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stopping at the inn for the fishing. He was very pleasant and went with us twice to the Irati River. There was no word from Robert Cohn nor from Brett and Mike.
CHAPTER 13
One morning I went down to breakfast and the Englishman, Harris, was already at the table. He was reading the paper through spectacles. He looked up and smiled.
“Good morning,” he said. “Letter for you. I stopped at the post and they gave it me with mine.”
The letter was at my place at the table, leaning against a coffee-cup. Harris was reading the paper again. I opened the letter. It had been forwarded from Pamplona. It was dated San Sebastian, Sunday:
Dear Jake,
We got here Friday, Brett passed out on the train, so brought her here for 3 days rest with old friends of ours. We go to Montoya Hotel Pamplona Tuesday, arriving at I don’t know what hour. Will you send a note by the bus to tell us what to do to rejoin you all on Wednesday. All our love and sorry to be late, but Brett was really done in and will be quite all right by Tues. and is practically so now. I know her so well and try to look after her but it’s not so easy. Love to all the chaps,
Michael.
“What day of the week is it?” I asked Harris.
“Wednesday, I think. Yes, quite. Wednesday. Wonderful how one loses track of the days up here in the mountains.”
“Yes. We’ve been here nearly a week.”
“I hope you’re not thinking of leaving?”
“Yes. We’ll go in on the afternoon bus, I’m afraid.”
“What a rotten business. I had hoped we’d all have another go at the Irati together.”
“We have to go into Pamplona. We’re meeting people there.”
“What rotten luck for me. We’ve had a jolly time here at Burguete.”
“Come on in to Pamplona. We can play some bridge there, and there’s going to be a damned fine fiesta.”
“I’d like to. Awfully nice of you to ask me. I’d best stop on here, though. I’ve not much more time to fish.”
“You want those big ones in the Irati.”
“I say, I do, you know. They’re enormous trout there.”
“I’d like to try them once more.”
“Do. Stop over another day. Be a good chap.”
“We really have to get into town,” I said.
“What a pity.”
After breakfast Bill and I were sitting warming in the sun on a bench out in front of the inn and talking it over. I saw a girl coming up the road from the centre of the town. She stopped in front of us and took a telegram out of the leather wallet that hung against her skirt.
“Por ustedes?”
I looked at it. The address was: “Barnes, Burguete.”
“Yes. It’s for us.”
She brought out a book for me to sign, and I gave her a couple of coppers. The telegram was in Spanish: “Vengo Jueves Cohn.”
I handed it to Bill.
“What does the word Cohn mean?” he asked.
“What a lousy telegram!” I said. “He could send ten words for the same price. ‘I come Thursday.’ That gives you a lot of dope, doesn’t it?”
“It gives you all the dope that’s of interest to Cohn.”
“We’re going in, anyway,” I said. “There’s no use trying to move Brett and Mike out here and back before the fiesta. Should we answer it?”
“We might as well,” said Bill. “There’s no need for us to be snooty.”
We walked up to the post-office and asked for a telegraph blank.
“What will we say?” Bill asked.
“ ‘Arriving to-night.’ That’s enough.”
We paid for the message and walked back to the inn. Harris was there and the three of us walked up to Roncesvalles. We went through the monastery.
“It’s a remarkable place,” Harris said, when we came out. “But you know I’m not much on those sort of places.”
“Me either,” Bill said.
“It’s a remarkable place, though,” Harris said. “I wouldn’t not have seen it. I’d been intending coming up each day.”
“It isn’t the same as fishing, though, is it?” Bill asked. He liked Harris.
“I say not.”
We were standing in front of the old chapel of the monastery.
“Isn’t that a pub across the way?” Harris asked. “Or do my eyes deceive me?”
“It has the look of a pub,” Bill said.
“It looks to me like a pub,” I said.
“I say,” said Harris, “let’s utilize it.” He had taken up utilizing from Bill.
We had a bottle of wine apiece. Harris would not let us pay. He talked Spanish quite well, and the innkeeper would not take our money.
“I say. You don’t know what it’s meant to me to have you chaps up here.”
“We’ve had a grand time, Harris.”
Harris was a little tight.
“I say. Really you don’t know how much it means. I’ve not had much fun since the war.”
“We’ll fish together again, some time. Don’t you forget it, Harris.”
“We must. We have had such a jolly good time.”
“How about another bottle around?”
“Jolly good idea,” said Harris.
“This is mine,” said Bill. “Or we don’t drink it.”
“I wish you’d let me pay for it. It does give me pleasure, you know.”
“This is going to give me pleasure,” Bill said.
The innkeeper brought in the fourth bottle. We had kept the same glasses. Harris lifted his glass.
“I say. You know this does utilize well.”
Bill slapped him on the back.
“Good old Harris.”
“I say. You know my name isn’t really Harris. It’s Wilson-Harris. All one name. With a hyphen, you know.”
“Good old Wilson-Harris,” Bill said. “We call you Harris because we’re so fond of you.”
“I say, Barnes. You don’t know what this all means to me.”
“Come on and utilize another glass,” I said.
“Barnes. Really, Barnes, you can’t know. That’s all.”
“Drink up, Harris.”
We walked back down the road from Roncesvalles with Harris between us. We had lunch at the inn and Harris went with us to the bus. He gave us his card, with his address in London and his club and his business address, and as we got on the bus he handed us each an envelope. I opened mine and there were a dozen flies in it. Harris had tied them himself. He tied all his own flies.
“I say, Harris—”