On the second following Friday evening, Audrey’s suite¹ of rooms at the Hôtel du Danube glowed in every corner with pink-shaded electricity. According to what Audrey had everywhere observed to be the French custom, there was in this flat the minimum of corridor and the maximum of doors. Each room communicated directly with all the other rooms. The doors were open, and three women continually in a feverish² elation³ passed to and fro. Empire chairs and sofas were covered with rich garments of every colour and form and material, from the transparent⁴ blue silk matinée to the dark heavy cloak of velvet⁵ ornamented⁶ with fur. The place was in fact very like the showrooms of a cosmopolitan⁷ dressmaker after a vast trying-on. Sundry⁸ cosmopolitan dressmakers had contributed to the rich confusion. None had hesitated for an instant to execute Audrey’s commands. They had all been waiting, apparently⁹ since the beginning of time, to serve her. All that district of Paris had been thus waiting. The flat had been waiting, the automobile¹⁰ had been waiting, the chauffeur¹¹ had been waiting, and purveyors of every sort. A word from her seemed to have released them from an enchantment¹². For the most part they were strange people, these magical attendants, never mentioning money, but rather deprecating the sound of it, and content to supply nothing but the finest productions of their unquestionable genius. Still, Audrey reckoned that she owed about twenty-five thousand francs to Paris.

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