Ellen caressed Marcueil passionately. Vexed that he was not yet altogether spent, her mouth bit him repeatedly. It must be that he did not love his mistress, since he had not yet given her all, given until he could give no more!

The Indian experienced ecstasy several times, sometimes passive like a man, sometimes like a woman. . .

This, to be sure, was what Theophrastus had meant by: “And more.”

The girls’ imprecations floated above them like a canopy.

Amused at first, they were getting exasperated. Marcueil sat up, seized a light Japanese vase and made as if to throw it at the window. But he changed his mind: he was not in his own home, since he was the Indian.

“Still, I must make some sort of noise to make them be quiet,” he said. “Oh! if only I had a hunting horn!”

His eyes searched over the large, encumbered table on which he had replaced the vase.

And suddenly, with the abrupt decisiveness of a man under attack loading a revolver, he took a cylindrical object from the drawer.

Above him the voices began to sound frightened.

“No funny business, Mr. Savage,” cried Virginie, who could not quit the breach, as she had been the first to arrive and was now hemmed in by her companions.

“Don’t be afraid,” jested Ellen, grabbing André with a gesture of tragic effrontery. “Don’t be afraid, ladies, I have hold of him!”

André freed himself and shrugged his shoulders. He seemed to be winding with a key a sort of box topped by a crystal corolla, the one into which the bouquet of roses had been thrust, without water. It appeared to be leaning at an angle simply because of the weight of the flowers. A phonograph loudspeaker occupied the center of the table from which they had eaten. From its horn, now strangely blocked by odors and colors, there blared forth a loud singing that filled the hall.

“Bravo,” said Virginie again.

The word was inaudible, but the gesture of her pudgy hands could be seen as they tried, ironically, to applaud, without relinquishing their grip on her vantage point.

“Why don’t you –” and she shouted at the top of her voice in an effort to be heard above the organlike roar of the enormous instrument – “show motion pictures?”

The girls’ lips were moving, but their voices could no longer be heard.

Whether or not they heard Virginie, André and Ellen seemed disposed to answer her request by striking some theatrical attitudes: the “Indian” had plucked a red rose from the bouquet and offered it, with a tenderness humorously tinged with ceremony, to the masked woman on the divan; then their mouths joined for a minute, with no more concern for their audience, who were now unable to trouble them, and let themselves sway to the flowing rhythm of the music.