notwithstanding the comical struggles she made to protect herself from the auricular confession thus forced upon her. "_Mais vous etes affreux_," she cried out at length and struck at him with her handkerchief, very much in the same way that one tries to rid one's self of a swarm of importunate gnats. "I beg a thousand pardons," growled Schnetz, again addressing himself to Irene. "_C'est contre la bienseance, de chuchoter en societe_--you see I haven't quite forgotten my catechism of good-breeding even yet, though I do sometimes sin against it. I merely wished to convince the countess that the '_Boheme_' from which I have chosen my friends, does indeed consist of men, and not of angels, but that it would be impossible for me to introduce the Fraeulein to any one there, from whom the history of morals and civilization in this city could learn as much as it could from certain members of the best circles." The old countess hastily rose. Her face had grown very red, her nostrils quivered. She gave a slight cough, and then said, turning with a motherly smile to Irene, who was helping her on with her furs. "_Ce cher Schnetz, il a toujours le petit mot pour rire._ Well, _ma mignonne, faites ce que vous voudrez. Je m'en lave les mains. Adieu, Baron! A tantot! Adieu, Schnetz_, you renegade, you horrid wretch! I see it is true what the world says of you, and what I have always disputed, that you have the most malicious tongue in the whole city." She gave him as she passed a little tap, intended to be light and coquettish, but really delivered so sharply that the recipient could easily see how glad the same hand would have been to give him a more forcible lesson--if it had only been good _ton_. CHAPTER II. She had scarcely left the room, accompanied by Irene, when the baron stepped up to Schnetz. "Well, I must confess," he cried, "you are not a cheerful man to pick bones with! For Heaven's sake, tell me, _mon vieux_, what devil possesses you to talk in this reckless way to that old court mummy?" Schnetz looked him coolly in the face, and once more began to rub his mutilated ear. "Do you really think she understood me?" "Understood you? _Que diable!_ You certainly left nothing to be desired on the score of plainness. I must say though, my good friend, now that we are quite alone again, that, excellent as I find your plan of bringing the two offended lovers together under cover of the freedom of a masquerade, I really can't approve of the way in which you have gone to work. For no matter how much my niece may be shaken in her whim by the prospect of America, or how thankful she may be at heart for every chance that is given her to capture her roving bird again--still, just think how difficult you have made the matter for her, by bringing up this question of the ball before that old woman! I ought to have been kept out of the game too. Now, if she asks me on my conscience as uncle and guardian----."