Et tu, Berthe, I thought, and took the box from her.

It was light and flat, with a cellophane lid glassing the dark heartshaped leaves and fragile blossoms of white violets; milk- white blooms, moth-white, delicate in dark-green leaves. There was the faintest veining of cream on throat and wing.

A card was tucked among the leaves. Without opening the lid I could see the single letter in an arrogant black scrawl: -R.

I finished dressing in silence.

Then I pinned the violets on, said quietly: "Thank you, Berthe," and went towards the music and the laughter.

The ball was well under way, and I was thankful to see that Monsieur and Madame de Valmy had finished receiving. Their place near the banked flowers at the foot of the great staircase was empty. Now the hall was brilliant with a shifting mass of people. I hesitated on the gallery, having no mind to make an entrance alone down that impressive flight of steps; then three young women came chattering past me from some room along the corridor, and I followed as inconspicuously as I could in their wake.

It was easy enough to slip unremarked through the throng and into the ballroom itself, where I found a corner sheltered by a pillar and a bank of azaleas, and settled down quietly to watch the dancers.

I couldn't see Léon de Valmy's chair anywhere, but Héloïse, looking wonderful in a gown the colour of sea-lavender, was dancing with an elderly bearded man on whose breast the blue ribbon of an Order showed. I saw Florimond over by one of the windows talking, or rather listening, to a terrifying-looking old woman with a beak of a nose and improbable blue hair. He was leaning forward slightly, that flattering air of his assuring her that she was the most amusing and intelligent woman in the room. For all I know she may have been. But had she been the dreariest hag on earth I am sure that Florimond would have looked exactly the same.

I turned to look for Raoul. On a swirl of music the dancers near me swung and parted and I saw him. He was dancing with a blonde girl with slanting eyes and a beautiful mouth. She was in black, with a high neck and a straight-cut skirt that spoke of Madame Fath and made her look incredibly slender and fragile. She was dancing very close to him and talking rapidly, with flickering upward glances through her long lashes. I didn't see him speak, but he was smiling. They were a striking couple, and danced so beautifully that more than one glance was thrown in their direction and-I had nothing else to do but see it-more than one significant eyebrow lifted in their wake. It would seem that Mrs. Seddon had been right: where Raoul went, rumour walked. I wondered who the girl was. When-if-he danced with me, what would the eyebrows do then? Who's the new girl? My dear, nobody, obviously. And my dear, the dress… The governess?… Oh… Oh, I see…

The music stopped, and people drifted to the sides of the ballroom. I was hidden by the crowd. Nobody had noticed me. I sat still, glad of the sheltering pillar and the massed azaleas. Beside me a trickle of water ran down a little scale, soulless as the music of a spinet. There was a tank of fish here, too, and the water dripped into it from a bank of moss. The azaleas threw patterns on the water, and gold and silver fish moved warily underneath.

The music started again, obliterating talk, laughter, and the tiny tinkle of water. The glittering dresses took the floor. This time he led out an elderly woman with a dreadful gown of royal blue and magnificent diamonds. And then a dark hawk of a woman with a clever hungry face and hands like yellow claws. And then the lovely blonde girl again. And then a well-corseted woman with dyed hair who wore dramatic black with emeralds. And then a white-haired woman with a gentle face. And then the blonde again.

The fish hung suspended in water green as serpentine, fins moving rhythmically. A petal, loosed from a pink azalea, floated down to lie upon the surface. I remembered my promise to Philippe. I got up, shaking out the folds of my skirt. The fish, startled, shuttled about the tank under the hanging mosses.

When a voice said: "Mademoiselle," just behind me, I started like a guilty thing upon a fearful summons, and dropped my handbag, missing the tank by millimetres.

The owner of the voice stooped a little ponderously to pick it up for me. I might have known he would come sooner or later to comfort the wallflower.

"Monsieur Florimond!" I said. "You startled me."

"I'm sorry." He handed me the bag with a smile. "But you must not fly away now, mademoiselle. I'm depending on you for an alibi.”

"An alibi?"

He made one of his wide gestures. "My dear, I don't dance and I've talked myself to a standstill. I thought perhaps if I cornered you quickly we could resume our flirtation, which is something I can do at any time without effort."

"And," I said, watching how his hand hovered already over his pocket, "have a quiet smoke at the same time? All right Monsieur Florimond. I’ll be your chimney-corner."

"A sympathetic woman," said Florimond, unabashed, taking out his case, "is above rubies."

"Don't you believe it. No woman is above rubies," I said, sitting down again. "No thank you, I don't smoke."

"Above diamonds, pearls, and rubies," said Florimond lowering himself into the chair beside me with a sigh, and proceeding, as to an elaborate ritual, to light a cigarette. He beamed at me through the resultant cloud of smoke. "That's a very pretty gown, my dear."

I laughed at him. "Shakespeare," I said, "congratulating Minou Drouet on a neat phrase? Thank you, monsieur."

His eyes puckered at the corners. "I meant it. But you're rather hiding your light under a bushel, aren't you? I've been watching for you, but I haven't seen you dancing."

"I don't know anyone."

"Oh, là-là! And didn't Héloïse introduce any young men?"

"I haven't seen her to speak to. I came down late."

"And now she is-ah, yes, there she is, dancing with Monsieur de St. Hubert." He scanned the floor. "Then where's Raoul? He knows everybody. Perhaps he-"

"Oh, no, please!" The exclamation burst out quite involuntarily. I met Florimond's eye of mild inquiry and finished lamely: "I-I was just going upstairs. I promised Philippe to go and see him. I-don't bother Monsieur Raoul, please?"

"Upstairs? And not to come down again, is that it?" The kind eyes surveyed me. "And is that also why you came down so late and then hid among the flowers?”

"I don't-what d'you mean?"

His gaze fixed itself on the violets. He didn't answer. My hand moved in spite of me to cup the flowers, a curiously defensive gesture and quite futile. I said: "How did you know?" and touched the violets with a finger-tip. "These?"

He shook his head. "My dear," he said gently, "haven't you learnt yet that every breath the Valmys take is news in the valley?"

I said bitterly: "I'm learning." I looked away from him. A fish was nosing at the azalea-petal, butting it gently from underneath. I watched it absorbedly. The dance-music seemed to come from a great way off. Here among the flowers was a little walled garden of silence broken only by the liquid arpeggios of the dripping mosses.

At length he spoke. "You're very young."

"Twenty-three." My voice tried hard not to sound defensive.

"Mademoiselle"-he seemed to be choosing his words-"if you ever thought of leaving Valmy, where would you go?"

I stared at him through a moment of whirling silence. Here, too. It was true. It hadn't been imagination to see those dragon's-teeth of scandal springing up in Albertine's malicious wake. Madame de Valmy or (something caught at my breathing) Monsieur himself had said something, hinted something about dismissing me. And Florimond the kind had sought me out to talk to me about it. Everybody, it seemed, was making my connection with Raoul their business.