Ethel Vernon bit her lip as her husband drew out, with huge relish, in his profuse execrable German the ambagious ignorance of the hotel staff.
"Well," he laughed, as the last witness withdrew, "it seems you may expect Caragh any moment from lunch-time until this day month. If only these good people had named an hour at which he couldn't possibly turn up we should have known when to look for him."
"He may come when he pleases," said his wife indifferently.
"It's a way he has," remarked the other, smiling.
Lady Ethel determined before his arrival to see everything in the city which Caragh might wish to show her.
The effort would bore her considerably, but she hoped for some compensation from his chagrin. The city was, however, for the following days, almost obliterated by pelting rain.
But even that brought a measure of consolation. Ethel sat at her window, and watched the green river grow turbid and swollen under the streaming skies.
"I hope he likes his raft," she murmured grimly.
But it was her husband who on that aspiration had the first news. He had paid a visit to Vacz, and meant to return by water. On the pier he found Caragh, whose curiosity in raft travel was satisfied, and who yearned for dry clothes. They travelled by the same boat, and Maurice explained that his adventure dated back many years in design, which a chance meeting with a timber merchant at Gyor enabled him to execute. He gave an account of the raft-men, their hardihood, humour, and riparian morality.
"I see," said Vernon, amused and interested. "Pity it's not the sort of thing that appeals to a woman!"