"C'est bien." He tipped the man generously, delighted at the result of his tactics.
"Monsieur, sans doute, travels to Siena?—a cold journey ... the passes are full of snow. But Monsieur will be quite undisturbed"—a gleam of mischief came into the dark shrewd face—"one understands Monsieur could not travel with the Church!"
This puzzled Peter. He had yet to learn that his Uncle had been a member of the Anti-clerical party. Like most Protestants, he lived in the error that the nearer one approached to Rome the more fervent the Catholicism. He had heard of the two great factions in that city, the "Black" and the "White," without measuring their importance. Moreover, he did not realize the curious apathy of the lower classes in the land of the Saints and that deep-rooted hatred of the Socialist and "Patriot" for monastic institutions and temporal power.
But he smiled at the sally, conscious of hidden meaning, and the man, encouraged, lowered his voice.
"This berth, milord, was reserved for a German—un banquier Juif—qui vient de Hambourg..." he reached up and removed the ticket from its slot—"we will place him to-night on the road to salvation!"
"With the priest?"—McTaggart laughed until he cried as the door closed on his new friend's parting grin. He tried to picture the same scene in England with the typical conductor of a Pullman Car.
What a nation it was! Light and witty, with under the froth a curious depth. He thought of its paralyzing series of defeats in the Franco-Prussian war, its mad Revolutions and that marvellous recuperative force which had brought France back to her present era of prosperity. Then he began to dream of Italy; to picture Siena and, in the far distance, Cydonia beside him there ... Cydonia in his arms.
With her name on his lips he fell asleep.
He woke, refreshed, made a leisurely toilette and wandered forth in search of breakfast. In the Restaurant Car he announced his nationality by demanding eggs with his café au lait; then settled down to the long day's journey, thankful now for the full steam heat as they mounted steadily toward the Alps and plunged with a shrill whistle into the tunnel.
On and on, with tantalizing peeps of the Mont Cenis Pass. The hoar frost without traced fairy patterns on the window-pane. The wind roared past them but the sun shone bright on snow-clad peaks and valleys dazzling white. Through Turin, with its broad blue river twisting like a serpent round her ancient walls, on and on, now heading South, as the snow vanished swiftly and the plains spread about them.