Suddenly Truyn exclaims in dismay: "What has become of Zinka and Sempaly?"
"They have lingered talking on the way," says Madame de Gandry with pinched lips as she leans back in her chair and pulls off her gloves. "People always walk slowly when they have so much to say to each other."
Truyn frowned. "I am afraid they have got entangled in the crowd and have not been able to make their way out. I have hated this expedition from the first. I cannot imagine, Marie, what could have put such a plan into your head...."
"Mine!" says his sister in an undertone and with a meaning glance. But she says no more. He knows perfectly well that she is as innocent of the scheme as the angels in heaven.
"Why, what on earth is the matter?" asks Vulpini pouring huge quantities of grated cheese into his soup, while Mrs. Ferguson complains that she is dying of hunger, which is singular, considering the enormous number of bonbons she has eaten in the course of the day. Madame de Gandry asks for a series of French dishes which the 'Falcone' has never heard of Countess Schalingen is loud in her praises of the Italian cookery and is only sorry that she has no appetite.
Truyn and the general sat gazing at the door in growing anxiety; Zinka and Sempaly do not make their appearance--Truyn can hardly conceal his alarm.
"I certainly cannot understand what you are so uneasy about," says Madame de Gandry with a perfidious smile; "if Fräulein Zinka has been mobbed and hindered Sempaly is in the same predicament and will take good care of her. If she were with any one less trustworthy, less competent, with whom she was less intimate ... then I could understand...." Truyn passes his hand over his grey hair in extreme perplexity and mutters in his mother tongue: "This woman will be the death of me!" and then he again blames his sister.
Yet another quarter of an hour; though the waiters are not nimble they have got to the dessert and still no signs of Sempaly and Zinka.
"I am beginning to feel very anxious," says Marie. "I only hope the child has not fainted in the crowd."
Madame de Gandry makes a meaning grimace. "It is perhaps the cleverest thing she could have done," she says. Truyn hears and bites his lip.