“He won’t come to-night, now,” interrupted the stationmaster, none too politely. “No other train arrives to-night.”
“Tell him when he does come to follow me at once to the Wintenbergerhof. I’m going there immediately.” For time was short, and I did not wish to keep Mr. Rassendyll waiting. Besides, in my new-born nervousness, I was anxious to accomplish my errand as soon as might be. What had become of Bauer? The thought returned, and now with it another, that seemed to connect itself in some subtle way with my present position: why and whither had the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim set out from Strelsau a day before I started on my journey to Wintenberg?
“If he comes I’ll tell him,” said the station-master, and as he spoke he looked round the yard.
There was not a cab to be seen! I knew that the station lay on the extreme outskirts of the town, for I had passed through Wintenberg on my wedding journey, nearly three years before. The trouble involved in walking, and the further waste of time, put the cap on my irritation.
“Why don’t you have enough cabs?” I asked angrily.
“There are plenty generally, sir,” he answered more civilly, with an apologetic air. “There would be to-night but for an accident.”
Another accident! This expedition of mine seemed doomed to be the sport of chance.
“Just before your train arrived,” he continued, “a local came in. As a rule, hardly anybody comes by it, but to-night a number of men—oh, twenty or five-and-twenty, I should think—got out. I collected their tickets myself, and they all came from the first station on the line. Well, that’s not so strange, for there’s a good beer-garden there. But, curiously enough, every one of them hired a separate cab and drove off, laughing and shouting to one another as they went. That’s how it happens that there were only one or two cabs left when your train came in, and they were snapped up at once.”
Taken alone, this occurrence was nothing; but I asked myself whether the conspiracy that had robbed me of my servant had deprived me of a vehicle also.
“What sort of men were they?” I asked.