“You are droll, you English and Americans,” he said, “you see nothing but your own way. I have heard Englishmen laugh as to how yet the Russians count their time different from the civilization part of the world, and then all England and America do their measure and weight in a manner so uneven that a European is useless to even attempt to understand it. There was a man there at Lucerne,—what did he say to me? ‘A mark is a quarter, is it not?’ that is what he asked. ‘Mon Dieu,’ I said, ‘if you cut it in four pieces it is four quarters, and if you leave it whole it is whole,’ then he looked to find me bête, and I was very sure that he was, and we spoke no more.”
Rosina laughed.
“He meant a quarter of a dollar,” she explained.
“I know that. You do not really think that I did not know that, do you? It was for his poor careless grammar that I find the American even more bête than for his ignorance. Do you believe that in my own tongue I would speak as many of you speak yours? In my own tongue I am above correction.”
They were under the long arcade in front of the Regierung and in view of the discussion which seemed impending she judged it advisable to say, with a gesture:
“There is where we met Jack; you remember?”
Von Ibn looked quickly about.
“Yes, it was here,” he said, and then he shuddered slightly. “It was very well to laugh after, but that might have been so bad. I was angry and I struck a fearful blow then; I have often think of it when we were travelling together.”
She grew thoughtful also, and her imagination found food among some miserable possibilities which might have been.
So they came to the river banks and the Maximilianbrücke, and paused by its rail.