"I beg your pardon," I said, addressing her, and
at the sound my obscurity was illuminated, about
half of the company turning to look at me with



CHAPTER ELEVEN 149

wide-eyed surprise. (I spoke in an ordinary tone,
it may need to be explained, and there is nothing
remarkable about my voice).
"I hear you're at Les Trais Pigeons," said Miss
Elliott.
"Yes?"

"Would you mind telling us something of the
mysterious Narcissus?"

"If you'll be more definite," I returned, in the
tone of a question.
"There couldn't be more than one like that,"
said Miss Elliott, "at least, not in one neighbour-
hood, could there? I mean a recklessly charming
vision with a white tie and white hair and white
flannels."

"Oh," said I, "he's not mysterious."

"But he is," she returned; "I insist on his being
mysterious! Rarely, grandly, strangely mysterious!
You will let me think so?" This young lady had a
whimsical manner of emphasising words unexpect-
edly, with a breathless intensity that approached
violence, a habit dangerously contagious among
nervous persons, so that I answered slowly, out of
a fear that I might echo it.
"It would need a great deal of imagination.
160 THE GUEST OF QUESNAY

He's a young American, very attractive, very
simple "

"But he's mad !" she interrupted.
"Oh, no!" I said hastily.
"But he w/ A person told me so in a garden
this very afternoon," she went on eagerly; "a person
with a rake and ever so many moles on his chin.
