No one was tired; no one wanted to rest. On the contrary, our rapid flight over the Alps had intoxicated us with the sense of speed; and we were all excitedly for going on until we should reach the frontier. As pink dawn blossomed in the sky, like a heavenly orchard, and the mountain tops were beaten into copper, we glided along the edge of the lake, past picturesque villages and campanili, and cypress trees. At the Italian frontier there were the usual tedious formalities of payment and sealing the car with a leaden seal; but when all this was done by sleepy officials, surly at our early passage, though little recking of our crimes, we sailed on again, Molly driving now, through a landscape magically clear in the young morning light.
Suddenly we all started in joyous astonishment, and Molly brought the car to a stop. Each had seen the same thing, each had been struck with the same thought. Here, at last, we had found what we had come so far to seek; what Switzerland denied us, Italy offered. Standing alone in a field by the roadside was a small, dark grey donkey, tethered to a stone; and no other living being was in sight. The creature was not eating; it was only thinking; and it looked at us with an eye that seemed to speak of loneliness and the desire for human fellowship. "The very thing for you!" cried Molly; and the long-sought-for treasure, finding itself observed, flicked one of its heavy ears.
Gotteland and I dismounted and went nearer. As we approached, the donkey nickered; and as its family is famed for reticence, such proof of friendliness made me yearn to possess the deserted little beast. But its legs were very thin, its hoofs exceedingly small, and the thought of loading so frail a structure with the great packs that held my camping kit seemed a barbarity. Meanwhile Gotteland, who knows something of everything, had carefully examined the tiny animal, and just as I was growing sentimental over its perfections, he broke the charm by pronouncing it to be incredibly old, and unfit for work. He also drew my attention to a disagreeable sore upon its shoulder. It was sad; but indisputably the man was right; in any case there was no one with whom a bargain could have been arranged, and with poignant regret I was forced to leave my treasure-trove to its solitary thoughts. After this we did not stop again until Molly steered the car to the door of a beautiful hotel in Pallanza, where the shirt-sleeved concierge hurried into his gold-laced coat, to receive in fitting style the unusually early guests.
My first care, after coffee and a bath, was to examine the landlord of the hotel on momentous question of mules and donkeys. At Lucerne, I told him, they had assured me that the animals "flourished" in Canton Ticino and the neighbourhood of the Italian Lakes. But I met with no encouragement. Mules and donkeys were rarely seen in these parts, the host declared. True, a few peasants employed them in the fields; but those were poor things, unfit for an excursion such as Monsieur purposed. At Piedimulera, perhaps, Monsieur would find what he wanted; yes, at Piedimulera, or if not, at Domodossola; or—his face brightened—in the Valais, preferably at Brig. Yes, he was certain that mules and asses in abundance could be found at Brig in the Rhone Valley. Brig! My heart sank. It was the old story. Counterfeiting patience, I explained that I had an antipathy to the Rhone Valley, and had actually crossed the Alps to find animals in Italy rather than be driven to seek them in Brig.
Crushed by a hopeless, answering gesture, I made my report to Molly and Jack. "It will end," I said, "in my traversing the world, and eventually arriving in Japan, still searching the rara avis. By that time I shall have become a harmless lunatic, and people will treat my babblings with indulgent forbearance, when I go from house to house begging to be supplied with a pack-mule or a pack-donkey."
At déjeuner, in a garden which was a successful imitation of Eden, the situation did not, however, look so dark. The perfume of flowers, distilled by the hot sun, was of Araby the Blest; the Borromean Islands spread their enchantments before us, across a glittering blue expanse of lake, and the world was after all endurable, though empty of mules. Besides, Molly was a sweet consoler. She dwelt on the hopeful suggestion in the name Piedimulera. It could not be wholly deceiving, she argued. Why name a place Foot-of-a-Mule, if there were no mules there?
"If there aren't," I exclaimed, "I swear to you that I will, by fair means or foul, dispose of at Piedimulera all the things with which I fondly thought to deck the animal my fancy had painted. Everything I bought at Bern shall go, if I have to dig a grave by night in which to bury them. This is a vow, and though my heart be wrung, I'll keep it."
Molly listened to this outburst as gravely as if I had been threatening to sacrifice a son, did not some incredible good fortune supply a ram caught by his horns in the bushes.
For Piedimulera we left in the afternoon, somewhat buoyed up by the omen of the name. The way led back towards the Alps, up a broad and beautiful valley strewn with evidences of the works for the Simplon railway: embankments, bridges, quarries, and occasional groups of workmen hauling rhythmically on the many ropes of a pile-driver. Presently we swerved from the main road, and crossed the valley bed, obedient to the map, which was our only guide to Piedimulera. We passed one or two romantically placed, ancient villages, each of which I hoped might be our goal; but, as usual in life, the town for which we were bound did not appear as alluring as other towns, where we had no need to stop.
"I feel there will be not so much as the ghost of a long-perished Roman mule in this hamlet," I said despondently, hoping that Molly would contradict me. But she, too, looked anxious, now that the great moment had come, for we were driving into a town, at the mouth of a deep gorge already dusky with purpling shadows, and there was no doubt that it was Piedimulera.