I looked at my companion, and she looked at me, and ground her teeth.
"Then you absolutely refuse us the courtesy of walking across the
street with us and mending matters, do you?" I said.
Again those heels, that hat, that bow. I could have killed him. I am
sorry now that I didn't. I missed a glorious opportunity.
So off we started alone at eleven o'clock at night for Poland, with
our trunks safely checked through to St. Petersburg, and fifty-five
marks lighter in pocket.
My companion kept saying, "Well, I never!" A pause. And again, "Well,
I never!" And again, "Did you ever in all your life!" Yet there was no
sameness in my ears to her remarks, for it was all that I, too, wanted
to say. It covered the ground completely.
I was speechless with surprise. It kept recurring to my mind that my
friends in America who had lived in Germany had told me that I need
expect nothing at the hands of German men on account of being a woman.
I couldn't seem to get it through my head. But now that it had
happened to me--now that a man had deliberately refused to cross the
street--no farther, mind you!--to get us out of such a mess! Why, in
America, there isn't a man from the President to a chimney-sweep, from
a major-general to the blackest nigger in the cotton fields, who
wouldn't do ten times that much for _any_ woman!
I shall never get over it.
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