Page:Gaston Leroux--The man with the black feather.djvu/81

Rh their eloquence … Ah, here's M. Mifroid, my friend the Commissary of Police, whom I 've so long wanted you to know. Well, this is lucky!"

A man of forty, dressed in the height of fashion and as neat as a new pin, with one white lock drawn carefully down on his unwrinkled brow, came up to them smiling, raised his hat, and shook Adolphe warmly by the hand.

"How are you?" said Adolphe cordially. "Let me introduce you to my friends. M. Mifroid—Madame Longuet—M. Longuet."

From the glance of respectful admiration which he bestowed on her charming face Marceline gathered that the Commissary of Police was also a squire of dames.

"We have often heard our friend M. Lecamus speak of you," she said with a gracious smile.

"I feel that I have known you for a long time. Every time I meet him, he talks about his friends of Gerando Street, and in such terms that the good fortune which this moment befalls me, this introduction, has been my most fervent desire," said M. Mifroid gallantly.

"I hear that you are an accomplished violinist," said Marceline, delighted with his politeness.

"Accomplished? I don't know about accomp-