CHAPTER 22
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LUCIA:
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THE PARTIES AND INVITATIONS rolled on in an endless succession.
The rakishly gregarious Baron Andre d’Erlanger did his part in contributing to our amusements on the French Riviera with an invitation to a party being held by Baroness Béatrice Ephrussi de Rothschild at her villa at Cap Ferrat. He congratulated himself on the success of his exhortions for us to attend—we were, he had once complained, notoriously difficult to impress or sway. The baron was likely unaware of Charley’s friendly acquaintance with the British and French branches of the Rothschilds, and he could not have known that we had already received an invitation to Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild or that it had been headed for the to-be-declined pile (Charley’s excuse this time was that
