But all this being entirely unintelligible to poor Cyrano, the well-known national swear-word came rolling vigorously out, and after some futile stamping on the gravel and further hopeless misunderstanding with the ever affable Swiss, the visitor went into the house with quick, angry steps, and was seen no more till soon after sunset. At that hour Mrs. Allonby, idling cosily between her wood-fire and the window, saw him walking and amicably talking with the hostile crocodile of the Carnival--who, with the Bontemps ladies, had come back half an hour before--from the private wing of the house to the gate, where they parted with ceremony, leaving Ermengarde in doubt as to whether it meant pistols and coffee or friendship and apology. The thin man subsequently averred that the young Englishman had been eating humble pie, and M. Isidore had graciously accepted his explanation, and duly presented it and the apologist to M. Bontemps, who had been equally gracious. In the meantime Ermengarde put two facts together--that the woman of mystery had received and furtively read a letter from the Cyrano on one afternoon, and on the next had accorded him a recognition one remove from a dead cut. And upon this occasion of meeting M. Isidore in the Casino Gardens walking with a woman of such distinguished appearance, with whom he appeared to be on equal and friendly, almost affectionate, terms, she remembered that the young Englishman's manner to him that afternoon at Les Oliviers had been quite that of an equal. Who and what, then, was this pleasant and mysterious youth, occupying a position so palpably anomalous? In any case, it was a great convenience to have such a delicate, Ariel-like being at hand as an attendant sprite, especially on this unfortunate occasion, of being so completely cleaned out at the tables as not even to have the price of a cup of tea. "You are always our guardian angel at Les Oliviers," she told him, after imparting the history of the afternoon's ill-luck. "Evidently you possess a sixth sense, by virtue of which you invariably turn up whenever we come to grief. It was only yesterday that you saved Mr. Welbourne from a broken neck." "Ah! ce pauvre monsieur! Mais il vaut bien la peine, n'est-ce pas, Madame?"