The Princess shrugged her shoulders.

“Three months,” she remarked, “is not a long time.  Wait, my dear child, until you have at least lived through a single season before you commit yourself to any final opinions.”

Their host intervened.  He was beginning to find the conversation dull.  He was far more interested in another matter.

“Let us talk about that visit,” he said to the Princess.  “I do wish that you could make up your mind to come.  Of course, I haven’t any amusements to offer you, but you could rest as thoroughly as you like.  They say that the air is the finest in England.  There is always bridge, you know, for the evenings, and if Miss Jeanne likes bathing, my gardens go down to the beach.”

“It sounds delightful,” the Princess said, “and exactly what we want.  We have a good many invitations, but I have not cared to accept any of them, for I do not think that Jeanne would care much for the life at an ordinary country house.  I myself,” she continued, with perfect truth, “am not squeamish, but the last house-party I was at was certainly not the place for a very young girl.”

“Make up your mind, then, and say yes,” Cecil de la Borne pleaded.

“You shall hear from us within the next few days,” the Princess answered.  “I really believe that we shall come.”

The little party left the restaurant a few minutes later on their way into the foyer for coffee.  The Princess contrived to pass out with Forrest as her companion.

“I think,” she said under her breath, “that this is the best opportunity you could possibly have.  We shall be quite alone down there, and perhaps it would be as well that you were out of London for a few weeks.  If it does not come to anything we can easily make an excuse to get away.”

Forrest nodded.

“But who is this young man, De la Borne?” he asked.  “I don’t mean that.  I know who he is, of course, but why should he invite perfect strangers to stay with him?”

The Princess smiled faintly.

“Can’t you see,” she answered, “that he is simply a silly boy?  He is only twenty-four years old, and I think that he cannot have seen much of the world.  He told me that he had just been abroad for the first time.  He fancies that he is a little in love with me, and he is dazzled, of course, by the idea of Jeanne’s fortune.  He wants to play the host to us.  Let him.  I should be glad enough to get away for a few weeks, if only to escape from these pestering letters.  I do think that one’s tradespeople might let one alone until the end of the season.”

Forrest, who was feeling a good deal braver since dinner, on the whole favoured the idea.

“I do not see,” he remarked, “why it should not work out very well indeed.  There will be nothing to do in the evenings except to play bridge, and no one to interfere.”

“Besides which,” the Princess remarked, “you will be out of London for a few weeks, and I dare say that if you keep away from the clubs for a time and lose a few rubbers when you get back your little trouble may blow over.”