The priest opposite looked up from his cold veal and potato salad and smiled. It was a nice face. He explained quietly that he did not belong here, but was making a tour of the parishes of Württemberg and Baden.

“It was a strict life,” added Harris. “We English, I remember, used to call it Gefängnisleben ⁠—prison life!”

The face of the other, for some unaccountable reason, darkened. After a slight pause, and more by way of politeness than because he wished to continue the subject, he said quietly⁠—

“It was a flourishing school in those days, of course. Afterwards, I have heard⁠—” He shrugged his shoulders slightly, and the odd look⁠—it almost seemed a look of alarm⁠—came back into his eyes. The sentence remained unfinished.

Something in the tone of the man seemed to his listener uncalled for⁠—in a sense reproachful, singular. Harris bridled in spite of himself.