One of Tatiana’s chief talents was to give to all her houses the peculiar charm with which she was herself endowed. Nothing banal or commonplace was ever inclosed between any walls belonging to her, but this, be it understood, without the slightest effort on her part to create originality. Every detail of exterior or interior decoration was obviously spontaneous, utterly natural, and this was what made her various homes so intensely attractive. Indeed, to-night, when her husband and her son entered the dining-room, they turned a simultaneous look of gratitude upon the woman who created so delicious an atmosphere for them. The square table strewn with dark violets and feathery little tufts of mimosa, the dazzling crystal and beautiful old silver, the lace-shaded silver hanging-lamp half sunk in a bowl of pale turquoise filled with more violets, and slender branches of green and white ivy that twined about the silver suspension-chains to the very ceiling, were as beautifully restful to the eye as the dove-hued window draperies and wall hangings, whereon a few very choice water-color pictures alternated with carven brackets supporting rare cloisonné vases in the same shade of blue as the lamp bowl--also crowned with delicate flowers. Through the open windows the peculiarly aromatic scent of northern poplars and larch mingled with the perfume of résèda and heliotrope rising from the gardens, and as they took their places and unfolded their napkins each of the three indulged in a little sigh of deep satisfaction. Hospitable though they were, this was how the Salvières really loved to be, “between themselves”; close together as a table just large enough for Tatiana’s scheme of decoration in fruit and flowers would permit; with comfortable chairs where one could actually lean back at dessert; satin damask upon which one might even familiarly venture an elbow, and noiseless servants in plain liveries. Coffee was, on those occasions, served there, and cigarettes--of which Tatiana made a rather immoderate usage, since, as she gayly boasted, it was her only vice--were smoked while chatting in a most agreeable post-prandial manner. In her white dress of some crinkly material that was idealized crêpe-de-Chine, her pearls wound carelessly about her throat, and a sapphire arrow planted through her heavy torsades, the “Field Marshal,” as Jean often called his wife, looked amazingly young, almost as if she had been Pavlo’s elder sister by but a few years, and Salvières suddenly laughed.