It couldn't have been colder in the spotty man's family vault, and I hope not as musty.
Maida flew to one of the two windows, set deep in the thickness of the wall, and darkened by the stone arcade outside. But apparently it was hermetically sealed, and so was the other which I attacked. The Ten of Clubs looked shocked when we implored him to open something—anything; and it was with reluctance that he unscrewed a window. "The ladies will be cold," he said. "It is not the weather for letting into the house the out of doors. We do that in the summer."
"Haven't these windows been opened since then?" gasped Maida.
"But no mademoiselle. Not to my knowledge."
"Make him show us other rooms, quick," said Mamma, who can't speak much more French than a cat, though she had a lesson from a handsome young gentleman every day at Cap Martin, at ten francs an hour.
"This is the only one that will accommodate the ladies," replied the Ten of Clubs. "The other that we have unoccupied must be for the gentlemen."
The idea of our two men and the Prince as room-mates was so excruciating that I suddenly felt equal to bearing any hardship; but Mamma hasn't the same sense of humour I have, and she said that she knew she was sickening for something, probably smallpox.
"Three of us in this room all night!" she wailed. "We shall never leave the hotel alive."
At this juncture Sir Ralph appeared at the door, peeping gingerly in at us, and looking the picture of misery.
"I'm so sorry for everything," he said. "Terry's down-stairs, and we both feel that we're awful sweeps, though we hope you won't think we are. He's going to interview the other hotels and see if he can find anything better, so don't decide till he comes back."