And so it went on until before the dinner was over she had captured every man in the room--both by what she said and the way she said it--her eyes flashing like a revolving light, now dim, now brilliant with the thoughts behind them, her white teeth gleaming as she talked. Marc seemed beside himself with pride and happiness. "Never was there such a woman," he was pouring into Herbert's ear; "and you should see her pictures and her stables and her gun-room. Really the most extraordinary creature I have ever known! Does just as she pleases--a tramp one day and a duchess the next. And you should watch her at the head of her table in her château--then you will know what a real 'Grande Dame' is." While the others were crowding about her, Marc eager to anticipate her every wish in the way of cushions, footstools, and the like, I went to find Lemois, who was just outside, his hands laden with a tray of cordials. "You know her then?" "Oh, for years," he whispered back. "I did not tell you, for I wanted to see your surprise and surrender. It is always the same story with her. She does not live here except for a month or so in the autumn, when the small villa on the bluff above Buezval--two miles from here--is opened; a little box of a place filled with costly bric-à-brac. Her great château--the one in which she really lives--is on an estate of some thousands of acres near Rouen, and is stocked with big game--boar and deer. The marquis--and a great gentleman he was--died some twenty years ago. Madame paints, carves ivories, binds books, shoots, fishes, speaks five languages, has lived all over the world and knows everybody worth knowing. No one in her youth was more beautiful, but the figure has gone, as you see--and it is such a pity, for it was superb; only the eyes and the teeth are left--and the smile. That was always her greatest charm, and still is--except her charities, which never cease." Her musical voice was still vibrating through the room as I re-entered. "No, I don't agree with you, Monsieur Herbert," she was saying. "It is shameful that we do not keep closer to the usages and requirements of the old régime. In my time a woman would have excited comment who did not wear her finest gown and her choicest jewels in so select a company as this; and often very extraordinary things happened when any one defied the mandate. I remember one very queer instance which I wish I could tell you about--and it resulted in all sorts of dreadful complications. I became so adept a fibber in consequence that I wasn't able to speak the truth for months afterward--and all because this most charming girl wouldn't wear a low gown at one of our dinners." Herbert beat the air with his hand. "Keep still, everybody--madame la marquise is going to tell us a story." "Madame la marquise is going to do nothing of the kind. She has enough sins of her own to answer for without betraying those of this poor girl."