Page:In a winter city, by Ouida.djvu/31

24 called at the Hôtel Murat, and inquired if Miladi were visible, and being admitted, as better than nothing, as she would have admitted the bric-à-brac man, followed the servant upstairs, and walked into an atmosphere scented with some three hundred pots of tea roses, lilies of the valley, and hothouse heliotrope.

"Ah, ah! you have been to see her. Quite right," said the Duc de St. Louis, meeting him as he came down the steps of the hotel in the rain, when it was half-past five by the clock. "I am going also so soon as I have seen Salvareo at the Club about the theatricals; it will not take me a moment; get into my cab, you are going there too? How is Miladi? You found her charming?"

"She was in a very bad humour," replied Della Rocca, closing the cab door on himself.

"The more interesting for you to put her in a good one."

"Would either good or bad last ten minutes?—you know her: I, do not, but I should doubt it."

The Duc arranged the fur collar of his coat.