CHAPTER II. THE PASSENGERS ON THE STEAMBOAT.
THE table d’hôte room was empty as the two Englishmen entered it at supper-time, and they took their places, moodily enough, at one end of a table laid for nigh thirty guests. “All gone to Lahnech, Franz?” asked Calvert of the waiter.
“Yes, Sir, but they’ll be sorry for it, for there’s thunder in the air, and we are sure to have a deluge before nightfall.”
“And the new arrivals, are they gone too?”
“No, Sir. They are up stairs. The old lady would seem to have forgotten a box, or a desk, on board the steamer, and she has been in such a state about it that she couldn’t think of supping; and the young ones appear to sympathise in her anxieties, for they, too, said, ‘Oh, we can’t think of eating just now.’”
“But of course, she needn’t fuss herself. It will be detained at Mayence, and given up to her when she demands it.”
A very expressive shrug of the shoulders was the only answer Franz made, and Calvert added, “You don’t quite agree with me, perhaps?”
“It is an almost daily event, the loss of luggage on those Rhine steamers; so much so, that one is tempted to believe that stealing luggage is a regular livelihood here.”
Just at this moment the Englishwoman in question entered the room, and in French of a very home manufacture asked the waiter how she could manage, by means of the telegraph, to reclaim her missing property.
A most involved and intricate game of cross purposes ensued; for the waiter’s knowledge of French was scarcely more extensive, and embarrassed, besides, by some specialities in accent, so that though _she_ questioned and _he_ replied, the discussion gave little hope of an intelligible solution.
“May I venture to offer my services, Madam?” said Calvert, rising and bowing politely. “If I can be of the least use on this occasion----”
“None whatever, Sir. I am perfectly competent to express my own wishes, and have no need of an interpreter;” and then turning to the waiter, added: “Montrez moi le telegraph, garçon.”
The semi-tragic air in which she spoke, not to add the strange accent of her very peculiar French, was almost too much for Calvert’s gravity, while Loyd, half pained by the ridicule thus attached to a countrywoman, held down his head and never uttered a word. Meanwhile the old lady had retired with a haughty toss of her towering bonnet, followed by Franz.