A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 190: what you’re looking at

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

- ~~ <a - . ° ~ > 182. A SERVANT OF SATAN. dows of the drawing-room, and, peeping in between the half-closed blinds, he saw Dolores, who, stretched on an oriental divan, was smoking a cigarette. ‘There was but little hght in the corner of the room where she reclined, but he could plainly distinguish the outline of her voluptu- ous form in its soft loose white wrapper, and the gleam of the rings on her small hands. Her great black eyes seemed positively to glow in the semi-darkness as she looked up at the rings of blue smoke that floated through the air. Frederick’s heart began to beat faster. He vaguely felt that his hour of fate had come. They were as completely alone as if they had been in a desert. Noone of the household would have dared to approach that room without a summons from her. A nightingale was singing in the Cape jasmine which wreathed the ve. randa. Gently he pushed open the casement of the window, and stepped into theroom. She raised herself on her elbow, and, flinging her half-finished cigarette into a silver tray on _ the table, stretched out her hand to aoe saying, in her low, melodious voice: ‘‘This is a surprise. I am glad to see you.” ‘Ts it really so?” murmured he, bending over the small, cool hand, which he retained in his own, prolonging the fleeting moments with irresistible pleasure. Every gesture, glance, and breath of this girl allured him; a swift and wicked temptation flashed through his brain. He knew that she loved him, and that she was at his mercy. A shudder passed over him, and before he knew what he was about he had wound his arms around her and -pressed his lips to hers. It was but a second, and then he thrust her away from him. She gave him a look of such intense sur- prise and pain, that, dropping on one knee before her, he murmured, in a yoice which still shook with suppressed assion : “Dona Dolores, will you be my wife?” (e(0) mil G books €o