Stewart patted her hand, a patronizing touch that sent her blood racing.

“Much larger,” he said magnificently.  “I haven’t seen a hill in Europe I’d exchange for the Rockies.  And when we cross the mountains there we use railway coaches.  These toy railroads are a joke.  At home we’d use ’em as street-cars.”

“Really!  I should like to see America.”

“So should I.”

The conversation was taking a dangerous trend.  Mention of America was apt to put the Herr Doktor in a bad humor or to depress him, which was even worse.  Marie, her hand still on his arm and not repulsed, became silent.

At a small way station the three Germans in the compartment left the train.  Stewart, lowering a window, bought from a boy on the platform beer and sausages and a bag of pretzels.  As the train resumed its clanking progress they ate luncheon, drinking the beer from the bottles and slicing the sausage with a penknife.  It was a joyous trip, a red-letter day in the girl’s rather sordid if not uneventful life.  The Herr Doktor was pleased with her.  He liked her hat, and when she flushed with pleasure demanded proof that she was not rouged.  Proof was forthcoming.  She rubbed her cheeks vigorously with a handkerchief and produced in triumph its unreddened purity.

“Thou suspicious one!” she pouted.  “I must take off the skin to assure thee!  When the Herr Doktor says no rouge, I use none.”

“You’re a good child.”  He stooped over and kissed one scarlet cheek and then being very comfortable and the beer having made him drowsy, he put his head in her lap and slept.

When he awakened they were still higher.  The snow-peak towered above and the valleys were dizzying!  Semmering was getting near.  They were frequently in darkness; and between the tunnels were long lines of granite avalanche sheds.  The little passage of the car was full of tourists looking down.

“We are very close, I am sure,” an American girl was saying just outside the doorway.  “See, isn’t that the Kurhaus?  There, it is lost again.”

The tourists in the passage were Americans and the girl who had spoken was young and attractive.  Stewart noticed them for the first time and moved to a more decorous distance from Marie.

Marie Jedlicka took her cue and lapsed into silence, but her thoughts were busy.  Perhaps this girl was going to Semmering also and the Herr Doktor would meet her.  But that was foolish!  There were other resorts besides Semmering, and in the little villa to which they went there would be no Americans.  It was childish to worry about a girl whose back and profile only she had seen.  Also profiles were deceptive; there was the matter of the ears.  Marie’s ears were small and set close to her head.  If the American Fraulein’s ears stuck out or her face were only short and wide!  But no.  The American Fraulein turned and glanced once swiftly into the compartment.  She was quite lovely.