Angelot, the youngest man present, had been allowed to take his cousin Hélène in to dinner. Two minutes of happiness; for the arrangement of the table separated them by its whole length. But it had been enough to bring a smile and a tinge of lovely colour to Hélène's face, and to give her the rare feeling that happiness, after all, was a possibility. Then she found herself next to a person who, after Angelot, seemed to her the most delightful she had ever met; who asked her friendly questions, told her stories, watched her, in the intervals of his talk with others, with eyes full of admiration and a deep amusement which she did not understand, but which set her heart beating oddly and pleasantly, as she asked herself if Angelot could possibly have said anything to this dear uncle of his. Poor Angelot! he looked unhappy enough, there in the distance, sitting in most unusual sulks and silence. There was an opportunity for a word, as he led her back from the dining-room, through the smaller salon, into the large lighted room where all the guests had preceded them. "I don't wonder that you love your uncle," she said to him. "I don't love him, when I see him talking to you. I am too jealous." "How absurd!" "Besides, I am angry with him. He has not done something that I asked him. Delay is dangerous, and I live in terror." "What?" she asked, turning a little white. "If you would give me the Empire, I could not tell you now." They were in the salon. He put his heels together and bowed; she swept him a curtsey. "Help me to hand the coffee," she said under her breath. So it came to pass, when the coffee-table was brought in, that they walked up together to the new sofa, polished mahogany and yellow satin, finished with winged Sphinxes in gilded bronze, where Madame de Sainfoy and General Ratoneau were sitting side by side. The Prefect, of course, had brought his hostess back from the dining-room and had stood talking to her for a few minutes afterwards. But the General, having deposited his lady, came clanking up almost immediately to rejoin Madame de Sainfoy. "Allow me, my dear Prefect," he said. "I have not finished an interesting talk with Madame la Comtesse." Monsieur de Mauves looked at him, then glanced at her with a questioning smile. "Yes, it is true. We had just touched on a subject of the very deepest interest," she said. Her look, her smile, seemed to glide over the Prefect's tall figure and pleasant face, as if he was merely a not disagreeable obstacle, to rest thoughtfully, with satisfaction, on Ratoneau in his gorgeous uniform. "Listen! I will confide in you, and then you will understand," said the General, seizing the Prefect's arm. "I am going to consult Madame la Comtesse on the subject of a marriage." He showed his teeth in a broad smile, staring into the Prefect's face, which did not change in its expression of easy good-humour. "Whose marriage, may I ask? Your own?"