one hoped it might take away the sting.

"But you intend to return to France?" persisted the official, who
evidently gave even a foreigner credit for wishing to rush back to the
best country on earth with as little delay as possible.

"No," said Terry apologetically. "We are on our way to Italy and
Austria, and may go eventually to England by the Hook of Holland."

The _douanier_ gave us up as hopeless, with a resigned shrug of his
shoulders. He vanished into his lair, consulted a superior officer, and
after a long delay returned with the news that we must pay ten centimes,
probably as a penance for our mulish stupidity in leaving France.

I dropped a penny into his palm.

"Will you have a receipt for this sum?" he asked.

"No, thanks," I smiled. "I have infinite trust in your integrity."

"Perhaps we'd better get the receipt all the same," said Terry. "I've
never been paperless before, and there may be some fuss or other."

"It took them twenty minutes to decide about their silly ten centimes,"
said the Countess "and it will take them twenty more at least to make
out a receipt for it. Do let's go on, if he'll let us. I'm dying to see
what's on the other side of this bridge. We haven't been over into Italy
before; there was so much to do in Nice and Monte Carlo."

"All right, we'll risk it, then, as you wish it," Terry agreed; and our
prophetic souls did not even turn over in their sleep.

On we went, up the steep hill which, with our load, we were obliged to
climb so slowly that Terry and I were ashamed for the car, and tried
diplomatically to make it appear that, had we liked, we could have flown
up with undiminished speed.

[Illustration: _As he spoke a douanier lounged out of his little
whitewashed lair_]

Terry pointed out objects of interest here and there. I questioned him
rapidly and he, playing into my hand, answered as quickly, so that,
if our wheels lagged, our tongues gave the effect of keeping up a
rattling pace.

"Don't you think there's something particularly interesting and romantic
about frontiers?" asked Terry of the company in general. "Only a
fictitious and arbitrary dividing line, one would say, and yet what a
difference on either side, one from the other! Different languages,
different customs, prejudices so different that people living within ten
yards of each other are ready to go to war over them. Here, for
instance, though the first thing one thinks of in crossing the bridge is
t