"One of your friends wants you. He is sick to death. Not a moment have we to lose."
"Who?"
"I know not. But hurry!"
They made their way out of the disorderly, miserable town, which knew all the vicissitudes of warfare, and into squalid suburbs, where only Jews, and the poorest at that, could live. With many puzzling thoughts Ian asked his guide whither they were going and who of his friends lived in this unsavory quarter.
"I know nothing," answered he. "It is a friend. He wanted to send one of our people to Ruvno. But the messenger knew you had left Ruvno. But at the hospital none had the heart to tell him the truth. Just now I happened to see this messenger and tell him my Lord Count was here. So I sought you for a long while."
"Haven't you any idea who is this friend?"
"A gentleman. He sent out a hundred roubles to the messenger, I know."
He did not add that he was the messenger and the hundred roubles now lay in his pocket-book. After a quarter of an hour's brisk walking he led the way to a field. Ian could see the dim outline of a tent.
"A military hospital?" he asked.
"Yes." Hermann stopped. "Here I leave you. I fear the cholera." And he was gone.