Explore "The Refugees" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
It was the morning after the guardsman had returned to his duties. / Eight o'clock had struck on the great clock of Versailles, and it was / almost time for the monarch to rise. Through all the long corridors and / frescoed passages of the monster palace there was a subdued hum and / rustle, with a low muffled stir of preparation, for the rising of the / king was a great state function in which many had a part to play. / A servant with a steaming silver saucer hurried past, bearing it to / Monsieur de St. Quentin, the state barber. Others, with clothes thrown / over their arms, bustled down the passage which led to the ante-chamber. / The knot of guardsmen in their gorgeous blue and silver coats / straightened themselves up and brought their halberds to attention, / while the young officer, who had been looking wistfully out of the / window at some courtiers who were laughing and chatting on the terraces, / turned sharply upon his heel, and strode over to the white and gold door / of the royal bedroom.
He had hardly taken his stand there before the handle was very gently / turned from within, the door revolved noiselessly upon its hinges, and a / man slid silently through the aperture, closing it again behind him.