The Real Charlotte. 307 



that circumstances had forced him to accept from her. 

 His honeymoon, and those new clothes that Francie had 

 bought in London, had run away with no end of money, 

 and it would be infernally inconvenient if Charlotte was 

 going, just at this time of all others, to come down on him 

 for money that he had never asked her for. He turned 

 these things over uncomfortably in his mind as he lay back 

 on the grass, looking up at Francie's profile, dark against 

 the soft blue of the sky ; and even while he took one of her 

 hands and drew it down to his lips he was saying to himself 

 that he had never yet failed to come round Charlotte when 

 he tried, and it would not be for want of trying if he failed 

 now. 



The shadows of the trees began to stretch long fingers 

 across the grass of the Bosquet d'ApoUon, and Lambert 

 looked at his watch and began to think of table d'hote at the 

 Louvre Hotel. Pleasant, paradisaically pleasant as it was 

 here in the sun, with Francie's hand in his, and one of his 

 best cigars in his mouth, he had come to the age at which 

 not even Paradise would be enjoyable without a regular 

 dinner hour. 



Francie felt chilly and exhausted as they walked back 

 and climbed the innumerable flights of steps that lay be- 

 tween them and the Palace ; she privately thought that 

 Versailles would be a horrible place to live in, and not 

 to be compared in any way to BrufF, but, at all events, it 

 would be a great thing to say she had been there, and she 

 could read up all the history part of it in the guide-book 

 when she got back to the hotel. They were to go up the 

 Eiffel tower the next day ; that would be some fun, anyhow, 

 and to the Hippodrome in the evening, and, though that 

 wouldn't be as good as Hengler's circus, the elephants and 

 horses and things wouldn't be talking French and expecting 

 her to answer them, like the housemaids and shopmen. It 

 was a rest to lean back in the narrow carriage with the pair 

 of starveHng ponies, that rattled along with as much whip- 

 cracking and general pomp as if it were doing ten miles an 

 hour instead of four, and to watch the poplars and villas 

 pass by in placid succession, delightfully devoid of historical 

 interest. 



It was getting dark when they reached Paris, and the 



