Quite unembarrassed, she threw herself into the conversation that had begun. She cut into the story Lucile was telling with a general remark and obliged her to reply. They had to make room for her. They could not help listening to her politely, with interest and even pleasure, for she was so witty. But they did not reply, their minds wandered, they talked about other things. The conversation died away, started up again in little bursts, jumping from subject to subject. In the silence Annette heard herself talking in a detached tone, and she listened to her own voice as if it were that of a stranger: true woman that she was, fine, sensitive and proud, she missed none of these little humiliations. Accustomed from childhood to understand and use the equivocal language of drawing-rooms, she could divine, under the veil of deliberate inattentiveness, dubious smiles, disingenuous politeness, the wounds that were intended for her. She was hurt, but she laughed, and she went on talking. The others were thinking, "What poise that girl has!" Lucile took advantage of the departure of one of the guests to accompany her to the door and escape from Annette. The latter found herself abandoned to a group that had made up its mind to ignore her. Giving up any attempt to prolong the ordeal, she was on the point of rising to leave in turn when, crossing the drawing-room, Marcel Franck approached her. He had come in some time before, though she had not noticed him, for all her attention was occupied by her effort not to yield to the discouragement that was overcoming her. And as, with a humorous pity, he watched her talking, he admired her pride. He said to himself, "What made you come here and brave these idiots? Crazy little thing! It's enough to wring one's heart." He decided to lend her a helping hand. He bowed to her pleasantly. Annette's grateful eyes lighted up. Everybody about them became silent, all those hard, watching faces. "Well," he said, "so the globe-trotter is back again. Have you had enough of '_contemplé son azur, ô Méditerranée'_?" He wanted to turn the conversation to some harmless subject. But what demon drove her on? Pride, the instinct of bravado, or simply frankness? She replied gaily, "So far as the azure is concerned, I have scarcely contemplated anything for months but my baby's eyes." A little breeze of irony passed over those who were near them. Smiles and glances were discreetly exchanged. But Marie-Louise de Baudru rose indignantly; red, with her stout breast swollen with enough angry contempt to burst her gown, she pushed back her chair and, without bowing to anyone, started for the door and went out. The temperature of the drawing-room fell several degrees. Annette remained alone in her corner with Marcel Franck. He looked at her, sorry for her, half banteringly, and murmured, "You are imprudent." "How imprudent?" she asked in a clear voice.