Madame Chalice looked out of this ancient avenue, a contrast, yet a harmony; for, though her dress was modern, her person had a rare touch of the archaic, and fitted into the picture like a piece of beautiful porcelain, coloured long before the art of making fadeless colours was lost. There was an amused, meditative smiling at her lips, a kind of wonder, the tender flush of a new experience. She turned, and, stepping softly into the salon, seated herself near the immense chimney, in a heavily carved chair, her feet lost in rich furs on the polished floor. A quaint table at her hand was dotted with rare old books and miniatures, and behind her ticked an ancient clock in a tall mahogany case. Valmond came forward, hat in hand, and raised to his lips the fingers she gave him. He did it with the vagueness of one in a dream, she thought, and she neither understood nor relished his uncomplimentary abstraction; so she straightway determined to give him some troublesome moments. “I have waited to drink my coffee with you,” she said, motioning him to a seat; “and you may smoke a cigarette, if you wish.” Her eyes wandered over his costume with critical satisfaction. He waved his hand slightly, declining the permission, and looked at her with an intent seriousness, which took no account of the immediate charm of her presence. “I’d like to ask you a question,” he said, without preamble. She was amused, interested. Here was an unusual man, who ignored the conventional preliminary nothings, beating down the grass before the play, as it were. “I was never good at catechism,” she answered. “But I will be as hospitable as I can.” “I’ve felt,” he said, “that you can--can see through things; that you can balance them, that you get at all sides, and--” She had been reading Napoleon’s letters this very afternoon. “Full squared?” she interrupted quizzically. “As the Great Emperor said,” he answered. “A woman sees farther than a man, and if she has judgment as well, she is the best prophet in the world.” “It sounds distinctly like a compliment,” she answered. “You are trying to break that square!” She was mystified; he was different from any man she had ever entertained. She was not half sure she liked it. Yet, if he were in very truth a prince--she thought of his debut in flowered waistcoat, panama hat, and enamelled boots!--she should take this confidence as a compliment; if he were a barber, she could not resent it; she could not waste wit or time; she could not even, in extremity, call the servant to show the barber out; and in any case she was too comfortably interested to worry herself with speculation. He was very much in earnest. “I want to ask you,” he said, “what is the thing most needed to make a great idea succeed.” “I have never had a great idea,” she replied. He looked at her eagerly, with youthful, questioning eyes. “How simple, and yet how astute he is!” she thought, remembering the event of yesterday.