“You?” again asked the young gentleman.
“Is that so hard to understand?” asked the farmer. “Are there no lodgings here? Can we get them, or can’t we?”
The young gentleman walked away, and stopped to speak to another young gentleman like unto himself, who met him in the corridor. Soon after two more arrived, one of them with a napkin over his arm, and all the four began to laugh immoderately; so that Gerrit began to be tired of waiting, and, approaching the group, said, with some violence, “Now, what is it to be? Are we to get rooms, or are we not?” The young gentlemen continued to giggle, but suddenly stopped, and scattered with surprising rapidity, for a dignified elderly person entered the vestibule, and asked what was the matter here. Whereupon Gerrit expounded to him that he had asked, in a straightforward and downright way, for lodgings; that he did not know what the young gentlemen were up to; that he had come with his son to attend the fair; that he had no mind to be what-you-may-call-ummed and made a fool of by those young gentlemen; and that he asked, once more, Could he, or could he not?
The respectable gentleman took a good look at Gerrit and Gijs—the latter was still outside the door with the carpet-bag—for some moments; but the open honest face, and generally prosperous appearance of the farmer, reassured him as to the probability of their being good customers. He then laid his forefinger against his nose, and called out to one of the young gentlemen,—
“No. 71 and 72, Karel. Allons!”
Karel came. Gerrit beckoned Gijs to come in. Gijs also came.
“Take the gentleman’s luggage,” said the proprietor of the hotel to Karel, pointing to the carpet-bag, which Gijs still carried over his shoulder.
“Oh, no! thank you,” said Gijs, as the young gentleman Karel went about to relieve him of his load. Karel, however, did not leave go. The proprietor was present; and, in spite of Gijs’ asseverations that he was far too kind, he seized the bag and flew up the broad staircase like a jumping rabbit.
“If you will follow, gentlemen,” said the proprietor, “the garçon will show you your rooms.” Gerrit, putting up, for the sake of peace, with the title of gentleman, followed the flying garçon, and Gijs followed his father.
“Where are we going to?” cried the stout farmer, to whom climbing of stairs was an unaccustomed exercise.