Mr. Ruck said nothing, but he presently went in, and I did the same.
“It will be an opportunity,” I remarked, as cheerfully as possible, “for me to bid good-bye to the ladies.”
They turned round when Mr. Ruck came in, and looked at him without confusion. “Well, you had better go home to breakfast,” remarked his wife. Miss Sophy made no remark, but she took the bracelet from the attendant and gazed at it very fixedly. Mr. Ruck seated himself on an empty stool and looked round the shop.
“Well, you have been here before,” said his wife; “you were here the first day we came.”
Miss Ruck extended the precious object in her hands towards me. “Don’t you think that sweet?” she inquired.
I looked at it a moment. “No, I think it’s ugly.”
She glanced at me a moment, incredulous. “Well, I don’t believe you have any taste.”
“Why, sir, it’s just lovely,” said Mrs. Ruck.
“You’ll see it some day on me, any way,” her daughter declared.
“It will be his own fault, then,” Miss Sophy observed.
“Well, if we are going to Chamouni we want to get something here,” said Mrs. Ruck. “We may not have another chance.”
Mr. Ruck was still looking round the shop, whistling in a very low tone. “We ain’t going to Chamouni. We are going to New York city, straight.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear that,” said Mrs. Ruck. “Don’t you suppose we want to take something home?”
“If we are going straight back I must have that bracelet,” her daughter declared, “Only I don’t want a velvet case; I want a satin case.”
“I must bid you good-bye,” I said to the ladies. “I am leaving Geneva in an hour or two.”
“Take a good look at that bracelet, so you’ll know it when you see it,” said Miss Sophy.
“She’s bound to have something,” remarked her mother, almost proudly.
Mr. Ruck was still vaguely inspecting the shop; he was still whistling a little. “I am afraid he is not at all well,” I said, softly, to his wife.
She twisted her head a little, and glanced at him.
“Well, I wish he’d improve!” she exclaimed.
“A satin case, and a nice one!” said Miss Ruck to the shopman.
I bade Mr. Ruck good-bye. “Don’t wait for me,” he said, sitting there on his stool, and not meeting my eye. “I’ve got to see this thing through.”
I went back to the Pension Beaurepas, and when, an hour later, I left it with my luggage, the family had not returned.