I
might hurry the creaking, grinding revolution of the wheels. We were
climbing higher and higher among the mountains. The chestnuts, growing
scanter, were replaced by dark firs and pines. Streams came winding down
like icy crystal threads; the little rivers we crossed looked blue and
glacial; pale-pink roses and mountain flowers showed themselves as we
approached the peaks. A polite official, entering, examined our papers;
and with snow surrounding us and cold clear air blowing in at the
window, we left Bardonnecchia, the last of the frontier towns.

I was speeding toward France; but where was the girl of the _Re
d'Italia_? To what dubious rendezvous, what haunt of spies, had she
hurried, once ashore? The thought of her stung my vanity almost beyond
endurance. She had pleaded with me that night, swayed against me
trustingly, appealed to me as to a chivalrous gentleman and, having
competently pulled the wool over my eyes, had laughed at me in her
sleeve.

I had held myself a canny fellow, not an easy prey to adventurers;
a fairly decent one, too, who didn't lie to a king's officer or help
treasonable plots. Yet had I not done just those things by my silence
on the steamer? And for what reason? Upon my soul I didn't know, unless
because she had gray eyes.

"Hang it all!" I exclaimed, flinging my unlucky paper into a corner, and
becoming aware too late that Van Blarcom was observing me with a grin.

"I've got the black butterflies, as the French say," I explained
savagely. "This mountain travel is maddening; one might as well be a
snail."

"Sure, a slow train's tiresome," agreed Van Blarcom. "Specially if
you're not feeling overpleased with life anyway," he added, with a
knowing smile.

An angry answer rose to my lips, but the Mont Cenis tunnel opportunely
enveloped us, and in the dark half-hour transit that followed I regained
my self-control. It was not worth while, I decided, to quarrel with the
fellow, to break his head or to give him the chance of breaking mine.
After all, I thought low-spiritedly, what right had I to look down on
him? We were pot and kettle, indistinguishably black. It was true that
he had perjured himself upon the liner; but so, in spirit if not in
words, had I!

Thus reflecting, I saw the train emerge from the tunnel, felt it jar
to a standstill in the station of Modane, and, in obedience to staccato
French outcries on the platform, alighted in the frontier town. Followed
by Van Blarcom