It was one of those foolish little comedies--utterly unnecessary,
curiously pleasant--that occur twenty times a day in Parisian life.
Involuntarily the adventurer's heart warmed to the pallid clerk and to
the dirty hotel porter. He had arrived here without luggage, shabby,
unrecommended, yet no princely compatriot of his own could have been
made more sensible of welcome. He stepped out of the office and followed
his guide, conscious that, if only for an instant, Paris had lifted her
mask and smiled--the radiant, anticipated smile.

There is no such unnecessary luxury as a lift in the Hôtel Railleux. At
the back of the hall the spiral staircase begins its steep ascent,
mounting to unimagined heights.

Jean, breathing audibly, led the way, pausing at every landing to assure
monsieur that the ascent was nothing--a mere nothing, and that before
another thought could pass through monsieur's mind the fifth floor would
be reached. The boy followed, climbing and ever climbing, until the
meagre hand-rail appeared to lengthen into dream-like coils, and the
threadbare, drab-hued carpet, with its vivid red border, to assume the
proportions of some confusing scroll.

But at length the end was reached, and Jean, beaming and triumphant,
announced their goal.

'This way! If monsieur would have the goodness to take two steps in this
direction!' He dived into a long, dark corridor, illuminated by a single
flickering gas-jet, twin brother to that which lighted the office below;
and, still eager, still breathing loudly, he ushered the guest toward
what in his humble soul he believed to be the luxurious, the impressive
bedroom supplied by the Hôtel Railleux at three francs a night.