It was late afternoon when we straggled into Martigny. Now, our far
away Alpine Rome with its crumbling towers and castles, our remote
heights where a grey monastery was ever mirrored in the blue eye of
the mountain lake, seemed like phases of a dream.
Friends of the Boy's (nameless to me, like all links with his outside
life) had stopped lately at the hotel where Molly, Jack, and I had
stayed; he therefore proposed to go to the same house, and this jumped
with my inclination: for the hotel had a cheerful and home-like
individuality which I liked.
Pitying the Little Pal's distress, though I chaffed him for it, I
undertook the business of getting out the handbills I had suggested,
and arranging for an advertisement in a paper with a local
circulation. I had to visit the post-office, engaging in a long
discussion with the officials who controlled the diligence, and the
business occupied more than an hour. In mercy to Boy, I had not
delayed for any selfish attention to personal comfort, and tramping
back through an inch of white dust to the hotel, I was still as
travel-worn as on our arrival in the town, nearly two hours ago. I had
forbidden the tired child to accompany me, and by this time he would
no doubt be refreshed with a bath and a change of clothing, as,
fortunately, not all his personal belongings had been contained in the
ill-fated bag.
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