"They are taking as long as they can, on purpose," she whispered to
me, with the air of a naughty child planning mischief behind the backs
of its elders. "Anything to keep me to themselves and away from you!
But you are walking, and the way is uphill for a very long time, so
the hotel people say. We shall catch you up, and just to spite the Di
Nivolis, if nothing more, I shall beg first one of you, then the
other, to let me give you a lift. Neither of you must refuse, or I
shall cry, and no man has ever made me cry yet."
"I'm sure no man ever will," I answered promptly.
"And no boy?" she asked, with a long-lashed glance at my companion,
who had given no answer save a smile.
"I wonder how you would look when you cried, Contessa?" was the only
reply the little wretch deigned, but instead of offending, it appeared
to amuse her. She watched our cavalcade out of the hotel garden (the
_ruecksack_ once more on Souris' faithless back), and the silver bells
of her laughter lightly rang us down the road.
Again we had to pass through Martigny Bourg, and presently, turning
aside from the road which had led me to the Grand St. Bernard, we took
the way on the right, almost at once feeling the rise of the hill.
Steeper and steeper it grew, and warmer and warmer we, though the day
was young. Often we were glad of the excuse the view gave us to stop
and look back, down into the wide bowl of the Rhone Valley, with a
heat-haze of quivering blue, creating an effect of great distance,
like a "gauze drop" on the stage.
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