The flags were still flying, for these jolly Parisians are always loth to take in their bunting.

It was, indeed, a gay world in which I moved that morning.
The Hotel Clericy I found at the end of the Rue des Palmiers, which short street the great house closed.

Indeed, the Rue des Palmiers was but an avenue of houses terminated by the gloomy abode of the Clericys.

The house was built behind a high stone wall broken only by a railed doorway.
I rang the bell and heard its tinkle far away within the dwelling.

A covered way led from the street to the house, and I followed on the heels of the servant, a smart young Parisian, looking curiously at the little garden which in London would have been forlorn and smutty.