When we came up they were still rummaging, but had found nothing.

Bee hurried to the bureau and looked under the mat.  No tie.  She asked the two women.  They had not seen it.  Then everybody hunted.  Jimmie swore we had packed it.  But Bee’s gray eyes turned to green as she watched the flurried movements of the two maids.  She walked up to them.

“Give me that blue necktie,” she said, in awful German.

At that Jimmie, who hates a row when it is not of his own making, interfered and insisted that we must have packed it—­he remembered numbers of times when we had made a fuss over nothing—­it was of no account anyway, and if we would only come along and not miss the train he would send back to Charvet and get Bee another “blaue cravatte.”

“For heaven’s sake, take that man downstairs,” I said to Mrs. Jimmie, “and let us manage this affair.”

So poor Jimmie was whisked from the scene of action, still protesting and gesticulating, and being soothed but marched steadily onward by his wife.

When we came down we were heated but unsuccessful.  I insisted upon reporting the affair to my friend the head waiter.  He almost went back on his devotion to me in his assurances that those maids were honest.  Then Jimmie had to come up and interfere, and those two men decided that we had packed it.

Bee was in a cold ladylike fury.

We gave all the servants double fees to assure them that meanness had not prompted the search, and got into the carriage.

“Remember,” said Bee, “I claim that one of those women has that tie in her pocket now, because all four of us looked every inch of the rooms over together.  I advise you to have them searched.  On the other hand I will telegraph you from Nuremberg if I find it in my trunks.”

We had half an hour before the train left.  Bee, who was riding backward, kept looking out down the road whence we had come with a curious expression on her face.  Jimmie, in spite of warning pressures from his wife’s foot, kept sputtering about women’s poor memories, etc.  Bee didn’t even seem to hear.

Presently, in a cloud of dust, up drove one of the men from the hotel, with a little package in his hand.

“Blaue cravatte,” he said, bowing.

“Where did you find it?” demanded Mrs. Jimmie.

“Between the mattress and the springs of the bed.  Madame must have put it there to press it.”

Jimmie looked sheepish and put us into the train with a red face.  Bee simply slipped the tie into her satchel and put on her travelling-cap without a word, and began to read.  Bee never nags or crows.

So much for Baden-Baden.

CHAPTER IV

STUTTGART, NUREMBERG, AND BAYREUTH

We had planned to go to Stuttgart next, but as we were nearing the town, Bee pushed up her veil and said: