boots and clumsy felt over-shoes, that made them seem like so many gouty old gentlemen. Neither did she hear the boy cry “sausage-breads! ham-breads! beer, schnapps,” as he came and stood at the open carriage-door with the tin tray of refreshments slung before him, and with the tall glasses full of Lager-bier, arranged in a kind of big black cruet-stand, dangling from his hand; the girl had her face buried in her hands, and was sobbing away, half with joy at her deliverance, and half from the depression of the fright that had overcome her like a palsy.
“Is the Fraulein ill?” asked the boy; but as the question was unheeded the lad jerked his head, as if beckoning to some one hard by, and the minute after, the guard was at the carriage door with his face, swarthy as a gipsy’s with the smoke of the engine, and the high black sheepskin collar of his gaberdine-like over coat standing up about his ears and neck; for the seats of the railway officials accompanying the trains in Germany consist of mere low-backed arm-chairs perched on top of the carriages, and so exposed to the wind and the smoke of the engine, that the guards after a journey have the same Creole complexion as the stokers.
“The train stops here a quarter of an hour, Fraulein,” said the guard, as he entered the carriage, and touched the girl gently on the shoulder. “Would Fraulein like some refreshment? A cup of hot coffee might do her good: shall the boy here bring it you?”
But as the girl merely shook her head without looking up or taking her hands from her face, the official added in a softer tone:
“What ails the Fraulein? Has that fox-bearded fellow I saw in the carriage been rude to the young lady?”
“I have no complaint to make against him,” she merely faltered out in a low voice.
“H—m! Fraulein has left her friends, maybe,” went on the man, with all the civility of unfeigned compassion. “Can I do anything for the lady before I leave, for I don’t go any farther than this station with the train?”
“Nothing, thank you,” said Helen; “all I want is to be left alone.”
“Then,” said the man jestingly, as he quitted the vehicle, “the Fraulein couldn’t have come to a better place than a first-class railway carriage at this time of the year.”
The flood of grief had now somewhat subsided, and Helen Boyne began to feel as if she had strength to look for the reticule which contained the bottle of smelling-salts that she had so longed for, but wanted power to search for previously. She had upon entering the carriage placed it upon the cushion before her, and as she leant forward to reach it, she recognised the familiar little Eisenach newspaper (no bigger than a sheet of ordinary letter-paper). In an instant she knew it must have fallen from the man’s carpet-bag, and with a strange fascination of fright she could neither keep her eyes nor her fingers from it, and the curiosity that was on her restored her, for a minute or two, to her senses. She scanned it all over as hurriedly as a person reads a long-expected letter, her eyes flying from paragraph to paragraph, with all the restlessness of mental distraction till she came to the official announcements near the end, and there she found that a clerk in one of the Government offices of the town had absconded with a large sum of money, and that he stood charged with having falsified entries, and forged signatures to receipts, and when she had read the description of the delinquent that was appended, she saw in a minute the clue to the mystery of the adventure she had been forced to take part in.
The girl was busily engaged in pondering over the printed description of her late companion, and saying to herself that the desperation and restlessness of the man were now fully explained, when the guard appeared again suddenly at the carriage-door, and said:
“I beg your pardon, Fraulein; but didn’t you hear the man who was in the carriage with you say he was going on to Frankfurt by this afternoon’s train?”
The young lady remained silent.
“You remember, Fraulein, when I asked him for his ticket?” added the guard quickly.
Still there was no answer.
“He didn’t tell you anything about himself, or where he was going to—in the course of conversation, you know, Fraulein—as sometimes happens, you know, among strangers travelling together?” chattered on the guard inquisitively, as he waited eagerly for the answer.
“No,” was the reply, “he told me nothing.”
“Did the Fraulein see which way he went when he got out of the carriage?” inquired the official.
The damsel, again, shook her head.
“Tut! tut! tut!” said the man; “if I had only gone to the office directly, the fellow couldn’t have slipped through my fingers, nor the reward either. But I know how he is dressed, and could pick his foxy beard and long yellow hair out of any mob. So he can’t well escape me yet.”
Some quarter of an hour after the above colloquy.—Helen Boyne had sat speculating a hundred and one odd things during the brief interval as to her fellow traveller’s wretched career and fate,—the doors of the carriages were heard to slam one after the other, all along the line, preparatory to the train starting once more, and just as the scream of the whistle rattled against the wall of the long station, the door of Helen’s carriage was once more suddenly opened, and a man in a soft felt Tyrol-shaped hat dashed into the seat next to it, and with the high fur collar of his coat turned up over his ears, immediately nestled up into the corner, as if he were arranging himself to sleep through the journey.
“Another intruder!” sighed the damsel to herself. “Had I thought there was a chance of such a thing, I would have asked the guard to shift me into a second-class carriage.” Whereupon, she inwardly made a resolution to do so on reaching the next station.
The next moment the train was off, and in a few minutes afterwards another guard made his appearance at the window to inspect the tickets of the passengers, and as he did so, the stranger in the “Garibaldi hat” and huge fur cloak, handed up his ticket to be perforated, saying the while:
