Now, this pretty company, Englishmen, Roumanians, a Greek and a Turk, encamped in the woods together upon the evening of the second day, and found what comfort they could beneath the sheltering leaves of a spacious beech. It had been Gavin's intention to put up at a guest-house named by the guide-book he had purchased in Vienna; but when they came to the place where the inn should have stood, they discovered nothing but charred ruins and cinerous relics; and, "by all the gods," said Arthur Kenyon, "the red cock has crowed here before us." A romantic ear would have listened greedily at such a time to the guide's tales of border pleasantries--girls carried shrieking to the mountains, roofs blazing, priests burned in their holy oils, babes hoist on bayonets--for such they would have made a simple affair in which a drunken herdsman and a paraffin lamp had figured notably; but Gavin was in no mood for narratives, and he sent them to the right about, one for wood, another for water, a third to hunt a cot or homestead, if such were to be discovered. "The Hotel of the Belle Étoile after all," he said gloomily; "well, it might have been worse, Arthur." "Just so. If I had not stocked your larder at Slavitesti, you would now be doing what the amiable Foulon advised the French people to do a hundred years ago--eating hay with relish, my dear boy. Well, there's red wine strong enough to poison White Bull, and maize bread tough enough for a guinea set of ready-made grinders, to say nothing of cheese, sausage, and biscuits. Fall on, Macduff, and damned be he who eats enough!" "I don't care twopence about the food," said Gavin savagely; "it's the delay I fret over. We may be within riding distance of the place for all I know. They could have told us at this inn." "The boy on the burning deck grown eloquent. We might have put out the fire for them or comforted some of the ladies. Are you really in such a hurry, Gavin?" "Judge for yourself. From the Castle at Okna I can write to Evelyn and tell her the truth. Until it is told, she will be the daily victim of a rogue's plausible suggestions. Why, the man may have returned to Derbyshire by this time--all that is possible and more." "And there was a great square moon in the sky and thereon the people read the story of the Jaberwock. Tell me frankly, would Evelyn listen to the man now?" "Evelyn would not, but Etta Romney might. Enigmas--I shall not explain them. Let us go to supper. The day will come after the centuries." "Gavin, my dear fellow--this is the ancient fever. I bow to it. Pass the wine and I'll drink to your enigma. We are people of importance and our escort is a royal one. It is also musical. That song suggests Seigfried or is it the 'Belle of New York'? My musical education was completed at Magdalen College within Cambridge and is incomplete."