“My friends, I am sure, will have no objection,” he declared. “I think that there is room for all of us.”
The priest was volubly thankful. He lit his cigar and puffed at it with obvious pleasure.
“Monsieur is doubtless a great traveller,” he remarked, urbanely. “For me a journey such as this is an event—a wonderful event. Not once in many years do I leave my people. Monsieur will be amused, but it is indeed ten years since I found myself in a railway train.”
Ughtred was reserved, but the priest was quite willing to bear the brunt of the conversation so long as he had a listener. It appeared that he was on his way to visit his brother, who was a prosperous merchant in Belgrade. And monsieur?—if he were not too inquisitive—should he have the pleasure of his company all the way?
Ughtred hesitated for the fraction of a second. Reist was passing along the corridor with imperturbable face, but with his cap in his hand—an agreed upon sign of danger. So Ughtred, to whom a lie was as poison, braced himself for the effort.
“I go even farther than you,” he declared. “My journey is not ended at Constantinople.”
The priest’s fat face was wrinkled into smiles. It was most fortunate—his own good fortune. For himself he was so unaccustomed to travel that he found it impossible to read. He was excited—besides, it gave him the headache. To converse only was possible. But after all he had no right to inflict himself thus upon monsieur. He had perhaps affairs to attend to—or he desired to sleep? Ughtred, who found it impossible to suspect this fat, simple-mannered man so shabbily dressed, so wrapped in enjoyment of his bad cigar, smiled, and shook his head. They drifted into conversation. Ughtred learned the entire village history of Baineuill, and was made acquainted with the names and standing of each of its inhabitants from Jean the smith to Monsieur le Comte, who was an infidel, and whose house-parties were as orgies of the evil one.
“And monsieur,” the priest asked, ingenuously, “monsieur is perhaps a soldier? I have talked so long of my own poor affairs. It must be tedious.”
Just then Reist and Brand passed along the corridor, laughing heartily. Brand paused, and with a bow to the priest held out a paper to Ughtred.