Page:Selected Czech tales - 1925.djvu/160

 ran in quickly, afraid of missing the beginning of the lesson; at last the place was completely deserted. Hron walked on towards his office.

The hours were all too slow for him that day. He could hardly wait for his wife’s return. He went to the Sophia Island, to dine in company with a few friends whose families were already in the country.

‘Still a grass-widower?’ some of them asked him.

‘Only till to-night,’ he answered with a smile, ‘my wife will return this afternoon from her visit to her parents; then it will be only a few days before we are off on our holiday somewhere. Our boxes are ready to be packed.’

‘Where are you going, Direktor?’

‘Perhaps to Berlin and Hamburg on the way to Heligoland, or a quiet seaside place like Travemünde, perhaps in the other direction, to Munich, Salzburg and the Alpine Lakes. I don’t know yet, I shall see what my wife proposes.’

Hron was absent-minded at dinner and hurried away soon after, as though he were afraid to miss the train. He gulped down his cup of black coffee and went home. He