, the lady in question is not really a duchess, though people call her so."
"And why, pray?" inquired Gerald.
"Because they say she is as proud and beautiful as any duchess."
"But who is she? In my character of duke, my curiosity on this point should be gratified," insisted Gerald.
"She is a music teacher," replied Olivier. "She is degrading herself terribly, you see."
"Say rather the piano is becoming ennobled by the touch of her taper fingers, – for she must have the hands of a duchess, of course. Come now, tell us all about it. If you're in love, whom should you take into your confidence if not your uncle and your former comrade?"
"I sincerely wish I had the right to take you into my confidence," said Olivier, laughing; "but to tell the truth, this is the first time I ever saw the young girl."
"But tell us all you know about her."
"There is a Madame Herbaut who has rooms on the second floor of the house," replied Olivier, "and every Sunday this excellent woman invites a number of young girls, friends of her daughters, to spend the evening with her. Some are bookkeepers or shop girls, others are drawing teachers, or music teachers, like the duchess. There are several very charming girls among them, I assure you, though they work hard all day to earn an honest living. And how intensely they enjoy their Sunday with kind Madame Herbaut! They play games, and dance to the music of the piano. It is very amusing to watch them, and twice when Madame Barbançon took me up to Madame Herbaut's rooms – "
"I demand an introduction to Madame Herbaut, – an immediate introduction, do you hear?" cried the young duke.
"You demand – you demand. So you think you have only to ask, I suppose," retorted Olivier, gaily. "Understand, once for all, that the Batignolles are quite as exclusive as the Faubourg St. Germain."
"Ah, you are jealous! You make a great mistake, though, for real or supposed duchesses have very little charm for me. One doesn't come to the Batignolles to fall in love with a duchess, so you need have no fears on that score; besides, if you refuse my request, I'm on the best possible terms with Mother Barbançon, and I'll ask her to introduce me to Madame Herbaut."
"Try it, and see if you succeed in securing admittance," responded Olivier, with a laughable air of importance. "But to return to the subject of the duchess," he continued, "Madame Herbaut, who is evidently devoted to her, remarked to me the other day, when I was going into ecstasies over this company of charming young girls: 'Ah, what would you say if you could see the duchess? Unfortunately, she has failed us these last two Sundays, and we miss her terribly, for all the other girls simply worship her; but some time ago she was summoned to the bedside of a very wealthy lady who is extremely ill, and whose sufferings are so intense, as well as so peculiar in character, that her physician, at his wit's end, conceived the idea that soft and gentle music might assuage her agony at least to some extent.'"
"How singular!" exclaimed Gerald. "This invalid, whose sufferings they are endeavouring to mitigate in every conceivable way, and to whom your duchess must have been summoned, is Madame la Comtesse de Beaumesnil."
"The same lady who just sent for Madame Barbançon?" inquired the veteran.
"Yes, monsieur, for I had heard before of this musical remedy resorted to in the hope of assuaging that lady's terrible sufferings."
"A strange idea," said Olivier, "but one that has not proved entirely futile, I should judge, as the duchess, who is a fine musician, goes to the house of Madame de Beaumesnil every evening. That is the reason I did not see her at either of Madame Herbaut's soirées. She had just been calling on that lady, probably, when I met her just now. Struck by her regal bearing and her extraordinary beauty, I asked the porter if he knew who she was. 'It was the duchess I'm sure, M. Olivier,' he answered."
"This is all very interesting and charming, but it is rather too melancholy to suit my taste," said Gerald. "I prefer those pretty and lively girls who grace Madame Herbaut's entertainments. If you don't take me to one, you're an ingrate. Remember that pretty shop-girl in Algiers, who had an equally pretty sister!"
"What!" exclaimed the veteran, "I thought you were talking a moment ago of a pretty Jewess at Oran!"
"But, uncle, when one is at Oran one's sweetheart is at Oran. When one is at Algiers, one's sweetheart is there."
"So you're trying to outdo Don Juan, you naughty boy!" cried the veteran, evidently much flattered by his nephew's popularity with the fair sex.
"But what else could you expect, commander?" asked Gerald. "It is not a matter of inconstancy, you see, but simply of following one's regiment, that is all. That is the reason Olivier and I were obliged to desert the beauties of Oran for the pretty shop-girls of Algiers."
"Just as a change of station compelled us to desert the bronze-cheeked maidens of Martinique for the fisher maids of St. Pierre Miquelon," remarked the old sailor, who was becoming rather lively under the influence of the Cyprian wine which had been circulating freely during the conversation.
"A very sudden change of zone, commander," remarked Gerald, nudging the veteran with his elbow. "It must have been leaving fire for ice."
"No, no, you're very much mistaken there," protested the veteran, vehemently. "I don't know what to make of it, but those fisher maidens, fair as albinos, had the very deuce in them. There was one little roly-poly with white lashes, particularly, whom they called the Whaler – "
"About the temperature of Senegambia, eh, uncle?"
"I should say so," ejaculated the veteran. And as he replaced his glass upon the table, he made a clucking sound with his tongue, but it was hard to say whether this significant sound had reference to his recollection of the fair Whaler or to the pleasant flavour of the Cyprian wine. Then suddenly recollecting himself, the worthy man exclaimed:
"Well, well, what am I thinking of? It ill becomes an old fellow like me to be talking on such subjects to youths like you! Go on, talk of your Jewesses and your duchesses as much as you please, boys. It suits your years."
"Very well, then, I insist that Olivier shall take me to Madame Herbaut's," said the persistent Gerald.
"See the result of satiety. You go in the most fashionable and aristocratic society, and yet envy us our poor little Batignollais entertainments."
"Fashionable society is not at all amusing," said Gerald. "I frequent it merely to please my mother. To-morrow, for example, will be a particularly trying day to me, for my mother gives an afternoon dance. By the way, why can't you come, Olivier?"
"Come where?"
"Why, to this dance my mother gives."
"I?"
"Yes, you! Why not?"
"I, Olivier Raymond, a private in the hussars, attend a dance given in the Faubourg St. Germain!"
"It would be very strange if I could not take my dearest friend to my mother's house merely because he has the honour to be one of the bravest soldiers in the French army. Olivier, you must come. I insist upon it."
"In jacket and kepi, I suppose," said Olivier, smilingly, referring to his poverty, which did not permit him to indulge in citizen's clothing.
Knowing how this worthy fellow spent the proceeds of his arduous toil, and knowing, too, his extreme sensitiveness in money matters, Gerald could only say in reply:
"True, I did not think of that. It is a pity, for we might have had a very pleasant time together. I could have shown you some of our fashionable beauties, though I feel sure that, so far as young and pretty faces are concerned, Madame Herbaut's entertainments