"True--but suppose I go in here to look for it?"
"Into the restaurant garden?"
"Precisely."
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE PETIT COURIER ILLUSTRÉ.
The Toison d' Or was but a modest little establishment as regarded the house, but it was surrounded on three sides by a good-sized garden overlooking the river. Here, in the trellised arbors which lined the lawn on either side, those customers who preferred the open air could take their dinners, coffees, and absinthes al fresco.
The scene when we arrived was at its gayest. There were dinners going on in every arbor; waiters running distractedly to and fro with trays and bottles; two women, one with a guitar, the other with a tamborine, singing under a tree in the middle of the garden; while in the air there reigned an exhilarating confusion of sounds and smells impossible to describe.
We went in. Müller paused, looked round, captured a passing waiter, and asked for Monsieur le propriétaire. The waiter pointed over his shoulder towards the house, and breathlessly rushed on his way.
Müller at once led the way into a salon on the ground-floor looking over the garden.