‘Because six hundred years ago an ancestor of mine signed the Compact.’ He reflected a moment, than looked me over and said: ‘Ancestor! It’s my opinion you signed it yourself. For of all the old ancient relics that ever I—but never mind about that. What is it you are waiting here for so long?’ I said: ‘I’m not waiting here so long at all. I’m waiting fifteen minutes till they forget a glove and a book and go back and get them.’ Then I told him who they were that I had come for. He was very obliging, and began to shout inquiries to the tiers of heads and shoulders projecting from the windows above us. Then a woman away up there sang out: ‘Oh, they? Why, I got them a cab and they left here long ago—half-past eight, I should say.’ It was annoying. I glanced at my watch, but didn’t say anything. The officer said: ‘It is a quarter of twelve, you see. You should have inquired better. You have been asleep three-quarters of an hour, and in such a sun as this! You are baked—baked black. It is wonderful. And you will miss your train, perhaps. You interest me greatly. What is your occupation?’ I said I was a courier. It seemed to stun him, and before he could come to we were gone. When I arrived in the third story of the hotel I found our quarters vacant. I was not surprised. The moment a courier takes his eye off his tribe they go shopping. The nearer it is to train time the surer they are to go. I sat down to try and think out what I had best do next, but presently the hall boy found me there, and said the Expedition had gone to the station half an hour before. It was the first time I had known them to do a rational thing, and it was very confusing. This is one of the things that make a courier’s life so difficult and uncertain. Just as matters are going the smoothest, his people will strike a lucid interval, and down go all his arrangements to wreck and ruin. The train was to leave at twelve noon sharp. It was now ten minutes after twelve. I could be at the station in ten minutes. I saw I had no great amount of leeway, for this was the lightning express, and on the Continent the lightning expresses are pretty fastidious about getting away some time during the advertised day. My people were the only ones remaining in the waiting room; everybody else had passed through and ‘mounted the train,’ as they say in those regions. They were exhausted with nervousness and fret, but I comforted them and heartened them up, and we made our rush.