There was
a great deal of habit in his penuriousness; and his virtue, which
was very remarkable among his associates, was principally founded
upon diffidence and youth.
The next room to his was inhabited by a lady, very attractive in
her air and very elegant in toilette, whom, on his first arrival,
he had taken for a Countess. In course of time he had learned that
she was known by the name of Madame Zephyrine, and that whatever
station she occupied in life it was not that of a person of title.
Madame Zephyrine, probably in the hope of enchanting the young
American, used to flaunt by him on the stairs with a civil
inclination, a word of course, and a knock-down look out of her
black eyes, and disappear in a rustle of silk, and with the
revelation of an admirable foot and ankle. But these advances, so
far from encouraging Mr. Scuddamore, plunged him into the depths of
depression and bashfulness. She had come to him several times for
a light, or to apologise for the imaginary depredations of her
poodle; but his mouth was closed in the presence of so superior a
being, his French promptly left him, and he could only stare and
stammer until she was gone. The slenderness of their intercourse
did not prevent him from throwing out insinuations of a very
glorious order when he was safely alone with a few males.
The room on the other side of the American's - for there were three
rooms on a floor in the hotel - was tenanted by an old English
physician of rather doubtful reputation.
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