It is a notable gathering that assembles at Doctor Franklin’s house in Passy. Mr. Adams and his wife have just arrived, and the doctor presents them to Madame Brillon and Madame Houdetot, already there.

“Mr. Adams is but recently come from America,” the doctor whispers. “He takes Mr. Dean’s place as a member of our commission.”

Madame Houdetot talks with Mrs. Adams; and because of her bad English and the other’s bad French they get on badly.

“Mr. Lee sends his compliments,” observes Mr. Adams, loftily, to Doctor Franklin, “and regrets that he cannot come. He heard, I understand, that Captain Paul Jones is to be here, and does not care to meet him.”

“No?” responds the doctor, evincing scanty concern at the failure of Mr. Lee to come. “Now I do not wonder! I hear that Captain Jones thrashed Mr. Lee’s secretary in a tavern at Nantes, and our proud Mr. Lee, I suppose, resents it.”

“Thrashed him!” exclaims Mr. Adams, in high tones; “Captain Jones seized a stick and beat him like a dog, applying to him the while such epithets as ‘liar!’ and ‘spy.’ Mr. Lee’s secretary has left France through fear of him.”

The portly doctor lifts his hands at this; but underneath his deprecatory horror, hides a complacency, a satisfaction, as though the violence of Captain Jones will not leave him utterly unstrung.

“He fights everybody,” says the good doctor, resignedly; “on land as well as on sea. Nor can I teach him the difference between his own personal enemies, and the enemies of his country.”

“He seems a bit unruly,” observes the pompous Mr. Adams; “a bit unruly, does this Captain Jones of yours. I’m told he sold the Drake, and what other ships were captured on his recent cruise, in the most high-handed, masterful way.”

“What else was he to do? When a road becomes impassable, what is your course? You push down a panel of fence and go cross-lots. Captain Jones had two hundred prisoners to feed, besides his own brave crew of one hundred and eighteen. We had no money to give him. Were they to starve? I’m not surprised that he sold the ships.”

“I’m surprised that the Frenchmen bought them,” returns Mr. Adams. “Captain Jones could give no title.”

Doctor Franklin’s keen eyes twinkle.

“He could give possession, Mr. Adams. And let me tell you that in France, as everywhere else, possession is nine parts of the law.”

Madame Brillon draws Mr. Adams aside, while Doctor Franklin welcomes the beautiful royal girl—the Duchess de Chartres; to whom he later presents Mr. Adams and Mrs. Adams. Madame Houdetot leaves Mrs. Adams with the girl-Duchess and talks aside with Doctor Franklin.

“I did not know,” she whispers, with an eye on the girlish Duchess, “that you received calls from royalty.”

“The Duchess de Chartres has been with her great relative, the king, upon the business of Captain Jones. She comes to meet the captain, whom we every moment expect.”

“She is in love with him!—madly in love with him!” says Madame Houdetot. “All the world knows it.”

The doctor, who at seventy-two is a distinguished gallant, smiles sympathetically.

“Did I not once tell you that Captain Jones, the invincible among men, is the irresistible among women!”

“Something of the sort, I think. But you have heard of the duchess and your irresistible, invincible one, had you not?”

“My dear madam, I am a diplomat,” replies the doctor, slyly. “And it is an infraction of the laws of diplomacy to tell what you hear.”

“They have been very tender at the duchess’s summer house near Brest.”

“And the husband—the Duke de Chartres!”

“A most excellent gentleman! A most admirable husband of most unimpeachable domestic manners! Believe me, I cannot laud him too highly! Every husband in Prance should copy him! He honors his wife, and—stays aboard his ship, the Saint Esprit.” After a pause the gossipy Madame Houdetot continues: “No doubt the duke considers his wife’s rank. Is the great-granddaughter of the Grande Louis to be held within those narrow lines that confine the feet of other women?”

“Who is this Mr. Adams?” asks Madame Brillon, coming up. “Is he a great man?”

Doctor Franklin glances across where the austere Mr. Adams is stiffly posing, with a final thought of impressing the sparkling Duchess de Chartres.

“Rather he is a big man,” replies the philosopher. “Like some houses, his foundations cover a deal of ground; but then he is only one story high. If you could raise Mr. Adams another story, he would be a great man.”

The good doctor goes over, and becomes polite to Mrs. Adams; for the enlightenment of that lady of reserve and dignity, he expands on France and the French character. Suddenly the door is thrown open, and all unannounced a queer figure rushes in. She is clad in rumpled muslin and soiled lutestring. Her hair is frizzed, her face painted, her cap awry, and she is fair and fat and of middle years. This remarkable apparition embraces Doctor Franklin, kisses him resoundingly, first on the left cheek then on the right, crying:

“My flame!—my love!—my Franklin!”

The seasoned doctor receives this caressing broadside steadily, while the desolated Mrs. Adams sits round-eyed and stony.

“It is the eccentric Madame Helvetius,” explains Madame Brillon in a low tone to Mrs. Adams. “They call her the ‘Rich Widow of Passy.’ She and the good doctor are dearest friends.”

“Eccentric!” Mrs. Adams perceives as much, and says so.

Doctor Franklin returns to Mrs. Adams, whom he suspects of being hungry for an explanation, while the buoyant Madame Helvetius, as one sure of her impregnable position, wanders confidently about the room.

“You should become acquainted with Madame Helvetius,” submits the doctor pleasantly. “Wise, generous, afire for our cause—you would dote on her.”

Mrs. Adams icily fears not.

“Believe me; you would!” insists the doctor. “True! her manners are of her people and her region. They are not those of Puritan New England.”

Mrs. Adams interrupts to say that she has never before heard so much said in favor of Puritan New England.

“And yet, my dear Mrs. Adams,” goes on the good doctor, as one determined to conquer for Madame Helvetius the other’s favorable opinion, “you would do wrong to apply a New England judgment to our friend. Her exuberance is of the surface.” Then, quizzically: “A mere manner, I assure you, and counts for no more than should what she is doing now.”

Mrs. Adams lifts her severe gaze at this to Madame Helvetius. That amiable French woman is in rapt and closest converse with Mr. Adams, hand on his shoulder, her widowed lips to his ear. Mr. Adams is standing as one frozen, casting ever and anon a furtive glance, like an alarmed sheep, at Mrs. Adams. For an arctic moment, Mrs. Adams is held by the terrors of that spectacle; then she moves to her husband’s rescue.

Madame Helvetius comes presently to Doctor Franklin.

“What an iceberg!” she remarks, with a toss of the frizzed head towards Mr. Adams............