To which we consented.
The Italian had been following us, vainly begging us to walk over the frontier with him, but as we had still a trunk, two rucksacks, and the large Sevillian dish in its basket, his suggestion did not seem feasible. So we finally said good-bye to one another, he setting off again on foot for France.
We were sitting over our coffee after lunch, when the black-eyed host came near, drew a chair close up to us, stared at us with perplexed brows for a moment, then said, suddenly:
"I know why you have come here."
"We have come because the bridge is broken," we said.
He waved this aside.
"You need not mince matters with me," he answered. "I can see, I have two eyes. I have plenty of opium upstairs."
"Opium?"
"Yes, you can smuggle it over to France quite easily from here."
"But we are not smugglers."