A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 86: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

73 | A SERVANT OF SATAN by any of his former acquaintances. He had grown taller . -and broader, his face was bronzed by the Indian sun, and his beard, which he had once more allowed to grow during the long sea voyage, caused him to look much older than he was in reality. : One night, some two months after his arrival at Paris, he accompanied three of his new acquaintances to the Jardin -Mabille, at that time a well-known rendezvous of the jeunesse doree and of the demi-mondaines of every class. He was standing near the orchestra, leaning against one of the artificial palm trees loaded with fantastically colored glass fruits, each of which contained a tiny gas jet, and was watching the gay throng of dancers as they bounded through the intricate figures of a disheveled can-can, when suddenly a woman, who was conspicuous by the enormous amount of satin, lace, and flowers which'she had managed to accumu- late about the lower part of her person, and by the ex- traordinary scantiness of her corsage, stopped in front of him, and with the tip of her satin-slippered foot delicately knocked his hat from off his head to the ground. This _ being by no means an unusual feat among the female habitues of Mabille, the incident did not attract much at- tention and no one noticed the start of surprise and con- sternation with which Frederick recognized in the painted creature with dyed hair his wife Rose—Countess of Wald- berg. : As his hat fell to the ground, the mocking smile on Rose’s face disappeared. Her features assumed a hard, stony ex- pression; there was a dangerous glitter in her eyes, and she _ gave one or two convulsive little shivers, as if striving to control her feelings. ‘Then, rapidly bending toward him, she murmured: rae “Come with me, quickly. I must speak to you at once.” | ) Frederick, realizing that the recognition had been mutual comicbooks. co