“I should like to know about them,” Adamowski went on speculatively, in the manner of a man who has a genuine interest in the world about him. “These people that one meets on trains and ships—they fascinate me. You see some strange things. And these two—they interest me. I should like so much to know who they are.”
“And the other man?” George said. “The little one? The nervous, fidgety fellow who keeps staring at us—who do you suppose he is?”
“Oh, that one,” said Adamowski indifferently, impatiently. “I do not know. I do not care. He is some stuffy little man—it doesn’t matter…But shall we go back now?” he said. “Let’s talk to them and see if we can find out who they are. We shall never see them again after this. I like to talk to people in trains.”
George agreed. So his Polish friend called the waiter, asked for the bill, and paid it—and still had ten or twelve marks left of his waning twenty-three. Then they got up and went back through the speeding train to their compartment.
42. The Family of Earth
The woman smiled at them as they came in, and all three of their 1 fellow-passengers looked at them in a way that showed wakened curiosity and increased interest. It was evident that George and Adamowski had themselves been subjects of speculation during their absence.
Adamowski now spoke to the others. His German was not very good but it was coherent, and his deficiencies did not bother him at all. He was so self-assured, so confirmed in his self-possession, that he could plunge boldly into conversation in a foreign language with no sense whatever of personal handicap. Thus encouraged, the three Germans now gave free expression to their curiosity, to the speculations which the meeting of George and Adamowski and their apparent recognition of each other had aroused.
The woman asked Adamowski where he came from—”Was fur ein Landsmann sind sie?”
He replied that he was an American.
“Ach, so?” She looked surprised, then added quickly: “But not by birth? You were not born in America?”
“No,” said Adamowski. “I am Polish by birth. But I live in America now. And my friend here”—they all turned to stare curiously at George---“is an American by birth.”
They nodded in satisfaction. And the woman, smiling with good-humoured and eager interest, said:
“And your friend—he is an artist, isn’t he?”
“Yes,” said Adamowski.
“A painter?” The woman’s tone was almost gleeful as she pursued further confirmation of her own predictions.
“He is not a painter. He is ein Dichter.”
The word means “poet”, and George quickly amended it to “ein Schriftsteller“—a writer.
All three of them thereupon looked at one another with nods of satisfaction, saying, ah, they thought so, it was evident. Old Fussand-Fidget even spoke up now, making the sage observation that it was apparent “from the head”. The others nodded again, and the woman then turned once more to Adamowski, saying:
“But you—you are not an artist, are you? You do something else?”
He replied that he was a business man—”ein Gesch?ftsmann“—that he lived in New York, and that his business was in Wall Street. The name apparently had imposing connotations for them, for they all nodded in an impressed manner and said “Ali!” again.
George and Adamowski went on then and told them of the manner of their meeting, how they had never seen each other before that morning, but how each of them had known of the other through many mutual friends. This news delighted everyone. It was a complete confirmation of what they had themselves inferred. The little blonde lady nodded triumphantly and burst out in excited conversation with her companion and with Fussand-Fidget, saying:
“What did I tell you? I said the same thing, didn’t I? It’s a small world after all, isn’t it?”