"Because of what?" urged his companion.
Alois shrugged his shoulders and laughed. "I was going to say a thing which I had no business to say," he confessed. "We men sneer at our women because they keep no secrets, yet sometimes we find ourselves near to the same foolishness. I must take care, and beg that the noble lady will not embarrass me with questions."
The noble lady obediently held her tongue, yet there was a twinkle under her long, downcast lashes, which might in turn have aroused 28 Alois's curiosity if he had seen.
Slowly they climbed on; the two carriages, with the noble lady's noble mother, the middle-aged companion, the French maid, and the modest supply of luggage, toiling up behind.
At last they reached the inn with the steeply pointed roof of gray shingles and the big picture of Heiligengelt's patron saint portrayed in bright colours on the white house-wall. A characteristic call from Alois, sent forth before the highest plateau was reached, brought an apple-cheeked old dame to the front door; and it was the youngest of the travellers who asked, with a pleasant greeting, for the best suite of rooms that Frau Johann could provide.
The Rhaetian woman and her son exchanged a glance which mirrored mystery. Then Frau Johann regretted that her best rooms were already occupied by four gentlemen who came each year at this season to spend a week or ten days. They had the bedchambers commanding the finest view, and the only private sitting-room in the house; but there were other good rooms in plenty, and one of these could easily be 29 transformed into a sitting-room, if the ladies desired.
An hour later, when the newcomers, mother, daughter, and companion, sat down to a hot supper in a room rendered hastily habitable for dining, the youngest of the three remarked to Frau Johann upon the peaceful stillness of her house.
"One would think that there was not a soul in the place save ourselves," she said. "Yet we are not your only guests, we know."
"The gentlemen who are stopping with me are away all day on the mountains," explained Frau Johann. "It is now the season for chamois- hunting, and it is for that sport and also some good climbing, only to be done by experts, that they come to me. To-night they do not return, but stop at—at a hut they have near the top of the Weisshorn, to begin work in the morning earlier than would be possible if they slept in the village. That, indeed, is their constant custom."
"Then they are rather selfish to keep your only sitting-room, since they can make but little use of it," said the girl. "And so I should 30 like to hint, if I happened to meet them."