"Our employers!" repeated Mrs. De Peyster. And then with wrathful hauteur: "The apartment is for ourselves. We desire to occupy it at once."
The gentleman glanced her up and down; then up and down his eyes went over Matilda, just behind her. There was no doubting what Matilda was; and since the two were patently the same, there could be no doubt as to what Mrs. De Peyster was.
"I'm sorry—but, after all, the suite is not available," he said courteously.
"Not available?" cried Mrs. De Peyster. "Why not?"
"I prefer to say no more."
"But I insist!"
"Since you insist—the Dauphin does not receive servants, even of the higher order, as regular guests." The hotel clerk's voice was silken with courtesy; there was no telling with what important families these two were connected; and it would not do to give offense. "We receive servants only when they accompany their employers, and then assign them to the servants' quarters. You yourself must perceive the necessity of this," he added hastily, seeing that Mrs. De Peyster was shaking, "to preserve the Dauphin's social tone—"
"The servants' quarters!" gasped Mrs. De Peyster. "You mean—"
"You'll excuse me, please," interrupted the clerk, and with a bow ended the scene and moved to the rear of the office where he plainly busied himself over nothing at all.
Mrs. De Peyster, quivering, gulping, glared through her veil at him. A hotel clerk had turned his back on her! And this mere clerk had dared refuse her a room! Refuse her! Because she, she, Mrs. De Peyster had not the social tone!