He nodded somewhat less officially. “I know Frau Helse, and doubtless it is all as you say, Fräulein. But we have to be careful in these days. I trust your detention will not be prolonged.” He touched a bell and they were ushered into an adjoining room and left alone. “Looks as if my assistance was not of much use to you, my dear,” laughed Ray. “I wish I’d smashed Fat-Pig’s ugly old head in. It would at all events have put him hors-de-combat for a day or two and would have been a great satisfaction to my feelings as well.” “Then I should never have seen you at all,” said Lois. “It will be all right, I’m sure. Frau Helse will satisfy him. I’m glad he knows her.” And an hour later they were released without a word of apology. But it was enough for them to be free, and they made their way back to the station in good enough spirits. The delay, however, had lost them both the earlier and the later trains, and the time-tables showed that the next one for the south would land them at a place called Schwandorf at four o’clock in the morning, with the remote possibility of reaching Munich six hours later. There was a fast through train a little after midnight, which, barring accidents or delays, would get them there a couple of hours earlier, but after their late experience, and with the chance of running across their fat friend again, and perhaps becoming further victims to his pig-headed venom, Ray thought it best to get out of Leipsic as early as possible, even at cost of a weary night journey in a train that stopped at every station. Every station would at all events be that much between them and Pig-Head. So they had their mid-day meal in the Station restaurant, and dallied over it as long as possible, and spent the rest of their time in the waiting-room, so that the authorities should have no possible pretext for suspicion. They were perfectly happy, however, in one another’s company and the new relationship which Ray’s coming had jewelled into accepted family fact. Ray told her all he could think of about home-doings, and was keen to learn the smallest details of her life in Leipsic, and so there was no lack of talk between them and the time did not seem long. Streams of people passed through the station, mostly men, and mostly in uniform. Ray saw without seeming to notice, and was confirmed in the view that great and grave events were brewing. Their train was an hour late in starting, and, by reason of many stoppages and much side-tracking to allow other heavily-laden trains to pass, was more than two hours late in reaching Schwandorf.