The Cafe Des Bulgars

Their adieux to Fifi and Nini were elaborate and complicated by bursts
of laughter. The Tziganes recommended Captain Sengoun to go home and
seek further adventures on his pillow; and had it not been for the gay
babble of the fountain and the persistent perfume of flowers, he might
have followed their advice.

It was after the two young men had left the Jardin Russe that Captain
Sengoun positively but affectionately refused to relinquish possession
of Neeland's arm.

"Dear friend," he explained, "I am just waking up and I do not wish to
go to bed for days and days."

"But I do," returned Neeland, laughing. "Where do you want to go now,
Prince Erlik?"

The champagne was singing loudly in the Cossack's handsome head; the
distant brilliancy beyond the Place de la Concorde riveted his roving
eyes.

"Over there," he said joyously. "Listen, old fellow, I'll teach you
the skating step as we cross the Place! Then, in the first Bal, you
shall try it on the fairest form since Helen fell and Troy burned--or
Troy fell and Helen burned--it's all the same, old fellow--what you
call fifty-fifty, eh?"

Neeland tried to free his arm--to excuse himself; two policemen
laughed; but Sengoun, linking his arm more firmly in Neeland's,
crossed the Place in a series of Dutch rolls and outer edges, in which
Neeland was compelled to join. The Russian was as light and graceful
on his feet as one of the dancers of his own country; Neeland's
knowledge of skating aided his own less agile steps. There was
sympathetic applause from passing taxis and fiacres; and they might,
apparently, have had any number of fair partners for the asking, along
the way, except for Sengoun's headlong dive toward the brightest of
the boulevard lights beyond.