Her Royal Lover: A Novel — page 104: what you’re looking at

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

96 HER ROYAL LOVER. begins toring. Eleven strokes at equal intervals breaks the silence of the night; then all relapses into silence. A quarter of an hour passes; another is added to the preceding one, and always the same unbroken silence. Decidedly, Mineleko is mistaken, nothing unusual will transpire. Impatient, agitated, the prince feels that he can remain no longer in his apartment without becoming insane. He is suffocating. In the hotel of the Caucasian ambassador there was a large apartment in which Madame de Min- eleko painted. She had avery fine amateur talent. It was there in that atelier, more spacious and more airy than the other rooms of the house, that Min- eleko resloved to take refuge in order to be able to go and come without awaking his wife, whom he supposed to be asleep. Shod consequently in slippers with cork soles, he ascends, groping to find his way. Like a thief, he holds a dark lantern, ready to turn it on the face of whoever he would encounter. Arrived at the top of the stairs, he continues to guide himself with his hand until at last he reaches the studio. This large room occupies all the back part of the second story. Mineleko breathes at last. An icy temperature soothes agreeably the burning forehead of the jealous husband. No danger of any one surprising him here; he will be able then to circulate and reflect at his leisure. He softly closes the door. Before pulling the cord which lowers the large window of the apartmemt, he listens again. No noise without. In the garden the watch-dog Nero, that the slightest rustling of a leaf causes to bark, lays outstretched, his noble head resting upon his fore paws. In the sleeping Gomme JOO S (E(@)