“I should like to come.  I could learn something.  I want to learn.”

They were both silent till the path joined the road.

“We must be in front of the others; it’s nice to be in front—­let’s dawdle.  I forgot—­you never dawdle, Herr Harz.”

“After a big fit of work, I can dawdle against any one; then I get another fit of work—­it’s like appetite.”

“I’m always dawdling,” answered Christian.

By the roadside a peasant woman screwed up her sun-dried face, saying in a low voice:  “Please, gracious lady, help me to lift this basket!”

Christian stooped, but before she could raise it, Harz hoisted it up on his back.

“All right,” he nodded; “this good lady doesn’t mind.”

The woman, looking very much ashamed, walked along by Christian; she kept rubbing her brown hands together, and saying; “Gracious lady, I would not have wished.  It is heavy, but I would not have wished.”

“I’m sure he’d rather carry it,” said Christian.

They had not gone far along the road, however, before the others passed them in a carriage, and at the strange sight Miss Naylor could be seen pursing her lips; Cousin Teresa nodding pleasantly; a smile on Dawney’s face; and beside him Greta, very demure.  Harz began to laugh.

“What are you laughing at?” asked Christian.

“You English are so funny.  You mustn’t do this here, you mustn’t do that there, it’s like sitting in a field of nettles.  If I were to walk with you without my coat, that little lady would fall off her seat.”  His laugh infected Christian; they reached the station feeling that they knew each other better.

The sun had dipped behind the mountains when the little train steamed down the valley.  All were subdued, and Greta, with a nodding head, slept fitfully.  Christian, in her corner, was looking out of the window, and Harz kept studying her profile.

He tried to see her eyes.  He had remarked indeed that, whatever their expression, the brows, arched and rather wide apart, gave them a peculiar look of understanding.  He thought of his picture.  There was nothing in her face to seize on, it was too sympathetic, too much like light.  Yet her chin was firm, almost obstinate.

The train stopped with a jerk; she looked round at him.  It was as though she had said:  “You are my friend.”

At Villa Rubein, Herr Paul had killed the fatted calf for Greta’s Fest.  When the whole party were assembled, he alone remained standing; and waving his arm above the cloth, cried:  “My dears!  Your happiness!  There are good things here—­Come!” And with a sly look, the air of a conjurer producing rabbits, he whipped the cover off the soup tureen: 

“Soup-turtle, fat, green fat!” He smacked his lips.

No servants were allowed, because, as Greta said to Harz: 

“It is that we are to be glad this evening.”