“Folly!” I cried angrily. “You call love folly?” “Why, of course,” she laughed. “Do dry your eyes, or you’ll look an awful sight when Gerald comes. He said he would go for a walk with us on the Promenade at four, and it’s already half-past three. Come, it’s time we dressed.” I sighed heavily. Yes, it was true that Ulrica was utterly heartless towards those who admired her. I had with regret noticed her careless attitude times without number. She was a smart woman who thought only of her own good looks, her own toilettes, and her own amusements. Men amused her by their flattery, and she therefore tolerated them. She had told me so long ago with her own lips, and had urged me to follow her example. “Ulrica,” I said at last, “forgive me--forgive me; but I am so unhappy. Don’t let us speak of him again. I will try to forget, indeed I will--I will try and regard him as dead. I forgot myself--forgive me, dear.” “Yes, forget him, there’s a dear,” she said, kissing me. “And now call Felicita and let us dress. Gerald hates to be kept waiting, you know.” CHAPTER V DEALS WITH A MILLIONAIRE One evening, about ten days later, we dined at old Benjamin Keppel’s invitation at the Villa Fabron. Visitors to Nice know the great white mansion. High up above the sea, beyond the Magnam bridge, it stands in the midst of extensive grounds shaded by date-palms, olives, and oranges, approached by a fine eucalyptus avenue, and rendered bright with flowers, its dazzlingly white walls relieved by the green persiennes, a residence magnificent even for Nice, the town of princes. Along the whole front of the great place there runs a broad marble terrace, from which are obtained marvellous views of Nice on the left, the gilt-domed Jetée Promenade jutting out into the azure bay, the old château, Mont Boron, and the snow-capped Alps, while on the right lies the valley of the Var and that romantic chain of dark-purple mountains which lie far away beyond Cannes, a panorama almost as magnificent as that from the higher Corniche. The interior was, we found, the acme of luxury and comfort. Everywhere was displayed the fact that its owner was wealthy, yet none on entering there would believe him to be so simple in tastes and curiously eccentric in manner. Each winter he came to Nice in his splendid steam-yacht, the Vispera, which was now anchored as usual in Villefranche harbor, and with his sister, a small, wizen-faced old lady, and Mr. Barnes, his secretary, he lived there from December until the end of April. Ulrica had met him several times in New York, and he greeted us both very affably. He was, I found, a queer old fellow. Report had certainly not lied about him, and I could hardly believe that this absent-minded, rather ordinary-looking old gentleman with disordered gray hair and beard and dark, deep-set eyes was Gerald’s father, the great Benjamin Keppel, of Pittsburg.