"How far is it, to ride?"
"If one rides fast, one may do it in half an hour."
"Even through the storm?"
"I think so, monsieur."
"And how long would the ladies be, driving?"
"Like the rider, they must take the longest road over the hill and through the villages, monsieur; that could not take less than an hour, monsieur."
Giraldi had taken out his watch and was making a calculation. He put back the watch.
"It is just twenty minutes past four. You must be ready in ten minutes, at latest, to take a letter from me to madame at Wissow."
"Impossible, monsieur; even this morning, at eleven o'clock, Frau von Wallbach, who was bent upon going away, could not get horses; nobody will supply them, monsieur."
"There are the horses which brought me."