‘Tidy the sitting room, Jeanne,’ Emilie said, ‘and leave me some wine to drink when I return. Remember to mend the tear in the dress I wore this afternoon. It must have been caught by a bramble or a prickly bush. It is only a small mark near the hem, but it should be attended to at once.’

It appeared to Mistral that Jeanne almost crumpled up and she trembled all over. But she only muttered,

‘Yes, Madame – I will do it at once, Madame.’

But when her voice had died away, her lips continued to move and Mistral knew that she was still praying.

Aunt Emilie led the way downstairs to dinner and they made their usual late and impressive entrance into the dining room.

People stopped eating and talking to look up at them. Mistral wished, as she did every night, that the earth would open and swallow her up rather than that she should encounter the scrutiny of hundreds of curious eyes and be humiliated by the knowledge that her every movement was being criticised and commented upon.

At school the Mistress who taught deportment had always impressed on her pupils that self-consciousness was both vulgar and conceited.

‘Do not think of yourself at all on such occasions,’ she commanded.

Every evening at dinner time Mistral tried to obey her. She forced herself to think of other things, to repeat some lines of poetry as she threaded her way in Aunt Emilie’s wake between the tables of the crowded dining room.

Tonight some lines of Lord Byron’s came to her mind,

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies,

And all that’s best of dark and light

Meet in her aspect and her eyes.

‘How lovely to be like that,’ Mistral thought, and had no idea that the lines might have been written of her.

They reached the sanctuary of their table. Mistral, seating herself, thankful that the nightly ordeal she dreaded was over, was aware that she was hungry and agreed almost eagerly to the dishes that the waiter suggested for their delectation.

Unfortunately it seemed that Emilie could eat little. She took only a spoonful of soup, a mere mouthful of fish, and then she sent away the other dishes untouched. But she talked vivaciously, commenting on the people around them so unfavourably and in such a loud voice that Mistral was afraid her venom would be overheard.

She was thankful when the meal was finished and they could go to the Casino. Tonight it seemed that Emilie was in an extravagant mood. She changed four large bank notes for gold pieces, then had difficulty in carrying so much money. Mistral helped her.

‘You are going to play higher than usual, Aunt Emilie?’ she asked.

Having spoken, she was half afraid her Aunt would resent her remark, but Emilie only smiled and replied,

‘I can afford it! Yes, I can afford it tonight.’