Miss Rowrer and her party came on, a compact group among the scattered visitors. Ethel was listening absently to Caracal. Grandma was examining the crowd. The duke was winking at the pictures, while Will looked at the parquet floor.
Caracal seemed delighted. Besides his opportunity to shine by telling off names and dates, he was also going to show the party one of the hanging gardens of Paris. Presently he would explain the very modus operandi for making such blooming terraces—fine sand, tar, gravel, and earth.
“You know, Miss Rowrer, you go to the Louvre Gardens up a staircase.”
Suzanne and Poufaille at the Louvre
“Awful!” said grandma.
“A winding staircase cut in the thickness of the wall.”
“Really! Oh, how nice that is!” said Ethel, to whom these little details gave the sensation of being abroad. She forgave the lack of an elevator, as long as the staircase was winding and cut in the thickness of the wall—something impossible to find in her own country.