At this point there hailed us a voice, proceeding from a stout gentleman, who stood some fifty feet away from us under a big umbrella.
“Won’t you come inside?” asked the stout gentleman.
“Inside where?” I called back. I thought at first he was one of those fools that will try to be funny when there is nothing to be funny about.
“Inside the restaurant,” he answered.
We left our shelter and made for him. We wished for further information about this thing.
“I did call to you from the window,” said the stout gentleman, as we drew near to him, “but I suppose you did not hear me. This storm may last for another hour; you will get so wet.”
He was a kindly old gentleman; he seemed quite anxious about us.
I said: “It is very kind of you to have come out. We are not lunatics. We have not been standing under that tree for the last half-hour knowing all the time there was a restaurant, hidden by the trees, within twenty yards of us. We had no idea we were anywhere near a restaurant.”
“I thought maybe you hadn’t,” said the old gentleman; “that is why I came.”
It appeared that all the people in the inn had been watching us from the windows also, wondering why we stood there looking miserable. If it had not been for this nice old gentleman the fools would have remained watching us, I suppose, for the rest of the afternoon. The landlord excused himself by saying he thought we looked like English. It is no figure of speech. On the Continent they do sincerely believe that every Englishman is mad. They are as convinced of it as is every English peasant that Frenchmen live on frogs. Even when one makes a direct personal effort to disabuse them of the impression one is not always successful.