We made room for Isabel, but the train to Mayence was crowded that day, and before we arrived we had ample reason to believe that conjugal affection is not only at home but abroad in Germany.  The Senator, at one point, threatened to travel on the engine to avoid it.  He used, I think the language of exaggeration about it.  He said it was the most objectionable article made in Germany.  But I did not notice that Isabel devoted herself at all seriously to looking out of the window.

CHAPTER XXVII.

“He tells me,” said Miss Callis, “that you are to give him his answer at Cologne.”

“Does he, indeed?” said I. We were floating down the Rhine in the society of our friends, two hundred and fifty other floaters, and a string band.  We had left the battlements of Bingen, and the Mouse Tower was in sight.  As we had already acquired the legend, and were sitting behind the smoke stack, there was no reason why we should not discuss Mr. Mafferton.

“I suppose he does not, by any chance, mention an alternative lady,” I said carelessly.

“I don’t know,” said Miss Callis, “that I should be disposed to listen to him if he did.  He would have to put it in some other light.”

“Why should you object?” I asked.  “Isabel is quite a proper person to marry him.  Much more so, I often think, than I.”

“Oh!” said Miss Callis without meaning to.  “I think he has outgrown that taste.  In fact, he told me so.”

“He is for ever seeking a fresh bosom for a confidence!” I cried.

Miss Callis looked at me with more interest than she would have wished to express.

“What do you really think of him?” she asked.  “I sometimes feel as if I had known you for years,” and she took my hand.

I gave hers a gentle pressure, and edged a little nearer.  “He has good shoulders,” I remarked critically.

“You would hardly marry him for his shoulders!”

“It doesn’t seem quite enough,” I admitted, “but then—­his information is always so accurate.”

“If you think you would like living with an encyclopedia.”  Miss Callis had begun to look embarrassed by my hand, but I still permitted it to nestle confidingly in hers.

“He pronounces all his g’s,” I said, “and—­did you ever see him in a silk hat?”

“I don’t think you are really attached to him, dear.” (The “dear” was a really creditable sacrifice to the situation.)

“I sometimes think,” I murmured, “that one never knows one’s own heart until some sudden circumstance puts it to the test.  Now if I had a rival—­in you, for instance—­and I suddenly saw myself losing—­but, of course, that is impossible so far as you are concerned.  Because of the Count.”

“The Count isn’t in it,” said Miss Callis firmly.  “At least at present.”

“But,” I protested, “somebody must provide for him!  I was so happy in the thought that you had undertaken it.”