We were sitting at a table, sipping a brandy and soda, when she entered, a brisk, genial, sympathetic French person whose voice on the instant gave me a delightful impression of her. It was the loveliest voice I ever heard, soft and musical, a colorful voice touched with both gaiety and sadness. Her eyes were light blue, her hair was brown, and her manner sinuous and insinuating. She seemed to have the spirit of a delightfully friendly collie or a child, and all the vitality and alertness that go with either. I had a chance to observe her keenly. In a moment she turned to me and asked whether I knew either of two American authors whom she knew, men of considerable repute. Knowing them both very well, it surprised me to think that she knew them. From the way she spoke, she seemed to have been on the friendliest terms with both; and any one by looking at her could have understood why they should have taken an interest in her. If she had been of a somewhat more calculating type, I fancy that, with her intense charm of face and manner and her intellect and voice, she would have been very successful. I gained the impression that she had been on the stage in some small capacity; but she had been too diffident, not really brazen enough for the grim world in which the French actress rises. I soon gained the impression that she was a charming blend of emotion, desire, and refinement which one sometimes meets with in the demi-monde. She would have done better in literature or music or art, and she seemed fitted by her moods and her understanding to be a light in any one of them or all. I shall never forget how she looked at me, quite in the spirit of a gay uncertain child, and how quickly she made me feel that we should get along very well together. “Why, yes,” she said in her soft voice, “I will go about with you, although I should not know what is best to see. But I shall be here, and if you want to come for me, we can see things together.” Suddenly she reached over and took my hand and pressed it genially, as though to seal the bargain. Then Madame de J., promising to join us at the theater, went away. I would not say more of this evening except that it gave me another glimpse of this unquestionably remarkable woman, who was especially charming in a pale bluish-gray dress and gray furs. She helped entertain us through what to me was a somewhat dull performance of a farce in a tongue I did not understand. I was entertained by the effective character work of the actors, but nothing compensates, as I found everywhere, for ignorance of French. When we came out of this theater at half-past eleven, Madame de J. was anxious to return to her apartment, and X. said he’d give me an additional taste of the very vital café life of Paris.