11The Restaurant des Fleurs was having a Gala evening and all the most distinguished visitors to Monte Carlo were seated in its big dining room, the windows of which overlooked the sea. There were flowers everywhere, flowers artistically arranged on every table, flowers decorating the walls and hanging in twisted garlands from the ceiling.
Every woman had been given a bouquet on arrival, a small, beautifully arranged posy of scented flowers set in a holder of white perforated paper, and each male guest had received a buttonhole. These, combined with the variegated colours of the ladies’ dresses and jewels, their sequin-sprinkled fans and shimmering head dresses, produced a scintillating effect of colour and of gaiety.
On one side of the Restaurant there was a garden where the guests coul
