Inspecting the table arrangements with the eye of a mistress of the house, she straightened the line of some plates, gave a touch of distinction to the flowers scattered over the table in a conventional disarray; then she went to the sideboard, where the major-domo had left a china pot filled with flowers. With a slight shrug, the Baroness carried the pot to its usual place – a marble column at the far end of the room:

“It was fortunate I came to see how things were!

Antoine is a good fellow, but a hare-brained one too,” she thought.Madame de Vibray paused a moment: the light from an electric lamp shone on the vase and wonderfully enhanced its glittering beauty. It was a piece of faience decorated in the best taste. On its graceful form the artist had traced the lines of an old colour print, and had scrupulously preserved the picture born of an eighteenth century artist’s imagination, with its brilliancy of tone and soft background of tender grey. Madame de Vibray could not tear herself away from the contemplation of it. Not only did the design and the treatment please her, but she also felt a kind of maternal affection for the artist: “This dear Jacques,” she murmured, “has decidedly a great deal of talent, and I like to think that in a short time his reputation...” Her reflections were interrupted by the servant. The good Antoine announced in a low voice, and with a touch of respectful reproach in his tone:

“Monsieur Thomery awaits the Baroness in the small drawing-room: he has been waiting ten minutes.”

“Very well. I am coming.”

Madame de Vibray, whose movements were all harmonious elegance, returned by way of the gallery to greet her guest. She paused on the threshold of the small drawing-room, smiling graciously.

Framed in the dark drapery of the heavy door-curtains, the soft light from globes of ground glass falling on her, the Baroness de Vibray appeared a very attractive woman still. Her figure had retained its youthful slenderness, her neck, white as milk, was as round and fresh as a girl’s; and had the hair about her forehead and temples not been turning grey – the Baroness wore it powdered, a piece of coquettish affectation on her part – she would not have looked a day more than thirty.

Monsieur Thomery rose hastily, and advanced to meet her. He kissed her hand with a gallant air:

“My dear Mathilde,” he declared with an admiring glance, “you are decidedly an exquisite woman!” The Baroness replied by a glance, in which there was something ambiguous, something of ironic mockery:

“How are you, Norbert?”she asked in an affection ate tone... and those pains?”