Page:A Son at the Front (1923) Wharton.djvu/78

taxi was in sight down the whole length of the rue Royale, or the rue Boissy d'Anglas, or the rue de Rivoli: not even a horse-cab showed against the deserted distances. He crossed to the metro, and painfully descended its many stairs.

Campton, proffering twenty francs to an astonished maid-servant, learned that, yes, to his intimates—and of course Monsieur was one?—the doctor was in, was in fact dining, and did not leave till the next morning.

"Dining—at six o'clock?"

"Monsieur's son, Monsieur Jean, is starting at once for his depot. That's the reason."

Campton sent in his card. He expected to be received in the so-called "studio," a lofty room with Chinese hangings, Renaissance choir-stalls, organ, grand piano, and post-impressionist paintings, where Fortin-Lescluze received the celebrities of the hour. Mme. Fortin never appeared there, and Campton associated the studio with amusing talk, hot-house flowers, and ladies lolling on black velvet divans. He supposed that the physician was separated from his wife, and that she had a home of her own.

When the maid reappeared she did not lead him to the studio, but into a small dining-room with the traditional Henri II sideboard of waxed walnut, a