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+Project Gutenberg's Etext of Count Bunker by J. Storer Clouston
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+Count Bunker
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+by J. Storer Clouston
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+January, 1999  [Etext #1613]
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+
+COUNT BUNKER
+
+BEING
+A BALD YET VERACIOUS CHRONICLE CONTAINING
+SOME FURTHER PARTICULARS OF TWO GENTLEMEN
+WHOSE PREVIOUS CAREERS WERE TOUCHED UPON
+IN A TOME ENTITLED "THE LUNATIC AT LARGE"
+
+BY
+J. STORER CLOUSTON
+
+
+
+
+COUNT BUNKER
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+It is only with the politest affectation of interest,
+as a rule, that English Society learns the arrival
+in its midst of an ordinary Continental nobleman;
+but the announcement that the Baron Rudolph
+von Blitzenberg had been appointed attache to the German
+embassy at the Court of St. James was unquestionably
+received with a certain flutter of excitement.  That
+his estates were as vast as an average English county,
+and his ancestry among the noblest in Europe, would
+not alone perhaps have arrested the attention of the
+paragraphists, since acres and forefathers of foreign
+extraction are rightly regarded as conferring at the most a
+claim merely to toleration.  But in addition to these he
+possessed a charming English wife, belonging to one of
+the most distinguished families in the peerage (the Grillyers
+of Monkton-Grillyer), and had further demonstrated
+his judgment by purchasing the winner of the
+last year's Derby, with a view to improving the horse-
+flesh of his native land.
+
+From a footnote attached to the engraving of the
+Baron in a Homburg hat holding the head of the steed
+in question, which formed the principal attraction in several
+print-sellers' windows in Piccadilly, one gathered
+that though his faculties had been cultivated and exercised
+in every conceivable direction, yet this was his first
+serious entrance into the diplomatic world.  There was
+clearly, therefore, something unusual about the appointment;
+so that it was rumored, and rightly, that an international
+importance was to be attached to the incident,
+and a delicate compliment to be perceived in the selection
+of so popular a link between the Anglo-Saxon and the
+Teutonic peoples.  Accordingly "Die Wacht am Rhein"
+was played by the Guards' band down the entire length
+of Ebury Street, photographs of the Baroness appeared
+in all the leading periodicals, and Society, after its own
+less demonstrative but equally sincere fashion, prepared
+to welcome the distinguished visitors.
+
+They arrived in town upon a delightful day in July,
+somewhat late in the London season, to be sure, yet not
+too late to be inundated with a snowstorm of cards and
+invitations to all the smartest functions that remained. 
+For the first few weeks, at least, you would suppose the
+Baron to have no time for thought beyond official
+receptions and unofficial dinners; yet as he looked from his
+drawing-room windows into the gardens of Belgrave
+Square upon the second afternoon since they had settled
+into this great mansion, it was not upon such functions
+that his fancy ran.  Nobody was more fond of gaiety,
+nobody more appreciative of purple and fine linen, than
+the Baron von Blitzenberg; but as he mused there he began
+to recall more and more vividly, and with an ever
+rising pleasure, quite different memories of life in
+London.  Then by easy stages regret began to cloud this
+reminiscent satisfaction, until at last he sighed--
+
+"Ach, my dear London!  How moch should I enjoy
+you if I were free!"
+
+For the benefit of those who do not know the Baron
+either personally or by repute, he may briefly be
+described as an admirably typical Teuton.  When he first
+visited England (some five years previously) he stood
+for Bavarian manhood in the flower; now, you behold
+the fruit.  As magnificently mustached, as ruddy of
+skin, his eye as genial, and his impulses as hearty; he
+added to-day to these two more stone of Teutonic excellences
+incarnate.
+
+In his ingenuous glance, as in the more rounded contour
+of his waistcoat, you could see at once that fate
+had dealt kindly with him.  Indeed, to hear him sigh was
+so unwonted an occurrence that the Baroness looked up
+with an air of mild surprise.
+
+"My dear Rudolph," said she, "you should really
+open the window.  You are evidently feeling the heat."
+
+"No, not ze heat," replied the Baron.
+
+He did not turn his head towards her, and she looked
+at him more anxiously.
+
+"What is it, then?  I have noticed a something strange
+about you ever since we landed at Dover.  Tell me,
+Rudolph!"
+
+Thus adjured, he cast a troubled glance in her direction. 
+He saw a face whose mild blue eyes and undetermined
+mouth he still swore by as the standard by which
+to try all her inferior sisters, and a figure whose growing
+embonpoint yearly approached the outline of his ideal
+hausfrau.  But it was either St. Anthony or one of his
+fellow-martyrs who observed that an occasional holiday
+from the ideal is the condiment in the sauce of sanctity;
+and some such reflection perturbed the Baron at this
+moment.
+
+"It is nozing moch," he answered.
+
+"Oh, I know what it is.  You have grown so accustomed
+to seeing the same people, year after year--the
+Von Greifners, and Rosenbaums, and all those.  You
+miss them, don't you?  Personally, I think it a very
+good thing that you should go abroad and be a diplomatist,
+and not stay in Fogelschloss so much; and you'll
+soon make loads of friends here.  Mother comes to us
+next week, you know."
+
+"Your mozzer is a nice old lady," said the Baron
+slowly.  "I respect her, Alicia; bot it vas not mozzers
+zat I missed just now."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"Life!" roared the Baron, with a sudden outburst of
+thundering enthusiasm that startled the Baroness completely
+out of her composure.  "I did have fun for my
+money vunce in London.  Himmel, it is too hot to eat
+great dinners and to vear clothes like a monkey-jack."
+
+"Like a what?" gasped the Baroness.
+
+To hear the Baron von Blitzenberg decry the paraphernalia
+and splendors of his official liveries was even
+more astonishing than his remarkable denunciation of
+the pleasures of the table, since to dress as well as play
+the part of hereditary grandee had been till this minute
+his constant and enthusiastic ambition.
+
+"A meat-jack, I mean--or a--I know not vat you
+call it.  Ach, I vant a leetle fun, Alicia."
+
+"A little fun," repeated the Baroness in a breathless
+voice.  "What kind of fun?"
+
+"I know not," said he, turning once more to stare
+out of the window.
+
+To this dignified representative of a particularly
+dignified State even the trees of Belgrave Square seemed at
+that moment a trifle too conventionally perpendicular. 
+If they would but dance and wave their boughs he would
+have greeted their greenness more gladly.  A good-looking
+nursemaid wheeled a perambulator beneath their
+shade, and though she never looked his way, he took a
+wicked pleasure in surreptitiously closing first one eye
+and then the other in her direction.  This might not
+entirely satisfy the aspirations of his soul, yet it seemed
+to serve as some vent for his pent-up spirit.  He turned
+to his spouse with a pleasantly meditative air.
+
+"I should like to see old Bonker vunce more," he
+observed.
+
+"Bunker?  You mean Mr. Mandell-Essington?" said
+she, with an apprehensive note in her voice.
+
+"To me he vill alvays be Bonker."
+
+The Baroness looked at him reproachfully.
+
+"You promised me, Rudolph, you would see as
+little as possible of Mr. Essington."
+
+"Oh, ja, as leetle--as possible," answered the Baron,
+though not with his most ingenuous air.  "Besides, it is
+tree years since I promised.  For tree years I have seen
+nozing.  My love Alicia, you vould not have me forget
+mine friends altogezzer?"
+
+But the Baroness had too vivid a recollection of their
+last (and only) visit to England since their marriage. 
+By a curious coincidence that also was three years ago.
+
+"When you last met you remember what happened?"
+she asked, with an ominous hint of emotion in her
+accents .
+
+"My love, how often have I eggsplained?  Zat night
+you mean, I did schleep in mine hat because I had got a
+cold in my head.  I vas not dronk, no more zan you.  Vat
+you found in my pocket vas a mere joke, and ze cabman
+who called next day vas jost vat I told him to his ogly
+face--a blackmail."
+
+"You gave him money to go away."
+
+"A Blitzenberg does not bargain mit cabmen," said
+the Baron loftily.
+
+His wife's spirits began to revive.  There seemed to
+speak the owner of Fogelschloss, the haughty magnate
+of Bavaria.
+
+"You have too much self-respect to wish to find yourself
+in such a position again," she said.  "I know you
+have, Rudolph!"
+
+The Baron was silent.  This appeal met with distinctly
+less response than she confidently counted upon.  In a
+graver note she inquired--
+
+"You know what mother thinks of Mr. Essington?"
+
+"Your mozzer is a vise old lady, Alicia; but we do
+not zink ze same on all opinions."
+
+"She will be exceedingly displeased if you--well, if
+you do anything that she THOROUGHLY disapproves of."
+
+The Baron left the window and took his wife's plump
+hand affectionately within his own broad palm.
+
+"You can assure her, my love, zat I shall never do
+vat she dislikes.  You vill say zat to her if she
+inquires?"
+
+"Can I, truthfully?"
+
+"Ach, my own dear!"
+
+From his enfolding arms she whispered tenderly--
+
+"Of course I will, Rudolph!"
+
+With a final hug the embrace abruptly ended, and the
+Baron hastily glanced at his watch.
+
+"Ach, nearly had I forgot!  I must go to ze club
+for half an hour."
+
+"Must you?"
+
+"To meet a friend."
+
+"What friend?" asked the Baroness quickly.
+
+"A man whose name you vould know vell--oh, vary
+vell known he is!  But in diplomacy, mine Alicia, a quiet
+meeting in a club is sometimes better not to be advertised
+too moch.  Great wars have come from one vord of
+indiscretion.  You know ze axiom of Bismarck--
+'In diplomacy it is necessary for a diplomatist to be
+diplomatic.'  Good-by, my love."
+
+He bowed as profoundly as if she were a reigning
+sovereign, blew an affectionate kiss as he went through
+the door, and then descended the stairs with a rapidity
+that argued either that his appointment was urgent or
+that diplomacy shrank from a further test within this
+mansion.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+For the last year or two the name of Rudolph
+von Blitzenberg had appeared in the members'
+list of that most exclusive of institutions,
+the Regent's Club, Pall Mall; and it was
+thither he drove on this fine afternoon of July.  At
+no resort in London were more famous personages
+to be found, diplomatic and otherwise, and nothing
+would have been more natural than a meeting between the
+Baron and a European celebrity beneath its roof; so that
+if you had seen him bounding impetuously up the steps,
+and noted the eagerness with which he inquired whether
+a gentleman had called for him, you would have had
+considerable excuse for supposing his appointment to be
+with a dignitary of the highest importance.
+
+"Goot!" he cried on learning that a stranger was
+indeed waiting for him.  His face beamed with anticipatory
+joy.  Aha! he was not to be disappointed.
+
+"Vill he be jost the same?" he wondered.  "Ah, if he
+is changed I shall veep!"
+
+He rushed into the smoking-room, and there, instead
+of any bald notability or spectacled statesman, there
+advanced to meet him a merely private English gentleman,
+tolerably young, undeniably good-looking, and graced
+with the most debonair of smiles.
+
+"My dear Bonker!" cried the Baron, crimsoning with
+joy.  "Ach, how pleased I am!"
+
+"Baron!" replied his visitor gaily.  "You cannot
+deceive me--that waistcoat was made in Germany!  Let
+me lead you to a respectable tailor!"
+
+Yet, despite his bantering tone, it was easy to see that
+he took an equal pleasure in the meeting.
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed the Baron, "vot a fonny zing to
+say!  Droll as ever, eh?"
+
+"Five years less droll than when we first met," said
+the late Bunker and present Essington.  "You meet a
+dullish dog, Baron--a sobered reveller."
+
+"Ach, no!  Not surely?  Do not disappoint me, dear
+Bonker!"
+
+The Baron's plaintive note seemed to amuse his friend.
+
+"You don't mean to say you actually wish a boon
+companion?  You, Baron, the modern Talleyrand, the
+repository of three emperors' secrets?  My dear fellow,
+I nearly came in deep mourning."
+
+"Mourning!  For vat?"
+
+"For our lamented past:  I supposed you would have
+the air of a Nonconformist beadle."
+
+"My friend!" said the Baron eagerly, and yet with
+a lowering of his voice, "I vould not like to engage a
+beadle mit jost ze same feelings as me.  Come here to
+zis corner and let us talk!  Vaiter! whisky--soda--
+cigars--all for two.  Come, Bonker!"
+
+Stretched in arm-chairs, in a quiet corner of the room,
+the two surveyed one another with affectionate and
+humorous interest.  For three years they had not seen
+one another at all, and save once they had not met for
+five.  In five years a man may change his religion or lose
+his hair, inherit a principality or part with a reputation,
+grow a beard or turn teetotaler.  Nothing so fundamental
+had happened to either of our friends.  The Baron's
+fullness of contour we have already noticed; in Mandell-
+Essington, EX Bunker, was to be seen even less evidence
+of the march of time.  But years, like wheels upon a road,
+can hardly pass without leaving in their wake some faint
+impress, however fair the weather, and perhaps his hair
+lay a fraction of an inch higher up the temple, and in the
+corners of his eyes a hint might even be discerned of
+those little wrinkles that register the smiles and frowns.
+Otherwise he was the same distinguished-looking, immaculately
+dressed, supremely self-possessed, and charming
+Francis Bunker, whom the Baron's memory stored
+among its choicer possessions.
+
+"Tell me," demanded the Baron, "vat you are doing
+mit yourself, mine Bonker."
+
+"Doing?" said Essington, lighting his cigar. 
+"Well, my dear Baron, I am endeavoring to live as I
+imagine a gentleman should."
+
+"And how is zat?"
+
+"Riding a little, shooting a little, and occasionally
+telling the truth.  At other times I cock a wise eye at my
+modest patrimony, now and then I deliver a lecture with
+magic-lantern slides; and when I come up to town I
+sometimes watch cricket-matches.  A devilish invigorating
+programme, isn't it?"
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed the Baron again; he had come
+prepared to laugh, and carried out his intention
+religiously.  "But you do not feel more old and sober,
+eh?"
+
+"I don't want to, but no man can avoid his destiny. 
+The natives of this island are a serious people, or if they
+are frivolous, it is generally a trifle vulgarly done.  The
+diversions of the professedly gay-hooting over pointless
+badinage and speculating whose turn it is to get
+divorced next--become in time even more sobering than
+a scientific study with diagrams of how to breed pheasants
+or play golf.  If some one would teach us the
+simple art of being light-hearted he would deserve to
+be placed along with Nelson on his monument."
+
+"Oh, my dear vellow!" cried the Baron.  "Do I hear
+zese kind of vords from you?"
+
+"If you starved a city-full of people, wouldn't you
+expect to hear the man with the biggest appetite cry
+loudest?"
+
+The Baron's face fell further and Essington laughed
+aloud.
+
+"Come, Baron, hang it!  You of all people should
+be delighted to see me a fellow-member of respectable
+society.  I take you to be the type of the conventional
+aristocrat.  Why, a fellow who's been travelling in Germany
+said to me lately, when I asked about you--'Von
+Blitzenberg,' said he, 'he's used as a simile for
+traditional dignity.  His very dogs have to sit up on their
+hind-legs when he inspects the kennels!' "
+
+The Baron with a solemn face gulped down his
+whisky-and-soda.
+
+"Zat is not true about my dogs," he replied, "but
+I do confess my life is vary dignified.  So moch is expected
+of a Blitzenberg.  Oh, ja, zere is moch state and
+ceremony."
+
+"And you seem to thrive on it."
+
+"Vell, it does not destroy ze appetite," the Baron
+admitted; "and it is my duty so to live at Fogelschloss,
+and I alvays vish to do my duty.  But, ach, sometimes I
+do vant to kick ze trace!"
+
+"You mean you would want to if it were not for the
+Baroness?"
+
+Bunker smiled whimsically; but his friend continued
+as simply serious as ever.
+
+"Alicia is ze most divine woman in ze world--I respect
+her, Bonker, I love her, I gonsider her my better
+angel; but even in Heaven, I suppose, peoples sometimes
+vould enjoy a stroll in Piccadeelly, or in some vay to
+exercise ze legs and shout mit excitement.  No doubt
+you zink it unaccountable and strange--pairhaps ungrateful
+of me, eh?"
+
+"On the contrary, I feel as I should if I feared this
+cigar had gone out and then found it alight after all."
+
+"You say so!  Ah, zen I will have more boldness to
+confess my heart!  Bonker, ven I did land in England ze
+leetle thought zat vould rise vas--'Ze land of freedom
+vunce again!  Here shall I not have to be alvays ze
+Baron von Blitzenberg, oldest noble in Bavaria, hereditary
+carpet-beater to ze Court!  I vill disguise and go
+mit old Bonker for a frolic!' "
+
+"You touch my tenderest chord, Baron!"
+
+"Goot, goot, my friend!" cried the Baron, warming
+to his work of confession like a penitent whose absolution
+is promised in advance; "you speak ze vords I love to
+hear!  Of course I vould not be vicked, and I vould not
+disgrace myself; but I do need a leetle exercise. Is it
+possible?"
+
+Essington sprang up and enthusiastically shook his
+hand.
+
+"Dear Baron, you come like a ray of sunshine
+through a London fog--like a moulin rouge alighting
+in Carlton House Terrace!  I thought my own leaves
+were yellowing; I now perceive that was only an autumnal
+change.  Spring has returned, and I feel like a
+green bay tree!"
+
+"Hoch, hoch!" roared the Baron, to the great
+surprise of two Cabinet Ministers and a Bishop who were
+taking tea at the other side of the room.  "Vat shall ve
+do to show zere is no sick feeling?"
+
+"H'm," reflected Essington, with a comical look. 
+"There's a lot of scaffolding at the bottom of St.
+James's Street. Should we have it down to-night?  Or
+what do you say to a packet of dynamite in the two-
+penny tube?"
+
+The Baron sobered down a trifle.
+
+"Ach, not so fast, not qvite so fast, dear Bonker. 
+Remember I must not get into troble at ze embassy."
+
+"My dear fellow, that's your pull. Foreign diplomatists
+are police-proof!"
+
+"Ah, but my wife!"
+
+"One stormy hour--then tears and forgiveness!"
+
+The Baron lowered his voice.
+
+"Her mozzer vill visit us next veek.  I loff and respect
+Lady Grillyer; but I should not like to have to ask her
+for forgiveness."
+
+"Yes, she has rather an uncompromising nose, so far
+as I remember."
+
+"It is a kind nose to her friends, Bonker," the Baron
+explained, "but severe towards----"
+
+"Myself, for instance," laughed Essington.  "Well,
+what do you suggest?"
+
+"First, zat you dine mit me to-night.  No, I vill take
+no refusal!  Listen!  I am now meeting a distinguished
+person on important international business--do you
+pairceive?  Ha, ha, ha!  To-night it vill be necessary
+ve most dine togezzer.  I have an engagement, but he
+can be put off for soch a great person as the man I am
+now meeting at ze club!  You vill gom?"
+
+"I should have been delighted--only unluckily I have
+a man dining with me.  I tell you what!  You come and
+join us!  Will you?"
+
+"If zat is ze only vay--yes, mit pleasure!  Who is
+ze man?"
+
+"Young Tulliwuddle.  Do you remember going to a
+dance at Lord Tulliwuddle's, some five and a half years
+ago?"
+
+"Himmel!  Ha, ha!  Vell do I remember!"
+
+"Well, our host of that evening died the other day,
+and this fellow is his heir--a second or third cousin whose
+existence was so displeasing to the old peer that he left
+him absolutely nothing that wasn't entailed, and never
+said 'How-do-you-do?' to him in his life.  In
+consequence, he may not entertain you as much as I should
+like."
+
+"If he is your friend, I shall moch enjoy his society!"
+
+"I am flattered, but hardly convinced.  Tulliwuddle's
+intellect is scarcely of the sparkling kind.  However,
+come and try."
+
+The hour, the place, were arranged; a reminiscence or
+two exchanged; fresh suggestions thrown out for the
+rejuvenation of a Bavarian magnate; another baronial
+laugh shook the foundations of the club; and then, as
+the afternoon was wearing on, the Baron hailed a cab
+and galloped for Belgrave Square, and the late Mr.
+Bunker sauntered off along Pall Mall.
+
+"Who can despair of human nature while the Baron
+von Blitzenberg adorns the earth?" he reflected.  "The
+discovery of champagne and the invention of summer
+holidays were minor events compared with his descent
+from Olympus!"
+
+He bought a button-hole at the street corner and
+cocked his hat, more airily than ever.
+
+"A volcanic eruption may inspire one to succor
+humanity, a wedding to condole with it, and a general
+election to warn it of its folly; but the Baron inspires one
+to amuse!"
+
+Meanwhile that Heaven-sent nobleman, with a manner
+enshrouded in mystery, was comforting his wife.
+
+"Ah, do not grieve, mine Alicia!  No doubt ze Duke
+vill be disappointed not to see us to-night, but I have
+telegraphed.  Ja, I have said I had so important an
+affair.  Ach, do not veep!  I did not know you wanted
+so moch to dine mit ze old Duke.  I sopposed you vould
+like a quiet evening at home.  But anyhow I have now
+telegraphed--and my leetle dinner mit my friend--Ach,
+it is so important zat I most rosh and get dressed. 
+Cheer up, my loff!  Good-by!"
+
+He paused in answer to a tearful question.
+
+"His name?  Alas, I have promised not to say.  You
+vould not have a European war by my indiscretion?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+With mirrors reflecting a myriad lights,
+with the hum of voices, the rustle of
+satin and lace, the hurrying steps of
+waiters, the bubbling of laughter, of life,
+and of wine--all these on each side of them, and a plate,
+a foaming glass, and a friend in front, the Baron and
+his host smiled radiantly down upon less favored mortals.
+
+"Tulliwuddle is very late," said Essington; "but he's
+a devilish casual gentleman in all matters."
+
+"I am selfish enoff to hope he vill not gom at all!"
+exclaimed the Baron.
+
+"Unfortunately he has had the doubtful taste to
+conceive a curiously high opinion of myself.  I am afraid
+he won't desert us.  But I don't propose that we shall
+suffer for his slackness.  Bring the fish, waiter."
+
+The Baron was happy; and that is to say that his
+laughter re-echoed from the shining mirrors, his tongue
+was loosed, his heart expanded, his glass seemed ever
+empty.
+
+"Ach, how to make zis joie de vivre to last beyond to-
+night!" he cried.  "May ze Teufel fly off mit of offeecial
+duties and receptions and--and even mit my vife for a
+few days."
+
+"My dear Baron!"
+
+"To Alicia!" cried the Baron hastily, draining his
+glass at the toast.  "But some fun first!"
+
+     " 'I could not love thee, dear, so well,
+         Loved I not humor more!' "
+
+misquoted his host gaily.  "Ah!" he added, "here
+comes Tulliwuddle."
+
+A young man, with his hands in his pockets and an
+eyeglass in his eye, strolled up to their table.
+
+"I'm beastly sorry for being so late," said he; "but
+I'm hanged if I could make up my mind whether to
+risk wearing one of these frilled shirt-fronts.  It's not
+bad, I think, with one's tie tied this way.  What do you
+say?"
+
+"It suits you like a halo," Essington assured him. 
+"But let me introduce you to my friend the Baron
+Rudolph von Blitzenberg."
+
+Lord Tulliwuddle bowed politely and took the empty
+chair; but it was evident that his attention could not
+concentrate itself upon sublunary matters till the shirt-
+front had been critically inspected and appreciatively
+praised by his host.  Indeed, it was quite clear that
+Essington had not exaggerated his regard for himself. 
+This admiration was perhaps the most pleasing feature
+to be noted on a brief acquaintance with his lordship. 
+He was obviously intended neither for a strong man of
+action nor a great man of thought.  A tolerable appearance
+and considerable amiability he might no doubt
+claim; but unfortunately the effort to retain his eye-
+glass had apparently the effect of forcing his mouth
+chronically open, which somewhat marred his appearance;
+while his natural good-humor lapsed too frequently
+into the lamentations of an idle man that
+Providence neglected him or that his creditors were too
+attentive.
+
+It happens, however, that it is rather his
+circumstances than his person which concern this history.  And,
+briefly, these were something in this sort.  Born a poor
+relation and guided by no strong hand, he had gradually
+seen himself, as Reverend uncles and Right Honorable
+cousins died of, approach nearer and nearer to
+the ancient barony of Tulliwuddle (created 1475 in the
+peerage of Scotland), until this year he had actually
+succeeded to it.  But after his first delight in this piece
+of good fortune had subsided he began to realize in
+himself two notable deficiencies very clearly, the lack of
+money, and more vaguely, the want of any preparation
+for filling the shoes of a stately courtier and famous
+Highland chieftain.  He would often, and with considerable
+feeling, declare that any ordinary peer he
+could easily have become, but that being old Tulliwuddle's
+heir, by Gad! he didn't half like the job.
+
+At present he was being tolerated or befriended by a
+small circle of acquaintances, and rapidly becoming a
+familiar figure to three or four tailors and half a dozen
+door-keepers at the stage entrances to divers Metropolitan
+theatres.  In the circle of acquaintances, the humorous
+sagacity of Essington struck him as the most astonishing
+thing he had ever known.  He felt, in fact,
+much like a village youth watching his first conjuring
+performance, and while the whim lasted (a period which
+Essington put down as probably six weeks) he would
+have gone the length of paying a bill or ordering a
+tie on his recommendation alone.
+
+To-night the distinguished appearance and genial
+conversation of Essington's friend impressed him more
+than ever with the advantages of knowing so remarkable
+a personage.  A second bottle succeeded the first, and a
+third the second, the cordiality of the dinner growing
+all the while, till at last his lordship had laid aside the
+last traces of his national suspicion of even the most
+charming strangers.
+
+"I say, Essington," he said, "I had meant to tell
+you about a devilish delicate dilemma I'm in.  I want
+your advice."
+
+"You have it," interrupted his host.  "Give her a
+five-pound note, see that she burns your letters, and
+introduce her to another fellow."
+
+"But--er--that wasn't the thing----"
+
+"Tell him you'll pay in six months, and order
+another pair of trousers," said Essington, briskly as ever.
+
+"But, I say, it wasn't that----"
+
+"My dear Tulliwuddle, I never give racing tips."
+
+"Hang it!"
+
+"What is the matter?"
+
+Tulliwuddle glanced at the Baron.
+
+"I don't know whether the Baron would be interested----"
+
+"Immensely, my goot Tollyvoddle!  Supremely!
+hugely!  I could be interested to-night in a museum!"
+
+"The Baron's past life makes him a peculiarly
+catholic judge of indiscretions," said Essington.
+
+Thus reassured, Tulliwuddle began--
+
+"You know I've an aunt who takes an interest in me--
+wants me to collar an heiress and that sort of thing. 
+Well, she has more or less arranged a marriage for me."
+
+"Fill your glasses, gentlemen!" cried Essington.
+
+"Hoch, hoch!" roared the Baron.
+
+"But, I say, wait a minute!  That's only the
+beginning.  I don't know the girl--and she doesn't know
+me."
+
+He said the last words in a peculiarly significant tone.
+
+"Do you wish me to introduce you?"
+
+"Oh, hang it!  Be serious, Essington.  The point
+is--will she marry me if she does know me?"
+
+"Himmel!  Yes, certainly!" cried the Baron.
+
+"Who is she?" asked their host, more seriously.
+
+"Her father is Darius P. Maddison, the American
+Silver King."
+
+The other two could not withhold an exclamation.
+
+"He has only two children, a son and a daughter, and
+he wants to marry his daughter to an English peer--or
+a Scotch, it's all the same.  My aunt knows 'em pretty
+well, and she has recommended me."
+
+"An excellent selection," commented his host.
+
+"But the trouble is, they want rather a high-class
+peer.  Old Maddison is deuced particular, and I believe
+the girl is even worse."
+
+"What are the qualifications desired?"
+
+"Oh, he's got to be ambitious, and a promising young
+man--and elevated tastes--and all that kind of nonsense."
+
+"But you can be all zat if you try!" said the Baron
+eagerly.  "Go to Germany and get trained.  I did vork
+twelve hours a day for ten years to be vat I am."
+
+"I'm different," replied the young peer gloomily. 
+"Nobody ever trained me.  Old Tulliwuddle might have
+taken me up if he had liked, but he was prejudiced
+against me.  I can't become all those things now."
+
+"And yet you do want to marry the lady?"
+
+"My dear Essington, I can't afford to lose such a
+chance!  One doesn't get a Miss Maddison every day. 
+She's a deuced handsome girl too, they say."
+
+"By Gad, it's worth a trip across the Atlantic to try
+your luck," said Essington.  "Get 'em to guarantee
+your expenses and you'll at least learn to play poker and
+see Niagara for nothing."
+
+"They aren't in America.  They've got a salmon
+river in Scotland, and they are there now.  It's not far
+from my place, Hechnahoul."
+
+"She's practically in your arms, then?"
+
+"Ach.  Ze affair is easy!"
+
+"Pipe up the clan and abduct her!"
+
+"Approach her mit a kilt!"
+
+But even those optimistic exhortations left the peer
+still melancholy.
+
+"It sounds all very well," said he, "but my clansmen,
+as you call 'em, would expect such a devil of a lot
+from me too.  Old Tulliwuddle spoiled them for any ordinary
+mortal.  He went about looking like an advertisement
+for whisky, and called 'em all by their beastly
+Gaelic names.  I have never been in Scotland in my
+life, and I can't do that sort of thing.  I'd merely make
+a fool of myself.  If I'd had to go to America it
+wouldn't have been so bad."
+
+At this weak-kneed confession the Baron could hardly
+withhold an exclamation of contempt, but Essington,
+with more sympathy, inquired--
+
+"What do you propose to do, then?"
+
+His lordship emptied his glass.
+
+"I wish I had your brains and your way of carrying
+things off, Essington!" he said, with a sigh.  "If
+you got a chance of showing yourself off to Miss Maddison
+she'd jump at you!"
+
+A gleam, inspired and humorous, leaped into Essington's
+eyes.  The Baron, whose glance happened at the
+moment to fall on him, bounded gleefully from his
+seat.
+
+"Hoch!" he cried, "it is mine old Bonker zat I see
+before me!  Vat have you in your mind?"
+
+"Sit down, my dear Baron; that lady over there
+thinks you are preparing to attack her.  Shall we
+smoke?  Try these cigars."
+
+Throwing the Baron a shrewd glance to calm his
+somewhat alarming exhilaration, their host turned with
+a graver air to his other guest.
+
+"Tulliwuddle," said he, "I should like to help you."
+
+"I wish to the deuce you could!"
+
+Essington bent over the table confidentially.
+
+"I have an idea."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The three heads bent forward towards a common
+centre--the Baron agog with suppressed
+excitement, Tulliwuddle revived with curiosity
+and a gleam of hope, Essington impressive
+and cool.
+
+"I take it," he began, "that if Mr. Darius P.
+Maddison and his coveted daughter could see a little
+of Lord Tulliwuddle--meet him at lunch, talk to
+him afterwards, for instance--and carry away a
+favorable impression of the nobleman, there would not
+be much difficulty in subsequently arranging a marriage?"
+
+"Oh, none," said Tulliwuddle.  "They'd be only too
+keen, IF they approved of me; but that's the rub, you
+know."
+
+"So far so good.  Now it appears to me that our
+modest friend here somewhat underrates his own powers
+of fascination"
+
+"Ach, Tollyvoddle, you do indeed," interjected the
+Baron.
+
+"But since this idea is so firmly established in his
+mind that it may actually prevent him from displaying
+himself to the greatest advantage, and since he has
+been good enough to declare that he would regard with
+complete confidence my own chances of success were I in
+his place, I would propose--with all becoming diffidence--
+that _I_ should interview the lady and her parent
+instead of him."
+
+"A vary vise idea, Bonker," observed the Baron.
+
+"What!" said Tulliwuddle.  "Do you mean that
+you would go and crack me up, and that sort of
+thing?"
+
+"No; I mean that I should enjoy a temporary loan
+of your name and of your residence, and assure them
+by a personal inspection that I have a sufficient assortment
+of virtues for their requirements."
+
+"Splendid!" shouted the Baron.  "Tollyvoddle,
+accept zis generous offer before it is too late!"
+
+"But," gasped the diffident nobleman, "they would
+find out the next time they saw me."
+
+"If the business is properly arranged, that would
+only be when you came out of church with her.  Look
+here--what fault have you to find with this scheme? 
+I produce the desired impression, and either propose at
+once and am accepted----"
+
+"H'm," muttered Tulliwuddle doubtfully.
+
+"Or I leave things in such good train that you can
+propose and get accepted afterwards by letter."
+
+"That's better," said Tulliwuddle.
+
+"Then, by a little exercise of our wits, you find an
+excuse for hurrying on the marriage--have it a private
+affair for family reasons, and so on.  You will be
+prevented by one excuse or another from meeting the lady
+till the wedding-day.  We shall choose a darkish church,
+you will have a plaster on your face--and the deed is
+done!"
+
+"Not a fault can I find," commented the Baron
+sagely.  "Essington, I congratulate you."
+
+Between his complete confidence in Essington and the
+Baron's unqualified commendation, Lord Tulliwuddle
+was carried away by the project.
+
+"I say, Essington, what a good fellow you are!" he
+cried.  "You really think it will work?"
+
+"What do you say, Baron?"
+
+"It cannot fail, I do solemnly assure you.  Be
+thankful you have soch a friend, Tollyvoddle!"
+
+"You don't think anybody will suspect that you aren't
+really me?"
+
+"Does any one up at Hechnahoul know you?"
+
+"No."
+
+"And no one there knows me.  They will never suspect
+for an instant."
+
+His lordship assumed a look that would have been
+serious, almost impressive, had he first removed his eye-
+glass.  Evidently some weighty consideration had occurred
+to him.
+
+"You are an awfully clever chap, Essington," he
+said, "and deuced superior to most fellows, and--er--all
+that kind of thing.  But--well--you don't mind my
+saying it?"
+
+"My morals?  My appearance?  Say anything you
+like, my dear fellow."
+
+"It's only this, that noblesse oblige, and that kind of
+thing, you know."
+
+"I am afraid I don't quite follow."
+
+"Well, I mean that you aren't a nobleman, and do
+you think you could carry things off like a--ah--like
+a Tulliwuddle?"
+
+Essington remained entirely serious.
+
+"I shall have at my elbow an adviser whose knowledge
+of the highest society in Europe is, without exaggeration,
+unequalled.  Your perfectly natural doubts
+will be laid at rest when I tell you that I hope to
+be accompanied by the Baron Rudolph von Blitzenberg."
+
+The Baron could no longer contain himself.
+
+"Himmel!  Hurray!  My dear friend, I vill go mit
+you to hell!"
+
+"That's very good of you," said Essington, "but
+you mistake my present destination.  I merely wish your
+company as far as the Castle of Hechnahoul."
+
+"I gom mit so moch pleasure zat I cannot eggspress! 
+Tollyvoddle, be no longer afraid.  I have helped to
+write a book on ze noble families of Germany--zat is to
+say, I have contributed my portrait and some anecdote. 
+Our dear friend shall make no mistakes!"
+
+By this guarantee Lord Tulliwuddle's last doubts
+were completely set at rest.  His spirits rose as he
+perceived how happily this easy avenue would lead him
+out of all his troubles.  He insisted on calling for
+wine and pledging success to the adventure with the
+most resolute and confident air, and nothing but a
+few details remained now to be settled.  These were
+chiefly with regard to the precise limits up to which
+the duplicate Lord Tulliwuddle might advance his
+conquering arms.
+
+"You won't formally propose, will you?" said the
+first edition of that peer.
+
+"Certainly not, if you prefer to negotiate the
+surrender yourself," the later impression assured him.
+
+"And you mustn't--well--er----"
+
+"I shall touch nothing."
+
+"A girl might get carried away by you," said the
+original peer a trifle doubtfully.
+
+"The Baron is the most scrupulous of men.  He will
+be by my side almost continually.  Baron, you will act
+as my judge, my censor, and my chaperon?"
+
+"Tollyvoddle, I swear to you zat I shall use an eye
+like ze eagle.  He shall be so careful--ach, I shall see to
+it!  Myself, I am a Bayard mit ze ladies, and Bonker he
+shall not be less so!"
+
+"Thanks, Baron, thanks awfully," said his lordship. 
+"Now my mind is quite at rest!"
+
+In the vestibule of the restaurant they bade good-
+night to the confiding nobleman, and then turned to one
+another with an adventurer's smile.
+
+"You are sure you can leave your diplomatic
+duties?" asked Essington.
+
+"Zey vill be my diplomatic duties zat I go to do!  Oh,
+I shall prepare a leetle story--do not fear me."
+
+The Baron chuckled, and then burst forth
+
+"Never was zere a man like you.  Oh, cunning Mistair
+Bonker!  And you vill give me zomezing to do in ze
+adventure, eh?"
+
+"I promise you that, Baron."
+
+As he gave this reassuring pledge, a peculiar smile
+stole over Mr. Bunker's face--a smile that seemed to
+suggest even happier possibilities than either of his
+distinguished friends contemplated.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+It is at all times pleasant to contemplate thorough
+workmanship and sagacious foresight, particularly
+when these are allied with disinterested purpose
+and genuine enthusiasm.  For the next
+few days Mr. Bunker, preparing to carry out to
+the best of his ability the delicate commission with
+which he had been entrusted, presented this stimulating
+spectacle.
+
+Absolutely no pains were left untaken.  By the aid of
+some volumes lent him by Tulliwuddle he learned, and
+digested in a pocketbook, as much information as he
+thought necessary to acquire concerning the history of
+the noble family he was temporarily about to enter;
+together with notes of their slogan or war-cry (spelled
+phonetically to avoid the possibility of a mistake), of
+their acreage, gross and net rentals, the names of their
+land-agents, and many other matters equally to the
+point.  It was further to be observed that he spared no
+pains to imprint these particulars in the Baron's Teutonic
+memory--whether to support his own in case of need,
+or for some more secret purpose, it were impossible to
+fathom.  Disguised as unconspicuous and harmless persons,
+they would meet in many quiet haunts whose unsuspected
+excellences they could guarantee from their
+old experience, and there mature their philanthropic
+plan.
+
+Not only had its talented originator to impress the
+Tulliwuddle annals and statistics into his ally's eager
+mind, but he had to exercise the nicest tact and discernment
+lest the Baron's excess of zeal should trip their
+enterprise at the very outset.
+
+"To-day I have told Alicia zat my visit to Russia vill
+probably be vollowed by a visit to ze Emperor of China,"
+the Baron would recount with vast pride in his inventive
+powers.  "And I have dropped a leetle hint zat for an
+envoy to be imprisoned in China is not to be surprised. 
+Zat vill prepare her in case I am avay longer zan ve
+expect."
+
+"And how did she take that intimation?" asked
+Essington, with a less congratulatory air than he had
+expected.
+
+"I did leave her in tears."
+
+"My dear Baron, fly to her to tell her you are not
+going to China!  She will get so devilish alarmed if
+you are gone a week that she'll go straight to the embassy
+and make inquiries."
+
+He shook his head, and added in an impressive
+voice--
+
+"Never lie for lying's sake, Blitzenberg.  Besides,
+how do you propose to forge a Chinese post-mark?"
+
+The Baron had laid the foundations of his Russian
+trip on a sound basis by requesting a friend of his in
+that country to post to the Baroness the bi-weekly
+budgets of Muscovite gossip which he intended to compose
+at Hechnahoul.  This, it seemed to him, would be a
+simple feat, particularly with his friend Bunker to
+assist; but he had to confess that the provision of Chinese
+news would certainly be more difficult.
+
+"Ach, vell, I shall contradict China," he agreed.
+
+It will be readily believed that what with getting up
+his brief, pruning the legends with which the Baron proposed
+to satisfy his wife and his ambassador, and purchasing
+an outfit suitable to the roles of peer and chieftain,
+this indefatigable gentleman passed three or four
+extremely busy days.
+
+"Ve most start before my dear mozzer-in-law does
+gom!" the Baron more than once impressed upon him,
+so that there was no moment to be wasted.
+
+Two days before their departure Mr. Bunker greeted
+his ally with a peculiarly humorous smile.
+
+"The pleasures of our visit to Hechnahoul are to be
+considerably augmented," said he.  "Tulliwuddle has
+only just made the discovery that his ancestral castle is
+let; but his tenant, in the most handsome spirit, invites
+us to be his guests so long as we are in Scotland.  A
+very hospitable letter, isn't it?"
+
+He handed him a large envelope with a more than
+proportionately large crest upon it, and drawing from
+this a sheet of note-paper headed by a second crest, the
+Baron read this epistle:
+
+
+"MY LORD,--Learning that you propose visiting
+your Scottish estates, and Mr. M'Fadyen, your factor,
+informing me no lodge is at present available for your
+reception, it will give Mrs. Gallosh and myself great
+pleasure, and we will esteem it a distinguished honor,
+if you and your friend will be our guests at Hechnahoul
+Castle during the duration of your visit.  Should you
+do us the honor of accepting, I shall send my steam
+launch to meet you at Torrydhulish pier and convey
+you across the loch, if you will be kind enough to advise
+me which train you are coming by.
+
+"In conclusion, Mrs. Gallosh and myself beg to
+assure you that although you find strangers in your
+ancestral halls, you will receive both from your tenantry
+and ourselves a very hearty welcome to your native
+land.  Believe me, your obedient servant,
+                         "DUNCAN JNO. GALLOSH."
+
+
+"Zat is goot news!" cried the Baron.  "Ve shall have
+company--perhaps ladies!  Ach, Bonker, I have ze soft
+spot in mine heart: I am so constant as ze needle to ze
+pole; but I do like sometimes to talk mit voman!"
+
+"With Mrs. Gallosh, for instance?"
+
+"But, Bonker, zere may be a Miss Gallosh."
+
+"If you consulted the Baroness," said Bunker,
+smiling, "I suspect she would prefer you to be imprisoned
+in China."
+
+The Baron laughed, and curled his martial mustache
+with a dangerous air.
+
+"Who is zis Gallosh?" he inquired.
+
+"Scottish, I judge from his name; commercial, from
+his literary style; elevated by his own exertions, from
+the size of his crest; and wealthy, from the fact that he
+rents Hechnahoul Castle.  His mention of Mrs. Gallosh
+points to the fact that he is either married or would have
+us think so; and I should be inclined to conclude that
+he has probably begot a family."
+
+"Aha!" said the Baron.  "Ve vill gom and see,
+eh?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+A carefully clothed young man, with an
+eyeglass and a wavering gait, walked slowly
+out of Euston Station.  He had just seen
+the Scottish express depart, and this event
+seemed to have filled him with dubious reflections.  In
+fact, at the very last moment Lord Tulliwuddle's
+confidence in his two friends had been a trifling degree
+disturbed.  It occurred to him as he lingered by the door
+of their reserved first-class compartment that they had
+a little too much the air of gentlemen departing on their
+own pleasure rather than on his business.  No sooner did
+he drop a fretful hint of this opinion than their affectionate
+protestations had quickly revived his spirit; but
+now that they were no longer with him to counsel and
+encourage, it once more drooped.
+
+"Confound it!" he thought, "I hadn't bargained on
+having to keep out of people's way till they came back. 
+If Essington had mentioned that sooner, I don't know
+that I'd have been so keen about the notion.  Hang it! 
+I'll have to chuck the Morrells' dance.  And I can't go
+with the Greys to Ranelagh.  I can't even dine with
+my own aunt on Sunday.  Oh, the devil!"
+
+The perturbed young peer waved his umbrella and
+climbed into a hansom.
+
+"Well, anyhow, I can still go on seeing Connie. 
+That's some consolation," he told himself; and without
+stopping to consider what would be the thoughts of his
+two obliging friends had they known he was seeking
+consolation in the society of one lady while they were
+arranging his nuptials with another, the baptismal
+Tulliwuddle drove back to the civilization of St. James's.
+
+Within the reserved compartment was no foreboding,
+no faint-hearted paling of the cheek.  As the train
+clattered, hummed, and presently thundered on its way, the
+two laughed cheerfully towards one another, delighted
+beyond measure with the prosperous beginning of their
+enterprise.  The Baron could not sufficiently express his
+gratitude and admiration for the promptitude with which
+his friend had purveyed so promising an adventure.
+
+"Ve vill have fon, my Bonker.  Ach! ve vill," he
+exclaimed for the third or fourth time within a dozen miles
+from Euston.
+
+His Bunker assumed an air half affectionate, half
+apologetic.
+
+"I only regret that I should have the lion's share of
+the adventure, my dear Baron."
+
+"Yes," said the Baron, with a symptom of a sigh,
+"I do envy you indeed.  Yet I should not say zat----"
+Bunker swiftly interrupted him.
+
+"You would like to play a worthier part than merely
+his lordship's friend?"
+
+"Ach!  if I could."
+
+Bunker smiled benignantly.
+
+"Ah, Baron, you cannot suppose that I would really
+do Tulliwuddle such injustice as to attempt, in my own
+feeble manner, to impersonate him?"
+
+The Baron stared.
+
+"Vat mean you?"
+
+"YOU shall be the lion, _I_ the humble necessary jackal. 
+As our friend so aptly quoted, noblesse oblige.  Of
+course, there can be no doubt about it.  You, Baron,
+must play the part of peer, I of friend."
+
+The Baron gasped.
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"Quite simple, my dear fellow."
+
+"You--you don't mean so?"
+
+"I do indeed."
+
+"Bot I shall not do it so vell as you."
+
+"A hundred times better."
+
+"Bot vy did you not say so before?"
+
+"Tulliwuddle might not have agreed with me."
+
+"Bot vould he like it now?"
+
+"It is not what he likes that we should consider,
+it's what is good for his interests."
+
+"Bot if I should fail?"
+
+"He will be no worse off than before.  Left to
+himself, he certainly won't marry the lady.  You give him
+his only chance."
+
+"Bot more zan you vould, really and truthfully?"
+
+"My dear Baron, you are admitted by all to be
+an ideal German nobleman.  Therefore you will certainly
+make an ideal British peer.  You have the true
+Grand-Seigneur air.  No one would mistake you for
+anything but a great aristocrat, if they merely saw
+you in bathing pants; whereas I have something a
+little different about my manner.  I'm not so impressive--
+not so hall-marked, in fact."
+
+His friend's omniscient air and candidly eloquent
+tone impressed the Baron considerably.  His ingrained
+conviction of his own importance accorded admirably
+with these arguments.  His thirst for "life" craved
+this lion's share.  His sanguine spirit leaped at the
+appeal.  Yet his well-regulated conscience could not
+but state one or two patent objections.
+
+"Bot I have not read so moch of the Tollyvoddles
+as you.  I do not know ze strings so vell."
+
+"I have told you nearly everything I know.  You
+will find the rest here."
+
+Essington handed him the note-book containing his
+succinct digest.  In intelligent anticipation of this
+contingency it was written in his clearest handwriting.
+
+"You should have been a German," said the Baron
+admiringly.
+
+He glanced with sparkling eyes at the note-book,
+and then with a distinctly greater effort the Teutonic
+conscience advanced another objection.
+
+"Bot you have bought ze kilt, ze Highland hat, ze
+brogue shoes."
+
+"I had them made to your measurements."
+
+The Baron impetuously embraced his thoughtful
+friend.  Then again his smile died away.
+
+"Bot, Bonker, my voice!  Zey tell me I haf nozing
+zat you vould call qvite an accent; bot a foreigner--
+one does regognize him, eh?"
+
+"I shall explain that in a sentence.  The romantic
+tincture of--well, not quite accent, is a pleasant little
+piece of affectation adopted by the young bloods about
+the Court in compliment to the German connections of
+the Royal family."
+
+The Baron raised no more objections.
+
+"Bonker, I agree!  Tollyvoddle I shall be, by Jove
+and all!"
+
+He beamed his satisfaction, and then in an eager
+voice asked--
+
+"You haf not ze kilt in zat hat-box?"
+
+Unfortunately, however, the kilt was in the van.
+
+Now the journey, propitiously begun, became more
+exhilarating, more exciting with each mile flung by. 
+The Baron, egged on by his friend's high spirits and
+his own imagination to anticipate pleasure upon pleasure,
+watched with rapture the summer landscape whiz
+past the windows.  Through the flat midlands of
+England they sped; field after field, hedgerow after
+hedgerow, trees by the dozen, by the hundred, by the
+thousand, spinning by in one continuous green vista. 
+Red brick towns, sluggish rivers, thatched villages and
+ancient churches dark with yews, the shining web of
+junctions, and a whisking glimpse of wayside stations
+leaped towards them, past them, and leagues
+away behind.  But swiftly as they sped, it was all
+too slowly for the fresh-created Lord Tulliwuddle.
+
+"Are we not nearly to Scotland yet?" he inquired
+some fifty times.
+
+" 'My heart's in the Highlands a-chasing the
+dears!' " hummed the abdicated nobleman, whose
+hilarity had actually increased (if that were possible)
+since his descent into the herd again.
+
+All the travellers' familiar landmarks were hailed by
+the gleeful diplomatist with encouraging comments.
+
+"Ach, look!  Beauteeful view!  How quickly it is
+gone!  Hurray!  Ve must be nearly to Scotland."
+
+A panegyric on the rough sky-line of the north
+country fells was interrupted by the entrance of the
+dining-car attendant.  Learning that they would dine,
+he politely inquired in what names he should engage
+their seats.  Then, for an instant, a horrible confusion
+nearly overcame the Baron.  He--a von Blitzenberg--
+to give a false name!  His color rose, he stammered,
+and only in the nick of time caught his companion's
+eye.
+
+"Ze Lord Tollyvoddle," he announced, with an
+effort as heroic as any of his ancestors' most warlike
+enterprises.
+
+Too impressed to inquire how this remarkable title
+should be spelled, the man turned to the other
+distinguished-looking passenger.
+
+"Bunker," said that gentleman, with smiling assurance.
+
+The man went out.
+
+"Now are ve named!" cried the Baron, his courage
+rising the higher for the shock it had sustained. 
+"And you vunce more vill be Bonker?  Goot!"
+
+"That satisfies you?"
+
+The Baron hesitated.
+
+"My dear friend, I have a splendid idea!  Do you
+know I did disgover zere used to be a nobleman in
+Austria really called Count Bonker?  He vas a famous
+man; you need not be ashamed to take his name.  Vy
+should not you be Count Bonker?"
+
+"You prefer to travel in titled company?  Well,
+be hanged--why not!  When one comes to think of
+it, it seems a pity that my sins should always be
+attributed to the middle classes."
+
+Accordingly this history has now the honorable task
+of chronicling the exploits of no fewer than two
+noblemen.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Late that evening they reached a city which
+the home-coming chieftain in an outburst of
+Celtic fervor dubbed "mine own bonny
+Edinburg!" and there they repaired for the
+night to a hotel.  Once more the Baron (we may still
+style him so since the peerage of Tulliwuddle was
+of that standing also) showed a certain diffidence
+when it came to answering to his new title in public;
+but in the seclusion of their private sitting-room he
+was careful to assure his friend that this did not arise
+from any lack of nerve or qualms zof conscience, but
+merely through a species of headache--the result of
+railway travelling.
+
+"Do not fear for me," he declared as he stirred
+the sugar in his glass, "I have ze heart of a lion."
+
+The liquid he was sipping being nothing less potent
+than a brew of whisky punch, which he had ordered
+(or rather requested Bunker to order) as the most
+romantically national compound he could think of,
+produced, indeed, a fervor of foolhardiness.  He insisted
+upon opening the door wide, and getting Bunker
+to address him as "Tollyvoddle," in a strident
+voice, "so zat zey all may hear," and then answering
+in a firm "Yes, Count Bonker, vat vould you say to
+me?"
+
+It is true that he instantly closed the door again,
+and even bolted it, but his display seemed to make a
+vast impression upon himself.
+
+"Many men vould not dare so to go mit anozzer
+name," he announced; "bot I have my nerves onder
+a good gontrol."
+
+"You astonish me," said the Count.
+
+"I do even surprise myself," admitted the Baron.
+
+In truth the ordeal of carelessly carrying off an
+alias is said by those who have undergone it (and the
+report is confirmed by an experienced class of public
+officials) to require a species of hardihood which,
+fortunately for society, is somewhat rare.  The most
+daring Smith will sometimes stammer when it comes
+to merely answering "Yes" to a cry of "Brown!"
+and Count Bunker, whose knowledge of human nature
+was profound and remarkably accurate, was careful to
+fortify his friend by example and praise, till by the
+time they went to bed the Baron could scarcely be
+withheld from seeking out the manager and airing
+his assurance upon him.  Or, at least, he declared he
+would have done this had he been sure that the manager
+was not already in bed himself.
+
+Unfortunately at this juncture the Count committed
+one of those indiscretions to which a gay spirit is
+always prone, but which, to do him justice, seldom
+sullied his own record as a successful adventurer.  At
+an hour considerably past midnight, hearing an
+excited summons from the Baron's bedroom, he laid down
+his toothbrush and hastened across the passage, to
+find the new peer in a crimson dressing-gown of quilted
+silk gazing enthusiastically at a lithograph that hung
+upon the wall.
+
+"See!" he cried gleefully, "here is my own
+ancestor.  Bonker, I feel I am Tollyvoddle indeed."
+
+The print which had inspired this enthusiasm
+depicted a historical but treasonable Lord Tulliwuddle
+preparing to have his head removed.
+
+Giving it a droll look, the Count observed--
+
+"Well, if it inspires you, my dear Baron, that's all
+right.  The omen would have struck me differently."
+
+"Ze omen!" murmured the Baron with a start.
+
+It required all Bunker's tact to revive his ally's
+damped enthusiasm, and even at breakfast next morning
+he referred in a gloomy voice to various premonitions
+recorded in the history of his family, and the
+horrible consequences of disregarding them.
+
+But by the time they had started upon their journey
+north, his spirits rose a trifle; and when at length
+all lowland landscapes were left far behind them, and
+they had come into a province of peat streams and
+granite pinnacles, with the gloom of pines and the
+freshness of the birch blended like a May and December
+marriage, all appearance, at least, of disquietude
+had passed away.
+
+Yet the Count kept an anxious eye upon him.  He
+was becoming decidedly restless.  At one moment he
+would rave about the glorious scenery; the next,
+plunge into a brown study of the Tulliwuddle rent-
+roll; and then in an instant start humming an air and
+smoking so fast that both their cases were empty while
+they were yet half an hour from Torrydhulish Station. 
+Now the Baron took to biting his nails, looking at his
+watch, and answering questions at random--a very different
+spectacle from the enthusiastic traveller of
+yesterday.
+
+"Only ten minutes more," observed Bunker in his
+most cheering manner.
+
+The Baron made no reply.
+
+They were now running along the brink of a
+glimmering loch, the piled mountains on the farther shore
+perfectly mirrored; a tern or two lazily fishing; a
+delicate summer sky smiling above.  All at once Count
+Bunker started--
+
+"That must be Hechnahoul!" said he.
+
+The Baron looked and beheld, upon an eminence
+across the loch, the towers and turrets of an imposing
+mansion overtopping a green grove.
+
+"And here is the station," added the Count.
+
+The Baron's face assumed a piteous expression.
+
+"Bonker," he stammered, "I--I am afraid!  You
+be ze Tollyvoddle--I cannot do him!"
+
+"My dear Baron!"
+
+"Oh, I cannot!"
+
+"Be brave--for the honor of the fatherland.  Play
+the bold Blitzenberg!"
+
+"Ach, ja; but not bold Tollyvoddle.  Zat picture--
+you vere right--it vas omen!"
+
+Never did the genius of Bunker rise more audaciously
+to an occasion.
+
+"My dear Baron," said he, assuming on the instant
+a confidence-inspiring smile, "that print was a hoax; it
+wasn't old Tulliwuddle at all.  I faked it myself."
+
+"So?" gasped the Baron.  "You assure me
+truly?"
+
+Muttering (the historian sincerely hopes) a petition
+for forgiveness, Bunker firmly answered--
+
+"I do assure you!"
+
+The train had stopped, and as they were the only
+first-class passengers on board, a peculiarly magnificent
+footman already had his hand upon the door. 
+Before turning the handle, he touched his hat.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle?" he respectfully inquired.
+
+"Ja--zat is, yes, I am," replied the Baron.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+From the platform down to the pier was only
+some fifty yards, and before them the travellers
+perceived an exceedingly smart steam-
+launch, and a stout middle-aged gentleman,
+in a blue serge suit and yachting cap, advancing from
+it to greet them.  They had only time to observe that
+he had a sanguine complexion, iron-gray whiskers, and
+a wide-open eye, before he raised the cap and, in a
+decidedly North British accent, thus addressed them--
+
+"My lord--ahem!--your lordship, I should say--
+I presume I've the pleasure of seeing Lord Tulliwuddle?"
+
+The Count gently pushed his more distinguished
+friend in front.  With an embarrassment equal to their
+host's, his lordship bowed and gave his hand.
+
+"I am ze Tollyvoddle--vary pleased--Mistair Gosh,
+I soppose?"
+
+"Gallosh, my lord.  Very honored to welcome you."
+
+In the round eyes of Mr. Gallosh, Count Bunker
+perceived an unmistakable stare of astonishment at the
+sound of his lordship's accented voice.  The Baron,
+on his part, was evidently still suffering from his
+attack of stage fright; but again the Count's gifts
+smoothed the creases from the situation.
+
+"You have not introduced me to our host,
+Tulliwuddle," he said, with a gay, infectious confidence.
+
+"Ah, so!  Zis is my friend Count Bunker--gom all
+ze vay from Austria," responded the Baron, with no
+glimmer of his customary aplomb.
+
+Making a mental resolution to warn his ally never
+to say one word more about his fictitious past than
+was wrung by cross-examination, the distinguished-
+looking Austrian shook his host's hand warmly.
+
+"From Austria via London," he explained in his
+pleasantest manner.  "I object altogether to be
+considered a foreigner, Mr. Gallosh; and, in fact, I often
+tell Tulliwuddle that people will think me more English
+than himself.  The German fashions so much in vogue
+at Court are transforming the very speech of your
+nobility.  Don't you sometimes notice it?"
+
+Thus directly appealed to, Mr. Gallosh became
+manifestly perplexed.
+
+"Yes--yes, you're right in a way," he pronounced
+cautiously.  "I suppose they do that.  But will ye
+not take a seat?  This is my launch.  Hi!  Robert,
+give his lordship a hand on board!"
+
+Two mariners and a second tall footman assisted the
+guests to embark, and presently they were cutting the
+waters of the loch at a merry pace.
+
+In the prow, like youth, the Baron insisted upon
+sitting with folded arms and a gloomy aspect; and
+as his nerve was so patently disturbed, the Count
+decidedly approved of an arrangement which left his
+host and himself alone together in the stern.  In his
+present state of mind the Baron was capable of any
+indiscretion were he compelled to talk; while, silent and
+brooding in isolated majesty, he looked to perfection
+the part of returning exile.  So, evidently, thought
+Mr. Gallosh.
+
+"His lordship is looking verra well," he confided to
+the Count in a respectfully lowered voice.
+
+"The improvement has been remarkable ever since
+his foot touched his native heath."
+
+"You don't say so," said Mr. Gallosh, with even
+greater interest.  "Was he delicate before?"
+
+"A London life, Mr. Gallosh."
+
+"True--true, he'll have been busy seeing his
+friends; it'll have been verra wearing."
+
+"The anxiety, the business of being invested,
+and so on, has upset him a trifle.  You must put
+down any little--well, peculiarity to that, Mr. Gallosh."
+
+"I understand--aye, umh'm, quite so.  He'll like
+to be left to himself, perhaps?"
+
+"That depends on his condition," said the Count
+diplomatically.
+
+"It's a great responsibility for a young man; yon's
+a big property to look after," observed Mr. Gallosh
+in a moment.
+
+"You have touched the spot!" said the Count
+warmly.  "That is, in fact, the chief cause of Tulliwuddle's
+curious moodiness ever since he succeeded to
+the title.  He feels his responsibilities a little too
+acutely."
+
+Again Mr. Gallosh ruminated, while his guest from
+the corner of his eye surveyed him shrewdly.
+
+"My forecast was wonderfully accurate," he said
+to himself.
+
+The silence was first broken by Mr. Gallosh.  As
+if thinking aloud, he remarked--
+
+"I was awful surprised to hear him speak!  It's
+the Court fashion, you say?"
+
+"Partly that; partly a prolonged residence on the
+Continent in his youth.  He acquired his accent then;
+he has retained it for fashion's sake," explained the
+Count, who thought it as well to bolster up the weakest
+part of his case a little more securely.
+
+With this prudent purpose, he added, with a flattering
+air of taking his host into his aristocratic confidence--
+
+"You will perhaps be good enough to explain this
+to the friends and dependants Lord Tulliwuddle is
+about to meet?  A breath of unsympathetic criticism
+would grieve him greatly if it came to his ears."
+
+"Quite, quite," said Mr. Gallosh eagerly.  "I'll
+make it all right.  I understand the sentiment pairfectly. 
+It's verra natural--verra natural indeed."
+
+At that moment the Baron started from his reverie
+with an affrighted air.
+
+"Vat is zat strange sound!" he exclaimed.
+
+The others listened.
+
+"That's just the pipes, my lord," said Mr. Gallosh. 
+"They're tuning up to welcome you."
+
+His lordship stared at the shore ahead of them.
+
+"Zere are many peoples on ze coast!" he cried. 
+"Vat makes it for?"
+
+"They've come to receive you," his host explained. 
+"It's just a little spontaneous demonstration, my
+lord."
+
+His lordship's composure in no way increased.
+
+"It was Mrs. Gallosh organized a wee bit entertainment
+on his lordship's landing," their host explained
+confidentially to the Count.  "It's just informal, ye
+understand.  She's been instructing some of the tenants--
+and ma own girls will be there--but, oh, it's
+nothing to speak of.  If he says a few words in
+reply, that'll be all they'll be expecting."
+
+The strains of "Tulliwuddle wha hae" grew ever
+louder and, to an untrained ear, more terrific.  In
+a moment they were mingled with a clapping of hands
+and a Highland cheer, the launch glided alongside the
+pier, and, supported on his faithful friend's arm, the
+panic-stricken Tulliwuddle staggered ashore.  Before
+his dazed eyes there seemed to be arrayed the vastest
+and most barbaric concourse his worst nightmare had
+ever imagined.  Six pipers played within ten paces
+of him, each of them arrayed in the full panoply of
+the clan; at least a dozen dogs yelped their exultation;
+and from the surrounding throng two ancient
+men in tartan and four visions in snowy white stepped
+forth to greet the distinguished visitors.
+
+The first hitch in the proceedings occurred at this
+point.  According to the unofficial but carefully
+considered programme, the pipers ought to have ceased
+their melody; but, whether inspired by ecstatic loyalty
+or because the Tulliwuddle pibroch took longer to perform
+than had been anticipated, they continued to skirl
+with such vigor that expostulations passed entirely
+unheard.  Under the circumstances there was nothing
+for it but shouting, and in a stentorian yell Mr.
+Gallosh introduced his wife and three fair daughters.
+
+Thereupon Mrs. Gallosh, a broad-beamed matron
+whose complexion contrasted pleasantly with her costume,
+delivered the following oration--
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle, in the name of the women of
+Hechnahoul--I may say in the name of the women of
+all the Highlands--oor ain Heelands, my lord" (this
+with the most insinuating smile)--"I bid you welcome
+to your ancestral estates.  Remembering the conquests
+your ancestors used to make both in war and in a
+gentler sphere" (Mrs. Gallosh looked archness itself),
+"we ladies, I suppose, should regard your home-
+coming with some misgivings; but, my lord, every
+bonny Prince Charlie has his bonny Flora Macdonald,
+and in this land of mountain, mist, and flood, where
+'Dark Ben More frowns o'er the wave,' and where
+'Ilka lassie has her laddie,' you will find a thousand
+romantic maidens ready to welcome you as Ellen welcomed
+Fitz-James!  For centuries your heroic race has
+adorned the halls and trod the heather of Hechnahoul,
+and for centuries more we hope to see the offspring
+of your lordship and some winsome Celtic maid rule
+these cataracts and glens!"
+
+At this point the exertion of shouting down six
+bagpipes in active eruption caused a temporary cessation
+of the lady's eloquence, and the pause was filled
+by the cheers of the crowd led by the "Hip-hip-hip!"
+of Count Bunker, and by the broken and fortunately
+inaudible protests of the embarrassed father of future
+Tulliwuddles.  In a moment Mrs. Gallosh had resumed--
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle, though I myself am only a
+stranger to your clan, your Highland heart will feel
+reassured when I mention that I belong through my
+grandmother to the kindred clan of the Mackays!" 
+("Hear, hear!" from two or three ladies and gentlemen,
+evidently guests of the Gallosh.)  "We are but
+visitors at Hechnahoul, yet we assure you that no more
+devoted hearts beat in all Caledonia!  Lord Tulliwuddle,
+we welcome you!"
+
+"Put your hand on your heart and bow," whispered
+Bunker.  "Keep on bowing and say nothing!"
+
+Mechanically the bewildered Baron obeyed, and for
+a few moments presented a spectacle not unlike royalty
+in procession.
+
+But as some reply from him had evidently been
+expected at this point, and the pipers had even ceased
+playing lest any word of their chief's should be lost,
+a pause ensued which might have grown embarrassing
+had not the Count promptly stepped forward.
+
+"I think," he said, indicating two other snow-white
+figures who held gigantic bouquets, "that a pleasant
+part of the ceremony still remains before us."
+
+With a grateful glance at this discerning guest,
+Mrs. Gallosh thereupon led forward her two youngest
+daughters (aged fifteen and thirteen), who, with an
+air so delightfully coy that it fell like a ray of
+sunshine on the poor Baron's heart, presented him with
+their flowery symbols of Hechnahoul's obeisance to its
+lord.
+
+His consternation returned with the advance of the
+two ancient clansmen who, after a guttural panegyric
+in Gaelic, offered him further symbols--a claymore and
+target, very formidable to behold.  All these gifts
+having been adroitly transferred to the arms of the
+footmen by the ubiquitous Count, the Baron's emotions
+swiftly passed through another phase when the
+eldest Miss Gallosh, aged twenty, with burning eyes
+and the most distracting tresses, dropped him a sweeping
+courtesy and offered a final contribution--a fiery
+cross, carved and painted by her own fair hands.
+
+A fresh round of applause followed this, and then
+a sudden silence fell upon the assembly.  All eyes were
+turned upon the chieftain: not even a dog barked:
+it was the moment of a lifetime.
+
+"Can you manage a speech, old man?" whispered
+Bunker.
+
+"Ach, no, no, no!  Let me escape.  Oh, let me fly!"
+
+"Bury your face in your hands and lean on my
+shoulder," prompted the Count.
+
+This stage direction being obeyed, the most effective
+tableau conceivable was presented, and the climax was
+reached when the Count, after a brief dumb-show
+intended to indicate how vain were Lord Tulliwuddle's
+efforts to master his emotion, spoke these words in the
+most thrilling accents he could muster
+
+"Fair ladies and brave men of Hechnahoul!  Your
+chief, your friend, your father requests me to express
+to you the sentiments which his over-wrought emotions
+prevent him from uttering himself.  On his behalf
+I tender to his kind and courteous friends, Mr.,
+Mrs., and the fair maids Gallosh, the thanks of a long-
+absent exile returned to his native land for the welcome
+they have given him!  To his devoted clan he not
+only gives his thanks, but his promise that all rents shall
+be reduced by one half--so long as he dwells among
+them!"  (Tumultuous applause, disturbed only by a
+violent ejaculation from a large man in knickerbockers
+whom Bunker justly judged to be the factor.)
+
+"With his last breath he shall perpetually thunder:
+Ahasheen--comara--mohr!"
+
+The Tulliwuddle slogan, pronounced with the most
+conscientious accuracy of which a Sassenach was capable,
+proved as effective a curtain as he had anticipated;
+and amid a perfect babel of cheering and bagpiping
+the chieftain was led to his host's carriage.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+"Well, the worst of it is over," said Bunker
+cheerfully.
+
+The Baron groaned.  "Ze vorst is
+only jost beginning to gommence."
+
+They were sitting over a crackling fire of logs in
+the sitting-room of the suite which their host had
+reserved for his honored visitors.  How many heirlooms
+and dusky portraits the romantic thoughtfulness
+of the ladies had managed to crowd into this apartment
+for the occasion were hard to compute; enough,
+certainly, one would think, to inspire the most sluggish-
+blooded Tulliwuddle with a martial exultation. 
+Instead, the chieftain groaned again.
+
+"Tell zem I am ill.  I cannot gom to dinner.  To-
+morrow I shall take ze train back to London.  Himmel! 
+Vy vas I fool enof to act soch dishonorable lies!  I
+deceive all these kind peoples!"
+
+"It isn't that which worries me," said Bunker
+imperturbably.  "I am only afraid that if you display
+this spirit you won't deceive them."
+
+"I do not vish to," said the Baron sulkily.
+
+It required half an hour of the Count's most artful
+blandishments to persuade him that duty, honor, and
+prudence all summoned him to the feast.  This being
+accomplished, he next endeavored to convince him that
+he would feel more comfortable in the airy freedom
+of the Tulliwuddle tartan.  But here the Baron was
+obdurate.  Now that the kilt lay ready to his hand
+he could not be persuaded even to look at it.  In
+gloomy silence he donned his conventional evening
+dress and announced, last thing before they left their
+room--
+
+"Bonker, say no more!  To-morrow morning I depart!"
+
+Their hostess had explained that a merely informal
+dinner awaited them, since his lordship (she observed)
+would no doubt prefer a quiet evening after his long
+journey.  But Mrs. Gallosh was one of those good
+ladies who are fond of asking their friends to take
+"pot luck," and then providing them with fourteen
+courses; or suggesting a "quiet little evening together,"
+when they have previously removed the drawing-
+room carpet.  It is an affectation of modesty apt
+to disconcert the retiring guest who takes them at
+their word.  In the drawing-room of Mrs. Gallosh the
+startled Baron found assembled--firstly, the Gallosh
+family, consisting of all those whose acquaintance we
+have already made, and in addition two stalwart school-
+boy sons; secondly, their house-party, who comprised
+a Mr. and Mrs. Rentoul, from the same metropolis of
+commerce as Mr. Gallosh, and a hatchet-faced young
+man with glasses, answering to the name of Mr. Cromarty-
+Gow; and, finally, one or two neighbors.  These
+last included Mr. M'Fadyen, the large factor; the
+Established Church, U.F., Wee Free, Episcopalian,
+and Original Secession ministers, all of whom, together
+with their kirks, flourished within a four-mile radius
+of the Castle; the wives to three of the above; three
+young men and their tutor, being some portion of a
+reading-party in the village; and Mrs. Cameron-
+Campbell and her five daughters, from a neighboring
+dower-house upon the loch.
+
+It was fortunate that all these people were prepared
+to be impressed with Lord Tulliwuddle, whatever he
+should say or do; and further, that the unique position
+of such a famous hereditary magnate even led them to
+anticipate some marked deviation from the ordinary
+canons of conduct.  Otherwise, the gloomy brows; the
+stare, apparently haughty, in reality alarmed; the
+strange accent and the brief responses of the chief
+guest, might have caused an unfavorable opinion of
+his character.
+
+As it was, his aloofness, however natural, would
+probably have proved depressing had it not been for
+the gay charm and agreeable condescension of the
+other nobleman.  Seldom had more rested upon that
+adventurer's shoulders, and never had he acquitted
+himself with greater credit.  It was with considerable
+secret concern that he found himself placed at the
+opposite end of the table from his friend, but his
+tongue rattled as gaily and his smiles came as readily
+as ever.  With Mrs. Cameron-Campbell on one side,
+and a minister's lady upon the other, his host two
+places distant, and a considerable audience of silent
+eaters within earshot, he successfully managed to
+divert the attention of quite half the table from the
+chieftain's moody humor.
+
+"I always feel at home with a Scotsman," he
+discoursed genially.  "His imagination is so quick, his
+intellect so clear, his honesty so remarkable, and"
+(with an irresistible glance at the minister's lady) "his
+wife so charming."
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed Mr. Gallosh, who was mellowing
+rapidly under the influence of his own champagne. 
+"I'm verra glad to see you know good folks when
+you meet them.  What do you think now of the
+English?"
+
+Having previously assured himself that his audience
+was neat Scotch, the polished Austrian unblushingly
+replied--
+
+"The Englishman, I have observed, has a slightly
+slower imagination, a denser intelligence, and is less
+conspicuous for perfect honesty.  His womankind also
+have less of that nameless grace and ethereal beauty
+which distinguish their Scottish sisters."
+
+It is needless to say that a more popular visitor
+never was seen than this discriminating foreigner, and
+if his ambitions had not risen above a merely personal
+triumph, he would have been in the highest state of
+satisfaction.  But with a disinterested eye he every
+now and then sought the farther end of the table,
+where, between his hostess and her charming eldest
+daughter, and facing his factor, the Baron had to
+endure his ordeal unsupported.
+
+"I wonder how the devil he's getting on!" he more
+than once said to himself.
+
+For better or for worse, as the dinner advanced,
+he began to hear the Court accent more frequently,
+till his curiosity became extreme.
+
+"His lordship seems in better spirits," remarked
+Mr. Gallosh.
+
+"I hope to Heaven he may be!" was the fervent
+thought of Count Bunker.
+
+At that moment the point was settled.  With his
+old roar of exuberant gusto the Baron announced, in
+a voice that drowned even the five ministers--
+
+"Ach, yes, I vill toss ze caber to-morrow!  I vill
+toss him--so high!" (his napkin flapped upwards). 
+"How long shall he be?  So tall as my castle:  Mees
+Gallosh, you shall help me?  Ach, yes!  Mit hands so
+fair ze caber vill spring like zis!"
+
+His pudding-spoon, in vivid illustration, skipped
+across the table and struck his factor smartly on the
+shirt-front.
+
+"Sare, I beg your pardon," he beamed with a
+graciousness that charmed Mrs. Gallosh even more
+than his spirited conversation--"Ach, do not return it,
+please!  It is from my castle silver--keep it in memory
+of zis happy night!"
+
+The royal generosity of this act almost reconciled
+Mrs. Gallosh to the loss of one of her own silver spoons.
+
+"Saved!" sighed Bunker, draining his glass with
+a relish he had not felt in any item of the feast
+hitherto.
+
+Now that the Baron's courage had returned, no
+heraldic lion ever pranced more bravely.  His laughter,
+his jests, his compliments were showered upon the
+delighted diners.  Mr. Gallosh and he drank healths
+down the whole length of the table "mit no tap-heels!"
+at least four times.  He peeled an orange for Miss
+Gallosh, and cut the skin into the most diverting
+figures, pressing her hand tenderly as he presented her
+with these works of art.  He inquired of Mrs. Gallosh
+the names of the clergymen, and, shouting something
+distantly resembling these, toasted them each and
+all with what he conceived to be appropriate comments. 
+Finally he rose to his feet, and, to the surprise
+and delight of all, delivered the speech they had
+been disappointed of earlier in the day.
+
+"Goot Mr. Gallosh, fair Mrs. Gallosh, divine Mees
+Gallosh, and all ze ladies and gentlemans, how sorry
+I vas I could not make my speech before, I cannot
+eggspress.  I had a headache, and vas not vell vithin. 
+Ach, soch zings vill happen in a new climate.  Bot now
+I am inspired to tell you I loff you all!  I zank you
+eggstremely!  How can I return zis hospitality?  I
+vill tell you!  You must all go to Bavaria and stay
+mit----"
+
+"Tulliwuddle!  Tulliwuddle!" shouted Bunker
+frantically, to the great amazement of the company.  "Allow
+me to invite the company myself to stay with me
+in Bavaria!"
+
+The Baron turned crimson, as he realized the abyss
+of error into which he had so nearly plunged.  Adroitly
+the Count covered his confusion with a fit of laughter
+so ingeniously hearty that in a moment he had joined
+in it too.
+
+"Ha, ha, ha!" he shouted.  "Zat was a leetle joke
+at my friend's eggspense.  It is here, in my castle, you
+shall visit me; some day very soon I shall live in him. 
+Meanvile, dear Mrs. Gallosh, gonsider it your home! 
+For me you make it heaven, and I cannot ask more
+zan zat!  Now let us gom and have some fon!"
+
+A salvo of applause greeted this conclusion.  At the
+Baron's impetuous request the cigars were brought
+into the hall, and ladies and gentlemen all trooped out
+together.
+
+"I cannot vait till I have seen Miss Gallosh dance
+ze Highland reel," he explained to her gratified mother;
+"she has promised me."
+
+"But you must dance too, Lord Tulliwuddle," said
+ravishing Miss Gallosh.  "You know you said you
+would."
+
+"A promise to a lady is a law," replied the Baron
+gallantly, adding in a lower tone, "especially to so
+fair a lady!"
+
+"It's a pity his lordship hadn't on his kilt," put
+in Mr. Gallosh genially.
+
+"By ze Gad, I vill put him on!  Hoch!  Ve vill
+have some fon!"
+
+The Baron rushed from the hall, followed in a
+moment by his noble friend.  Bunker found him
+already wrapping many yards of tartan about his
+waist.
+
+"But, my dear fellow, you must take off your
+trousers," he expostulated.
+
+Despite his glee, the Baron answered with something
+of the Blitzenberg dignity--
+
+"Ze bare leg I cannot show to-night--not to dance
+mit ze young ladies.  Ven I have practised, perhaps;
+but not now, Bonker."
+
+Accordingly the portraits of four centuries of
+Tulliwuddles beheld their representative appear in the very
+castle of Hechnahoul with his trouser-legs capering beneath
+an ill-hung petticoat of tartan.  And, to make
+matters worse in their canvas eyes, his own shameless
+laugh rang loudest in the mirth that greeted his entrance.
+
+"Ze garb of Gaul!" he announced, shaking with
+hilarity.  "Gom, Bonker, dance mit me ze Highland
+fling!"
+
+The first night of Lord Tulliwuddle's visit to his
+ancestral halls is still remembered among his native
+hills.  The Count also, his mind now rapturously at
+ease, performed prodigies.  They danced together
+what they were pleased to call the latest thing in London,
+sang a duet, waltzed with the younger ladies, till
+hardly a head was left unturned, and, in short, sent
+away the ministers and their ladies, the five Miss
+Cameron-Campbells, the reading-party, and particularly
+the factor, with a new conception of a Highland
+chief.  As for the house-party, they felt that they
+were fortunate beyond the lot of most ordinary
+mortals.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+The Baron sat among his heirlooms, laboriously
+disengaging himself from his kilt.  Fitfully
+throughout this process he would warble
+snatches of an air which Miss Gallosh
+had sung.
+
+"Whae vould not dee for Sharlie?" he trolled, "Ze
+yong chevalier!"
+
+"Then you don't think of leaving to-morrow
+morning?" asked Count Bunker, who was watching him
+with a complacent air.
+
+"Mein Gott, no fears!"
+
+"We had better wait, perhaps, till the afternoon?"
+
+"I go not for tree veeks!  Gaben sie--das ist,
+gim'me zat tombler.  Vun more of mountain juice to
+ze health of all Galloshes!  Partic'ly of vun!  Eh, old
+Bonker?"
+
+The Count took care to see that the mountain juice
+was well diluted.  His friend had already found Scottish
+hospitality difficult to enjoy in moderation.
+
+"Baron, you gave us a marvellously lifelike
+representation of a Jacobite chieftain!"
+
+The Baron laughed a trifle vacantly.
+
+"Ach, it is easy for me.  Himmel, a Blitzenberg
+should know how!  Vollytoddle--Toddyvolly--whatsh
+my name, Bonker?"
+
+The Count informed him.
+
+"Tollivoddlesh is nozing to vat I am at home! 
+Abs'lutely nozing!  I have a house twice as big as zis,
+and servants--Ach, so many I know not!  Bot, mein
+Bonker, it is not soch fon as zis!  Mein Gott, I most
+get to bed.  I toss ze caber to-morrow."
+
+And upon the arm of his faithful ally he moved
+cautiously towards his bedroom.
+
+But if he had enjoyed his evening well, his pleasure
+was nothing to the gratification of his hosts.  They
+could not bring themselves to break up their party
+for the night: there were so many delightful reminiscences
+to discuss.
+
+"Of all the evenings ever I spent," declared Mr.
+Gallosh, "this fair takes the cake.  Just to think of
+that aristocratic young fellow being as companionable-
+like!  When first I put eyes on him, I said to myself--
+'You're not for the likes of us.  All lords and ladies
+is your kind.  Never a word did he say in the boat
+till he heard the pipes play, and then I really thought
+he was frightened!  It must just have been a kind of
+home-sickness or something."
+
+"It'll have been the tuning up that set his teeth on
+edge," Mrs. Gallosh suggested practically.
+
+"Or perhaps his heart was stirred with thoughts of
+the past!" said Miss Gallosh, her eyes brightening.
+
+In any case, all were agreed that the development of
+his hereditary instincts had been extraordinarily rapid.
+
+"I never really properly talked with a lord before,"
+sighed Mrs. Rentoul; "I hope they're all like this one."
+
+Mrs. Gallosh, on the other hand, who boasted of
+having had one tete-a-tete and joined in several general
+conversations with the peerage, appraised Lord Tulliwuddle
+with greater discrimination.
+
+"Ah, he's got a soupcon!" she declared.  "That's
+what I admire!"
+
+"Do you mean his German accent?" asked Mr.
+Cromarty-Gow, who was renowned for a cynical wit,
+and had been seeking an occasion to air it ever since
+Lord Tulliwuddle had made Miss Gallosh promise to
+dance a reel with him.
+
+But the feeling of the party was so strongly against
+a breath of irreverent criticism, and their protest so
+emphatic, that he presently strolled off to the smoking-
+room, wishing that Miss Gallosh, at least, would exercise
+more critical discrimination.
+
+"Do you think would they like breakfast in their
+own room, Duncan?" asked Mrs. Gallosh.
+
+"Offer it them--offer it them; they can but refuse,
+and it's a kind of compliment to give them the opportunity."
+
+"His lordship will not be wanting to rise early,"
+said Mr. Rentoul.  "Did you notice what an amount
+he could drink, Duncan?  Man, and he carried it fine! 
+But he'll be the better of a sleep-in in the morning,
+him coming from a journey too."
+
+Mr. Rentoul was a recognized authority on such
+questions, having, before the days of his affluence,
+travelled for a notable firm of distillers.  His praise of
+Lord Tulliwuddle's capacity was loudly echoed by Mr.
+Gallosh, and even the ladies could not but indulgently
+agree that he had exhibited a strength of head worthy
+of his race.
+
+"And yet he was a wee thing touched too," said Mr.
+Rentoul sagely.  "Maybe you were too far gone yourself,
+Duncan, to notice it, and the ladies would just
+think it was gallantry; but I saw it in his voice and his
+legs--oh, just a wee thingie, nothing to speak of."
+
+"Surely you are mistaken!" cried Miss Gallosh. 
+"Wasn't it only excitement at finding himself at
+Hechnahoul?"
+
+"There's two kinds of excitement," answered the
+oracle.  "And this was the kind I'm best acquaint
+with.  Oh, but it was just a wee bittie."
+
+"And who thinks the worse of him for it?" cried
+Mr. Gallosh.
+
+This question was answered by general acclamation
+in a manner and with a spirit that proved how deeply
+his lordship's gracious behavior had laid hold of all
+hearts.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+Breakfast in the private parlor was laid for
+two; but it was only Count Bunker, arrayed
+in a becoming suit of knickerbockers, and
+looking as fresh as if he had feasted last
+night on aerated water, who sat down to consume it.
+
+"Who would be his ordinary everyday self when
+there are fifty more amusing parts to play," he
+reflected gaily, as he sipped his coffee.  "Blitzenberg
+and Essington were two conventional members of society,
+ageing ingloriously, tamely approaching five-
+and-thirty in bath-chairs.  Tulliwuddle and Bunker
+are paladins of romance!  We thought we had grown
+up--thank Heaven, we were deceived!"
+
+Having breakfasted and lit a cigarette, he essayed
+for the second time to arouse the Baron; but getting
+nothing but the most somnolent responses, he set out
+for a stroll, visiting the gardens, stables, kennels, and
+keeper's house, and even inspecting a likely pool or two
+upon the river, and making in the course of it several
+useful acquaintances among the Tulliwuddle retainers.
+
+When he returned he found the Baron stirring a
+cup of strong tea and staring at an ancestral portrait
+with a thoughtful frown.
+
+"They are preparing the caber, Baron," he
+remarked genially.
+
+"Stoff and nonsense; I vill not fling her!" was the
+wholly unexpected reply.  "I do not love to play ze
+fool alvays!"
+
+"My dear Baron!"
+
+"Zat picture," said the Baron, nodding his head
+solemnly towards the portrait.  "It is like ze Lord
+Tollyvoddle in ze print at ze hotel.  I do believe he is ze
+same."
+
+"But I explained that he wasn't Tulliwuddle."
+
+"He is so like," repeated the Baron moodily.  "He
+most be ze same."
+
+Bunker looked at it and shook his head.
+
+"A different man, I assure you."
+
+"Oh, ze devil!" replied the Baron.
+
+"What's the matter?"
+
+"I haff a head zat tvists and turns like my head
+never did since many years."
+
+The Count had already surmised as much.
+
+"Hang it out of the window," he suggested.
+
+The Baron made no reply for some minutes.  Then
+with an earnest air he began--
+
+"Bonker, I have somezing to say to you."
+
+"You have the most sympathetic audience outside
+the clan."
+
+The Count's cheerful tone did not seem to please his
+friend.
+
+"Your heart, he is too light, Bonker; ja, too light. 
+Last night you did engourage me not to be seemly."
+
+"I!"
+
+"I did get almost dronk.  If my head vas not so
+hard I should be dronk.  Das ist not right.  If I am
+to be ze Tollyvoddle, it most be as I vould be Von
+Blitzenberg.  I most not forget zat I am not as ozzer
+men.  I am noble, and most be so accordingly."
+
+"What steps do you propose to take?" inquired
+Bunker with perfect gravity.
+
+The Baron stared at the picture.
+
+"Last night I had a dream.  It vas zat man--at
+least, probably it vas, for I cannot remember eggsactly. 
+He did pursue me mit a kilt."
+
+"With what did you defend yourself?"
+
+"I know not: I jost remember zat it should be a
+warning.  Ve Blitzenbergs have ze gift to dream."
+
+The Baron rose from the table and lit a cigar. 
+After three puffs he threw it from him.
+
+"I cannot smoke," he said dismally.  "It has a
+onpleasant taste."
+
+The Count assumed a seriously thoughtful air.
+
+"No doubt you will wish to see Miss Maddison as
+soon as possible and get it over," he began.  "I have
+just learned that their place is about seven miles away. 
+We could borrow a trap this afternoon----"
+
+"Nein, nein!" interrupted the Baron.   "Donnerwetter! 
+Ach, no, it most not be so soon.  I most
+practise a leetle first.  Not so immediately, Bonker."
+
+Bunker looked at him with a glance of unfathomable
+calm.
+
+"I find that it will be necessary for you to observe
+one or two ancient ceremonies, associated from time
+immemorial with the accession of a Tulliwuddle.  You
+are prepared for the ordeal?"
+
+"I most do my duty, Bonker."
+
+"This suggests some more inspiring vision than the
+gentleman in the gold frame," thought the Count
+acutely.
+
+Aloud he remarked
+
+"You have high ideals, Baron."
+
+"I hope so."
+
+Again the Baron was the unconscious object of a
+humorous, perspicacious scrutiny.
+
+"Last night I did hear zat moch was to be expected
+from me," he observed at length.
+
+"From Mrs. Gallosh?"
+
+"I do not zink it vas from Mrs. Gallosh."
+
+Count Bunker smiled.
+
+"You inflamed all hearts last night," said he.
+
+The Baron looked grave.
+
+"I did drink too moch last night.  But I did not
+say vat I should not, eh?  I vas not rude or gross to--
+Mistair Gallosh?"
+
+"Not to Mr. Gallosh."
+
+The Baron looked a trifle perturbed at the gravity
+of his tone.
+
+"I vas not too free, too undignified in presence of
+zat innocent and charming lady--Miss Gallosh?"
+
+The air of scrutiny passed from Count Bunker's
+face, and a droll smile came instead.
+
+"Baron, I understand your ideals and I appreciate
+your motives.  As you suggest, you had better rehearse
+your part quietly for a few days.  Miss Maddison will
+find you the more perfect suitor."
+
+The Baron looked as though he knew not whether to
+feel satisfied or not.
+
+"By the way," said the Count in a moment, "have
+you written to the Baroness yet?  Pardon me for
+reminding you, but you must remember that your letters
+will have to go out to Russia and back."
+
+The Baron started.
+
+"Teufel!" he exclaimed.  "I most indeed write."
+
+"The post goes at twelve."
+
+The Baron reflected gloomily, and then slowly moved
+to the writing-table and toyed with his pen.  A few
+minutes passed, and then in a fretful voice he asked--
+
+"Vat shall I say?"
+
+"Tell her about your journey across Europe--how
+the crops look in Russia--what you think of St. Petersburg--
+that sort of thing."
+
+A silent quarter of an hour went by, and then the
+Baron burst out
+
+"Ach, I cannot write to-day!  I cannot invent like
+you.  Ze crops--I have got zat--and zat I arrived safe
+--and zat Petersburg is nice.  Vat else?"
+
+"Anything you can remember from text-books on
+Muscovy or illustrated interviews with the Czar.  Just
+a word or two, don't you know, to show you've been
+there; with a few comments of your own."
+
+"Vat like comments?"
+
+"Such as--'Somewhat annoyed with bombs this
+afternoon,' or 'This caused me to reflect upon the
+disadvantages of an alcoholic marine'--any little bit of
+philosophy that occurs to you."
+
+The Baron pondered.
+
+"It is a pity zat I have not been in Rossia," he
+observed.
+
+"On the other hand, it is a blessing your wife hasn't. 
+Look at the bright side of things, my dear fellow."
+
+For a short time, from the way in which the Baron
+took hasty notes in pencil and elaborated them in ink
+(according to the system of Professor Virchausen), it
+appeared that he was following his friend's directions. 
+Later, from a sentimental look in his eye, the Count
+surmised that he was composing an amorous addendum;
+and at last he laid down his pen with a sigh which the
+cynical (but only the cynical) might have attributed
+to relief.
+
+"Ha, my head he is getting more clear!" he
+announced.  "Gom, let us present ourselves to ze ladies,
+mine Bonker!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"It is necessary, Bonker--you are sure?"
+
+"No Tulliwuddle has ever omitted the ceremony. 
+If you shirked, I am assured on the very
+best authority that it would excite the gravest
+suspicions of your authenticity."
+
+Count Bunker spoke with an air of the most resolute
+conviction.  Ever since they arrived he had taken
+infinite pains to discover precisely what was expected of
+the chieftain, and having by great good luck made the
+acquaintance of an elderly individual who claimed to
+be the piper of the clan, and who proved a perfect
+granary of legends, he was able to supply complete
+information on every point of importance.  Once the
+Baron had endeavored to corroborate these particulars
+by interviewing the piper himself, but they had found
+so much difficulty in understanding one another's
+dialects that he had been content to trust implicitly to his
+friend's information.  The Count, indeed, had rather
+avoided than sought advice on the subject, and the
+piper, after several confidential conversations and the
+passage of a sum of silver into his sporran, displayed
+an equally Delphic tendency.
+
+The Baron, therefore, argued the present point no
+longer.
+
+"It is jost a mere ceremony," he said.  "Ach, vell,
+nozing vill happen.  Zis ghost--vat is his name?"
+
+"It is known as the Wraith of the Tulliwuddles. 
+The heir must interview it within a week of coming to
+the Castle."
+
+"Vere most I see him?"
+
+"In the armory, at midnight.  You bring one
+friend, one candle, and wear a bonnet with one eagle's
+feather in it.  You enter at eleven and wait for an
+hour--and, by the way, neither of you must speak
+above a whisper."
+
+"Pooh!  Jost hombog!" said the Baron valiantly. 
+"I do not fear soch trash."
+
+"When the Wraith appears----"
+
+"My goot Bonker, he vill not gom!"
+
+"Supposing he does come--and mind you, strange
+things happen in these old buildings, particularly in
+the Highlands, and after dinner; if he comes, Baron,
+you must ask him three questions."
+
+The Baron laughed scornfully.
+
+"If I see a ghost I vill ask him many interesting
+questions--if he does feel cold, and sochlike, eh?  Ha,
+ha!"
+
+With an imperturbable gravity that was not without
+its effect upon the other, however gaily he might talk,
+Bunker continued
+
+"The three questions are: first, 'What art thou?'
+second, 'Why comest thou here, O spirit?' third,
+'What instructions desirest thou to give me?'  Strictly
+speaking, they ought to be asked in Gaelic, but exceptions
+have been made on former occasions, and Mac-
+Dui--who pipes, by the way, in the anteroom--assures
+me that English will satisfy the Wraith in your
+case."
+
+The Baron sniffed and laughed, and twirled up the
+ends of his mustaches till they presented a particularly
+desperate appearance.  Yet there was a faint intonation
+of anxiety in his voice as he inquired--
+
+"You vill gom as my friend, of course?"
+
+"I?  Quite out of the question, I am sorry to say. 
+To bring a foreigner (as I am supposed to be) would
+rouse the clan to rebellion.  No, Baron, you have a
+chance of paying a graceful compliment to your host
+which you must not lose.  Ask Mr. Gallosh to share
+your vigil."
+
+"Gallosh--he vould not be moch good sopposing--
+Ach, but nozing vill happen!  I vill ask him."
+
+The pride of Mr. Gallosh on being selected as his
+lordship's friend on this historic occasion was pleasant
+to witness.
+
+"It's just a bit of fiddle-de-dee," he informed his
+delighted family.  "Duncan Gallosh to be looking for
+bogles is pretty ridiculous--but oh, I can't refuse to
+disoblige his lordship."
+
+"I should think not, when he's done you the honor
+to invite you out of all his friends!" said Mrs. Gallosh
+warmly.  "Eva!  do you hear the compliment
+that's been paid your papa?"
+
+Eva, their fair eldest daughter, came into the room
+at a run.  She had indeed heard (since the news was
+on every tongue), and impetuously she flung her arms
+about her father's neck.
+
+"Oh, papa, do him credit!" she cried; "it's like a
+story come true!  What a romantic thing to happen!"
+
+"What a spirit!" her mother reflected proudly. 
+"She is just the girl for a chieftain's bride!"
+
+That very night was chosen for the ceremony, and
+eleven o'clock found them all assembled breathless in
+the drawing-room: all, save Lord Tulliwuddle and his
+host.
+
+"Will they have to wait for a whole hour?" asked
+Mrs. Gallosh in a low voice.
+
+Indeed they all spoke in subdued accents.
+
+"I am told," replied the Count, "that the apparition
+never appears till after midnight has struck.  Any time
+between twelve and one he may be expected."
+
+"Think of the terrible suspense after twelve has
+passed!" whispered Eva.
+
+The Count had thought of this.
+
+"I advised Duncan to take his flask," said Mr.
+Rentoul, with a solemn wink.  "So he'll not be so
+badly off."
+
+"Papa would never do such a thing to-night!"
+cried Eva.
+
+"It's always a kind of precaution," said the sage.
+
+Presently Count Bunker, who had been imparting
+the most terrific particulars of former interviews with
+the Wraith to the younger Galloshes, remarked that he
+must pass the time by overtaking some pressing correspondence.
+
+"You will forgive me, I hope, for shutting myself
+up for an hour or so," he said to his hostess.  "I shall
+come back in time to learn the results of the meeting."
+
+And with the loss of his encouraging company a
+greater uneasiness fell upon the party.
+
+Meanwhile, in a vast cavern of darkness, lit only by
+the solitary candle, the Baron and his host endeavored
+to maintain the sceptical buoyancy with which they
+had set forth upon their adventure.  But the chilliness
+of the room (they had no fire, and it was a misty night
+with a moaning wind), the inordinate quantity of odd-
+looking shadows, and the profound silence, were
+immediately destructive to buoyancy and ultimately trying
+to scepticism.
+
+"I wish ze piper vould play," whispered the Baron.
+
+"Mebbe he'll begin nearer the time," his companion
+suggested.
+
+The Baron shivered.  For the first time he had been
+persuaded to wear the full panoply of a Highland
+chief, and though he had exhibited himself to the ladies
+with much pride, and even in the course of dinner had
+promised Eva Gallosh that he would never again don
+anything less romantic, he now began to think that a
+travelling-rug of the Tulliwuddle tartan would prove
+a useful addition to the outfit on the occasion of a
+midnight vigil.  Also the stern prohibition against
+talking aloud (corroborated by the piper with many
+guttural warnings) grew more and more irksome as
+the night advanced.
+
+"It's an awesome place," whispered Mr. Gallosh.
+
+"I hardly thought it would have been as lonesome-
+like."
+
+There was a tremor in his voice that irritated the
+Baron.
+
+"Pooh!" he answered, "it is jost vun old piece of
+hombog!  I do not believe in soch things myself."
+
+"Neither do I, my lord; oh, neither do I; but--
+would you fancy a dram?"
+
+"Not for me, I zank you," said his lordship stiffly.
+
+Blessing the foresight of Mr. Rentoul, his host
+unscrewed his flask and had a generous swig.  As he was
+screwing on the top again, the Baron, in a less haughty
+voice, whispered
+
+"Perhaps jost vun leetle taste."
+
+They felt now for a few minutes more aggressively
+disposed.
+
+"Ve need not have ze curtain shut," said the Baron. 
+"Soppose you do draw him?"
+
+Through the gloom Mr. Gallosh took one or two
+faltering steps.
+
+"Man, it's awful hard to see one's way," he said
+nervously.
+
+The Baron took the candle, and with a martial stride
+escorted him to the window.  They pulled aside one
+corner of the heavy curtain, and then let it fall again
+and hurried back.  So far north there was indeed a
+gleam of daylight left, but it was such a pale and
+ghostly ray, and the wreaths of mist swept so eerily
+and silently across the pane, that candle-light and shadows
+seemed vastly preferable.
+
+"How much more time will there be?" whispered
+Mr. Gallosh presently.
+
+"It is twenty-five minutes to twelve."
+
+"Your lordship!  Can we leave at twelve?"
+
+The Baron started.
+
+"Oh, Himmel!" he exclaimed.  "Vy did I not realize
+before?  If nozing comes--and nozing vill come--ve
+most stay till one, I soppose."
+
+Mr. Gallosh emitted something like a groan.
+
+"Oh my, and that candle will not last more than
+half an hour at the most!"
+
+"Teufel!" said the Baron.  "It vas Bonker did
+give him to me.  He might have made a more proper
+calculation."
+
+The prospect was now gloomy indeed.  An hour
+of candle-light had been bad, but an hour of pitch
+darkness or of mist wreaths would be many times
+worse.
+
+"A wee tastie more, my lord?" Mr. Gallosh
+suggested, in a voice whose vibrations he made an effort
+to conceal.
+
+"Jost a vee," said his lordship, hardly more firmly.
+
+With a dismal disregard for their suspense the minutes
+dragged infinitely slowly.  The flask was finished;
+the candle guttered and flickered ominously; the very
+shadows grew restless.
+
+"There's a lot of secret doors and such like in this
+part of the house--let's hope there'll be nothing coming
+through one of them," said Mr. Gallosh in a breaking voice.
+
+The Baron muttered an inaudible reply, and then
+with a start their shoulders bumped together.
+
+"Damn it, what's yon!" whispered Mr. Gallosh.
+
+"Ze pipes!  Gallosh, how beastly he does play!"
+
+In point of fact the air seemed to consist of only
+one wailing note.
+
+"Bong!"--they heard the first stroke of midnight
+on the big clock on the Castle Tower; and so unfortunately
+had Count Bunker timed the candle that on the
+instant its flame expired.
+
+"Vithdraw ze curtains!" gasped the Baron.
+
+"I canna, my lord!  Oh, I canna!" wailed Mr.
+Gallosh, breaking out into his broadest native Scotch.
+
+This time the Baron made no movement, and in the
+palpitating silence the two sat through one long dark
+minute after another, till some ten of them had passed.
+
+"I shall stand it no more!" muttered the Baron. 
+"Ve vill creep for ze door."
+
+"My lord, my lord!  For maircy's sake gie's a hold
+of you!" stammered Mr. Gallosh, falling on his hands
+and knees and feeling for the skirt of his lordship's
+kilt.
+
+But their flight was arrested by a portent so
+remarkable that had there been only a single witness one
+would suppose it to be a figment of his imagination. 
+Fortunately, however, both the Baron and Mr. Gallosh
+can corroborate each detail.  About the middle,
+apparently, of the wall opposite, an oblong of light
+appeared in the thickest of the gloom.
+
+"Mein Gott!" cried the Baron.
+
+"It's filled wi' reek!" gasped Mr. Gallosh.
+
+And indeed the space seemed filled with a slowly
+rising cloud of pungent blue smoke.  Then their horrified
+eyes beheld the figure of an undoubted Being hazily
+outlined behind the cloud, and at the same time the
+piper, as if sympathetically aware of the crisis, burst
+into his most dreadful discords.  A yell rang through
+the gloom, followed by the sounds of a heavy body
+alternately scuffling across the floor and falling
+prostrate over unseen furniture.  The Baron felt for his
+host, and realized that this was the escaping Gallosh.
+
+"Tulliwuddle!  Speak!" a hollow voice muttered
+out of the smoke.
+
+The Baron has never ceased to exult over the hardihood
+he displayed in this unnerving crisis.  Rising to
+his feet and drawing his claymore, he actually managed
+to stammer out--
+
+"Who--who are you?"
+
+The Being (he could now perceive dimly that it was
+clad in tartan) answered in the same deep, measured
+voice--
+
+          "Your senses to confound and fuddle,
+            Behold the Wraith of Tulliwuddle!"
+
+
+This was sufficiently terrifying, one would think, to
+excuse the Baron for following the example of his host.
+But, though he found afterwards that he must have
+perspired freely, he courageously stood his ground.
+
+"Vy have you gomed here?" he demanded in a voice
+nearly as hollow as the Wraith'
+
+As solemnly as before the spirit replied--
+
+          "From Pit that's bottomless and dark--
+            Methinks I hear it shrieking--Hark!"
+
+
+(The Baron certainly did hear a tumult that might
+well be termed infernal; though whether it emanated
+from Mr. Gallosh, fiends, or the piper, he could not at
+the moment feel certain.)
+
+          "I came o'er many leagues of heather
+            To carry back the answer whether
+            The noble chieftain of my clan
+            Conducts him like a gentleman."
+
+
+After this warning, to put the third question
+required an effort of the most supreme resolution.  The
+Baron was equal to it, however.
+
+"Vat instroction do you give me?" he managed to
+utter.
+
+In the gravest accents the Wraith chanted--
+
+          "Hang ever kilt above the knee,
+            With Usquebaugh be not too free,
+            When toasts and sic'like games be mooted
+            See that your dram be well diluted;
+            And oh, if you'd escape from Hades,
+            Lord Tulliwuddle, 'ware the ladies!"
+
+
+The spirit vanished as magically as he had appeared,
+and with this solemn warning ringing in his ears, the
+Baron found himself in inky darkness again.  This
+time he did not hesitate to grope madly for the door,
+but hardly had he reached it, when, with a fresh sensation
+of horror, he stumbled upon a writhing form that
+seemed to be pawing the panels.  He was, fortunately;
+as quickly reassured by hearing the voice of Mr. Gallosh
+exclaim in terrified accents--
+
+"I canna find the haundle!  Oh, Gosh, where's the
+haundle?"
+
+Being the less frenzied of the two, the Baron did
+succeed in finding the handle, and with a gasp of relief
+burst into the lighted anteroom.  The piper had
+already departed, and evidently in haste, since he had
+left some portion of a bottle of whisky unfinished. 
+This fortunate circumstance enabled them to recover
+something of their color, though, even when he felt his
+blood warming again, Mr. Gallosh could scarcely speak
+coherently of his terrible ordeal.
+
+"What an awfu' night! what an awfu' night!" he
+murmured.  "Oh, my lord, let's get out of this!"
+
+He was making for the door when the Baron seized
+his arm.
+
+"Vait!" he cried.  "Ze danger is past!  Ach, vas
+I not brave?  Did you not hear me speak to him?  You
+can bear vitness how brave I vas, eh?"
+
+"I'll not swear I heard just exactly what passed,
+my lord.  Man, I'll own I was awful feared!"
+
+"Tuts! tuts!" said the Baron kindly.  "Ve vill say
+nozing about zat.  You stood vell by me, I shall say. 
+And you vill tell zem I did speak mit courage to ze
+ghost."
+
+"I will that!" said Mr. Gallosh.
+
+By the time they reached the drawing-room he had
+so far recovered his equanimity as to prove a very
+creditable witness, and between them they gave such
+an account of their adventure as satisfied even the
+excited expectations of their friends; though the Baron
+thought it both prudent and more becoming his dignity
+to leave considerable mystery attaching to the precise
+revelations of his ancestral spirit.
+
+"Bot vere is Bonker?" he asked, suddenly noticing
+the absence of his friend.
+
+A moment later the Count entered and listened with
+the greatest interest to a second (and even more
+graphic) account of the adventure.  More intimate
+particulars still were confided to him when they had
+retired to their own room, and he appeared as surprised
+and impressed as any wraith-seer could desire.  As
+they parted for the night, the Baron started and
+sniffed at him.
+
+"Vat a strange smell you have!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Peat smoke, probably.  This fire wouldn't draw."
+
+"Strange!" mused the Baron.  "I did smell a leetle
+smell of zat before to-night."
+
+"Yes; one notices it all through the house with an
+east wind."
+
+This seemed to the Baron a complete explanation of
+the coincidence.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+At the house in Belgrave Square at present
+tenanted by the Baron and Baroness von
+Blitzenberg, an event of considerable
+importance had occurred.  This was nothing
+less than the arrival of the Countess of Grillyer upon
+a visit both of affection and state.  So important was
+she, and so great the attachment of her daughter, that
+the preparations for her reception would have served
+for a reigning sovereign.  But the Countess had an
+eye as quick and an appetite for respect as exacting
+as Queen Elizabeth, and she had no sooner embraced
+the Baroness and kissed her ceremoniously upon either
+cheek, than her glance appeared to seek something that
+she deemed should have been there also.
+
+"And where is Rudolph?" she demanded.  "Is he
+so very busy that he cannot spare a moment even to
+welcome me?"
+
+The Baroness changed color, but with as easy an air
+as she could assume she answered that Rudolph had
+most unfortunately been summoned from England.
+
+"Indeed?" observed the Countess, and the observation
+was made in a tone that suggested the advisability
+of a satisfactory explanation.
+
+This paragon among mothers and peeresses was a
+lady of majestic port, whose ascendant expression and
+commanding voice were commonly held to typify all
+that is best in the feudal system; or, in other words,
+to indicate that her opinions had never been contradicted
+in her life.  When one of these is a firm belief
+in the holder's divine rights and semi-divine origin, the
+effect is undoubtedly impressive.  And the Countess
+impressed.
+
+"My dear Alicia," said she, when they had settled
+down to tea and confidential talk, "you have not yet
+told me what has taken Rudolph abroad again so
+soon."
+
+On nothing had the Baron laid more stress than on
+the necessity of maintaining the most profound secrecy
+respecting his mission.  "No, not even to your mozzer
+most you say.  My love, you vill remember?" had been
+almost his very last words before departing for St.
+Petersburg.  His devoted wife had promised this not
+once, but many times, while his finger was being shaken
+at her, and would have scorned herself had she thought
+it possible to break her vows.
+
+"That is a secret, mamma," she declared.
+
+Her mother opened her eyes.
+
+"A secret from me, Alicia?"
+
+"Rudolph made me promise."
+
+"Not to tell your friends--but that hardly was
+intended to include your mother."
+
+The Baroness looked uncomfortable.
+
+"I--I'm afraid----" she began, and stopped in
+hesitation.
+
+"Did he specifically include me?" demanded the
+Countess in an altered tone.
+
+"I think, mamma, he did," her daughter faltered.
+
+"Ah!"
+
+And there was a world of meaning in that comment.
+
+"Believe me, mamma, it is something very, very
+important, or Rudolph would certainly have let me tell
+you all about it."
+
+Lady Grillyer opened her eyes still wider.
+
+"Then I am to understand that he wishes to conceal
+from me anything that he considers of importance?"
+
+"Oh, no!  Not that!  I only mean that this thing
+is very secret."
+
+"Alicia," pronounced the Countess, "when a man
+specifically conceals anything from his mother-in-law,
+you may be quite certain that she ought to be informed
+of it at once."
+
+"I--I can't, mamma!"
+
+"A trip to Germany--for it is there, I presume, he
+has gone--back to the scenes of his bachelorhood,
+unprotected by the influence of his wife!  Do you call
+that a becoming procedure?"
+
+"But he hasn't gone to Germany."
+
+"He has no business anywhere else!"
+
+"You forget his diplomatic duties."
+
+"Ah!  He professes to have gone on diplomatic
+business?"
+
+"Professes, mamma?" exclaimed the poor Baroness. 
+"How can you say such a thing!  He certainly has
+gone on a diplomatic mission!"
+
+"To Paris, no doubt?" suggested Lady Grillyer,
+with an intonation that made it quite impossible not to
+contradict her.
+
+"Certainly not!  He has gone to Russia."
+
+The more the Countess learned, the more anxious
+she appeared to grow.
+
+"To Russia, on a diplomatic mission?  This is
+incredible, Alicia!"
+
+"Why should it be incredible?" demanded Alicia,
+flushing.
+
+"Because he is a mere tyro in diplomacy.  Because
+there is a German embassy at Petersburg, and they
+would not send a man from London on a mission--at
+least, it is most unlikely."
+
+"It seems to me quite natural," declared the
+Baroness.
+
+She was showing more fight than her mother had
+ever encountered from her before, and the opposition
+seemed to inflame Lady Grillyer's resentment against
+the unfilial couple.
+
+"You know nothing about it!  What is this mission
+about?"
+
+"That certainly is a secret," said Alicia, relieved
+that there was something left to keep her promise over.
+
+"Has he gone alone?"
+
+"I--I mustn't tell you, mamma."
+
+Alicia's face betrayed this subterfuge.
+
+"You do not know yourself, Alicia," said the
+Countess incisively.  "And so you need no longer
+pretend to be keeping a secret from me.  It now becomes
+our joint business to discover the actual truth.  Do
+not attempt to wrangle with me further!  This
+investigation is necessary for your peace of mind, dear."
+
+The unfortunate Baroness dropped a silent tear. 
+Her peace of mind had been serenely undisturbed till
+this moment, and now it was only broken by the
+thought of her husband's displeasure should he ever
+learn how she had disobeyed his injunctions.  Further
+investigation was the very last thing to cure it, she
+said to herself bitterly.  She looked piteously at her
+parent, but there she only saw an expression of
+concentrated purpose.
+
+"Have you any reason, Alicia, to suspect an
+attachment--an affair of any kind?"
+
+"Mamma!"
+
+"Do not jump in that excitable manner.  Think
+quietly.  He has evidently returned to Germany for
+some purpose which he wishes to conceal from us: the
+natural supposition is that a woman is at the bottom
+of it."
+
+"Rudolph is incapable----"
+
+"No man is incapable who is in the full possession
+of his faculties.  I know them perfectly."
+
+"But, mamma, I cannot bear to think of such a
+thing!"
+
+"That is a merely middle-class prejudice.  I can't
+imagine where you have picked it up."
+
+In point of fact, during Alicia's girlhood Lady
+Grillyer had always been at the greatest pains to preserve
+her daughter's innocent simplicity, as being preeminently
+a more marketable commodity than precocious
+worldliness.  But if reminded of this she would probably
+have retorted that consistency was middle-class
+also.
+
+"I have no reason to suspect anything of the sort,"
+the Baroness declared emphatically.
+
+Her mother indulged her with a pitying smile and
+inquired--
+
+"What other explanation can you offer?  Among
+his men friends is there anyone likely to lead him into
+mischief?"
+
+"None--at least----"
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"He promised me he would avoid Mr. Bunker--I
+mean Mr. Essington."
+
+The Countess started.  She had vivid and exceedingly
+distasteful recollections of Mr. Bunker.
+
+"That man!  Are they still acquainted?"
+
+"Acquainted--oh yes; but I give Rudolph credit
+for more sense and more truthfulness than to renew
+their friendship."
+
+The Countess pondered with a very grave expression
+upon her face, while Alicia gently wiped her eyes and
+ardently wished that her honest Rudolph was here to
+defend his character and refute these baseless insinuations. 
+At length her mother said with a brisker air--
+
+"Ah! I know exactly what we must do.  I shall
+make a point of seeing Sir Justin Wallingford tomorrow."
+
+"Sir Justin Wallingford!"
+
+"If anybody can obtain private information for us
+he can.  We shall soon learn whether the Baron has
+been sent to Russia."
+
+Alicia uttered a cry of protest.  Sir Justin, ex-
+diplomatist, author of a heavy volume of Victorian
+reminiscences, and confidant of many public personages,
+was one of her mother's oldest friends; but to
+her he was only one degree less formidable than the
+Countess, and quite the last person she would have
+chosen for consultation upon this, or indeed upon any
+other subject.
+
+"I am not going to intrust my husband's secrets to
+him!" she exclaimed.
+
+"I am," replied the Countess.
+
+"But I won't allow it!  Rudolph would be----"
+
+"Rudolph has only himself to blame.  My dear
+Alicia, you can trust Sir Justin implicitly.  When my
+child's happiness is at stake I would consult no one
+who was not discretion itself.  I am very glad I
+thought of him."
+
+The Baroness burst into tears.
+
+"My child, my child!" said her mother compassionately. 
+"The world is no Garden of Eden, however
+much we may all try to make it so."
+
+"You--you don't se--seem to be trying now,
+mamma."
+
+"May Heaven forgive you, my darling,"
+pronounced the Countess piously.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+"Sir Justin," said the Countess firmly, "please
+tell my daughter exactly what you have discovered."
+
+Sir Justin Wallingford sat in the drawing-
+room at Belgrave Square with one of these ladies on
+either side of him.  He was a tall, gaunt man with a
+grizzled black beard, a long nose, and such a formidably
+solemn expression that ambitious parents were in
+the habit of wishing that their offspring might some
+day be as wise as Sir Justin Wallingford looked.  His
+fund of information was prodigious, while his reasoning
+powers were so remarkable that he had never been
+known to commit the slightest action without furnishing
+a full and adequate explanation of his conduct. 
+Thus the discrimination shown by the Countess in
+choosing him to restore a lady's peace of mind will at
+once be apparent.
+
+"The results of my inquiries," he pronounced,
+"have been on the whole of a negative nature.  If this
+mission on which the Baron von Blitzenberg professes
+to be employed is in fact of an unusually delicate
+nature, it is just conceivable that the answer I received
+from Prince Gommell-Kinchen, when I sounded him at
+the Khalifa's luncheon, may have been intended merely
+to throw dust in my eyes.  At the same time, his
+highness appeared to speak with the candor of a man who
+has partaken, not excessively, you understand, but I
+may say freely, of the pleasures of the table."
+
+He looked steadily first at one lady and then at the
+other, to let this point sink in.
+
+"And what did the Prince say?" asked the Baroness,
+who, in spite of her supreme confidence in her husband,
+showed a certain eager nervousness inseparable from a
+judicial inquiry.
+
+"He told me--I merely give you his word, and
+not my own opinion; you perfectly understand that,
+Baroness?"
+
+"Oh yes," she answered hurriedly.
+
+"He informed me that, in fact, the Baron had been
+obliged to ask for a fortnight's leave of absence to
+attend to some very pressing and private business in
+connection with his Silesian estates."
+
+"I think, Alicia, we may take that as final," said
+her mother decisively.
+
+"Indeed _I_ shan't!" cried Alicia warmly.  "That
+was just an excuse, of course.  Rudolph's business is
+so very delicate that--that--well, that you could only
+expect Prince Gommell-Kinchen to say something of
+that sort."
+
+"What do you say to that, Sir Justin?" demanded
+the Countess.
+
+With the air of a man doing what was only his duty,
+he replied--
+
+"I say that I think it is improbable.  In fact, since
+you demand to know the truth, I may inform you that
+the Prince added that leave of absence was readily
+given, since the Baron's diplomatic duties are merely
+nominal.  To quote his own words, 'Von Blitzenberg
+is a nice fellow, and it pleases the English ladies to
+play with him.' "
+
+Even Lady Grillyer was a trifle taken aback at this
+description of her son-in-law, while Alicia turned scarlet
+with anger.
+
+"I don't believe he said anything of the sort!" she
+cried.  "You both of you only want to hurt me and
+insult Rudolph!  I won't stand it!"
+
+She was already on her feet to leave them, when
+her mother stopped her, and Sir Justin hastened to
+explain.
+
+"No reflection upon the Baron's character was
+intended, I assure you.  The Prince merely meant to
+imply that he represented the social rather than the
+business side of the embassy.  And both are equally
+necessary, I assure you--equally essential, Baroness,
+believe me."
+
+"In fact," said the Countess, "the remark comes to
+this, that Rudolph would never be sent to Russia, whatever
+else they might expect of him."
+
+Even through their tears Alicia's eyes brightened
+with triumph.
+
+"But he HAS gone, mamma!  I got a letter from
+him this morning--from St. Petersburg!"
+
+The satisfaction of her two physicians on hearing
+this piece of good news took the form of a start which
+might well have been mistaken for mere astonishment,
+or even for dismay.
+
+"And you did not tell ME of it!" cried her mother.
+
+"Rudolph did not wish me to.  I have only told you
+now to prove how utterly wrong you both are."
+
+"Let me see this letter!"
+
+"Indeed, mamma, I won't!"
+
+The two ladies looked at one another with such
+animosity that Sir Justin felt called upon to interfere.
+
+"Suppose the Baroness were to read us as much as
+is necessary to convince us that there is no possibility
+of a mistake," he suggested.
+
+So profoundly did the Countess respect his advice
+that she graciously waived her maternal rights so far
+as actually following the text with her eyes went; while
+her daughter, after a little demur, was induced to
+depart this one step further from her husband's injunctions.
+
+"You have no objections to my glancing at the
+post-mark?" said Sir Justin when this point was
+settled.
+
+With a toss of her head the Baroness silently handed
+him the envelope.
+
+"It seems correct," he observed cautiously.
+
+"But post-marks can be forged, can't they?"
+inquired the Countess.
+
+"I fear they can," he admitted, with a sorrowful air.
+
+Scorning to answer this insinuation, the Baroness
+proceeded to read aloud the following extracts
+
+" 'I travelled with comfort through Europe, and
+having by many countries passed, such as Germany
+and others, I arrived, my dear Alicia, in Russia.' "
+
+"Is that all he says about his journey?" interrupted
+Lady Grillyer.
+
+"It is certainly a curiously insufficient description
+of a particularly interesting route," commented Sir
+Justin.
+
+"It almost seems as if he didn't know what other
+countries lie between England and Russia," added the
+Countess.
+
+"It only means that he knows geography doesn't
+interest me!" replied Alicia.  "And he does say more
+about his journey--'Alone by myself, in a carriage
+very quietly I travelled.'  And again--'To be observed
+not wishing, and strict orders being given to me, with
+no man I spoke all the way.'  There!"
+
+"That certainly makes it more difficult to check his
+statements," Sir Justin admitted.
+
+"Ah, he evidently thought of that!" said the
+Countess.  "If he had said there was anyone with him, we
+could have asked him afterwards who it was.  What a
+pity!  Read on, my child--we are vastly interested."
+
+Thus encouraged, the Baroness continued
+
+" 'In Russia the crops are good, and from my
+window with pleasure I observe them.  Petersburg is a
+nice town, and I have a pleasant apartment in it!' "
+
+"What!" exclaimed the Countess.  "He is looking
+at the crops from his window in St. Petersburg!"
+
+Sir Justin grimly pursed his lips, but his silence was
+more ominous than speech.  In fact, the Baron's
+unfortunate effort at realism by the introduction of his
+window struck the first blow at his wife's implicit trust
+in him.  She was evidently a little disconcerted, though
+she stoutly declared--
+
+"He is evidently living in the suburbs, mamma."
+
+"Will you be so kind as to read on a little farther?"
+interposed Sir Justin in a grave voice.
+
+" 'The following reflections have I made.  Russia is
+very large and cold, where people in furs are to be
+seen, and sledges.  Bombs are thrown sometimes, and
+the marine is not good when it does drink too much.' 
+Now, mamma, he must have seen these things or he
+wouldn't put them in his letter."
+
+The Baroness broke of somewhat hurriedly to make
+this comment, almost indeed as though she felt it to
+be necessary.  As for her two comforters, they looked
+at one another with so much sorrow that their eyes
+gleamed and their lips appeared to smile.
+
+"The Baron did not write that letter in Russia,"
+said Sir Justin decisively.  "Furs are not worn in
+summer, nor do the inhabitants travel in sledges at this
+time of the year."
+
+"But--but he doesn't say he actually saw them,"
+pleaded the Baroness.
+
+"Then that remark, just like the rest of his reflections,
+makes utter nonsense," rejoined her mother.
+
+"Is that all?" inquired Sir Justin.
+
+"Almost all--all that is important," faltered the
+Baroness.
+
+"Let us hear the rest," said her mother inexorably.
+
+"There is only a postscript, and that merely says--
+'The flask that you filled I thank you for; it was so
+large that it was sufficient for----'  I can't read the
+last word."
+
+"Let me see it, Alicia."
+
+A few minutes ago Alicia would have torn the
+precious letter up rather than let another eye fall upon
+it.  That her devotion was a little disturbed was proved
+by her allowing her two advisers to study even a single
+sentence.  Keeping her hand over the rest, she showed
+it to them.  They bent their brows, and then simultaneously
+exclaimed--
+
+" 'Us both!' "
+
+"Oh, it can't be!" cried the poor Baroness.
+
+"It is absolutely certain," said her mother in a
+terrible voice--" 'It was so large that it was sufficient
+for us both!' "
+
+"There is no doubt about it," corroborated Sir
+Justin sternly.  "The unfortunate young man has
+inadvertently confessed his deception."
+
+"It cannot be!" murmured the Baroness.  "He
+said at the beginning that he travelled quite alone."
+
+"That is precisely what condemns him," said her
+mother.
+
+"Precisely," reiterated Sir Justin.
+
+The Baroness audibly sobbed, while the two patchers
+of her peace of mind gazed at her commiserately.
+
+"What am I to do?" she asked at length.  "I can't
+believe he really----  But how am I to find out?"
+
+"I shall make further investigations," promptly
+replied Sir Justin.
+
+"And I also," added the Countess.
+
+"Meanwhile," said Sir Justin, "we shall be
+exceedingly interested to learn what further particulars of
+his wanderings the Baron supplies you with."
+
+"Yes," observed the Countess, "he can fortunately
+be trusted to betray himself.  You will inform me,
+Alicia, as soon as you hear from him again."
+
+Her daughter made no reply.
+
+Sir Justin rose and bade them a grave farewell.
+
+"In my daughter's name I thank you cordially,"
+said the Countess, as she pressed his hand.
+
+"Anything I have done has been a pleasure to me,"
+he assured them with a sincerity there was no mistaking.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+In an ancient and delightful garden, where glimpses
+of the loch below gleamed through a mass of
+summer foliage, and the gray castle walls looked
+down on smooth, green glades, the Baron slowly
+paced the shaven turf.  But he did not pace it quite
+alone, for by his side moved a graceful figure in a
+wide, sun-shading hat and a frock entirely irresistible. 
+Beneath the hat, by bending a little down, you could
+have seen the dark liquid eyes and tender lips of Eva
+Gallosh.  And the Baron frequently bent down.
+
+"I am proud of everyzing zat I find in my home,"
+said the Baron gallantly.
+
+The lady's color rose, but not apparently in anger.
+
+"Ach, here is a pretty leetle seat!" he exclaimed in
+a tone of pleased discovery, just as though he had not
+been leading her insidiously towards it ever since they,
+came into the garden.
+
+It was, indeed, a most shady and secluded bench, an
+ideal seat for any gallant young Baron who had left
+his Baroness sufficiently far away.  He glanced down
+complacently upon his brawny knees, displayed (he
+could not but think) to great advantage beneath his
+kilt and sporran, and then with a tenderer complacency,
+turned his gaze upon his fair companion.
+
+"You say you like me in ze tartan?" he murmured.
+
+"I adore everything Highland!  Oh, Lord Tulliwuddle,
+how fortunate you are!"
+
+Nature had gifted Miss Gallosh with a generous
+share of romantic sentiment.  It was she who had
+egged on her father to rent this Highland castle for
+the summer, instead of chartering a yacht as he had
+done for the past few years; and ever since they had
+come here that sentiment had grown, till she was
+ready to don the white cockade and plot a new Jacobite
+uprising.  Then, while her heart was in this
+inspired condition, a noble young chief had stepped in
+to complete the story.  No wonder her dark eyes
+burned.
+
+"What attachment you must feel for each stone of
+the Castle!" she continued in a rapt voice.  "How
+your heart must beat to remember that your great-
+grandfather--wasn't his name Fergus?"
+
+"Fergus: yes," said the Baron, blindly but
+promptly.
+
+"No, no; it was Ian, of course."
+
+"Ach, so!  Ian he vas."
+
+"You were thinking of his father," she smiled.
+
+"Yes, his fazzer."
+
+She reflected sagely.
+
+"I am afraid I get my facts mixed up some
+times.  Ian--ah, Reginald came before him--not
+Fergus!"
+
+"Reginald--oh yes, so he did!"
+
+She looked a trifle disappointed.
+
+"If I were you I should know them all by heart,"
+said she.
+
+"I vill learn zem.  Oh yes, I most not make soch
+mistakes."
+
+Indeed he registered a very sincere vow to study his
+family history that afternoon.
+
+"What was I saying?  Oh yes--about your brave
+great-grandfather.  Do you know, Lord Tulliwuddle,
+I want to ask you a strange favor?  You won't think
+it very odd of me?"
+
+"Odd?  Never!  Already it is granted."
+
+"I want to hear from your own lips--from the lips
+of an actual Lord Tulliwuddle--the story of your
+ancestor Ian's exploit."
+
+With beseeching eyes and a face flushed with a sense
+of her presumption, she uttered this request in a voice
+that tore the Baron with conflicting emotions.
+
+"Vich exploit do you mean?" he asked in a kindly
+voice but with a troubled eye.
+
+"You must know!  When he defended the pass, of
+course."
+
+"Ach, so!"
+
+The Baron looked at her, and though he boasted of
+no such inventive gifts as his friend Bunker, his ardent
+heart bade him rather commit himself to perdition than
+refuse.
+
+"You will tell it to me?"
+
+"I vill!"
+
+Making as much as possible of the raconteur's
+privileges of clearing his throat, settling himself into good
+position, and gazing dreamily at the tree-tops for
+inspiration, he began in a slow, measured voice--
+
+"In ze pass he stood.  Zen gomed his enemies.  He
+fired his gon and shooted some dead.  Zen did zey run
+avay.  Zat vas vat happened."
+
+When he ventured to meet her candid gaze after
+thus lamely libelling his forefather, he was horrified to
+observe that she had already recoiled some feet away
+from him, and seemed still to be in the act of recoiling.
+
+"It would have been kinder to tell me at once that
+I had asked too much!" she exclaimed in a voice
+affected by several emotions.  "I only wanted to hear
+you repeat his death-cry as his foes slew him, so that
+it might always seem more real to me.  And you snub
+me like this!"
+
+The Baron threw himself upon one knee.
+
+"Forgive me!  I did jost lose mine head mit your
+eyes looking so at me!  I get confused, you are so
+lovely!  I did not mean to snob!"
+
+In the ardor of his penitence he discovered himself
+holding her hand; she no longer seemed to be recoiling;
+and Heaven knows what might have happened next if
+an ostentatious sound of whistling had not come to
+their rescue.
+
+"Bot you vill forgive?" he whispered, as they
+sprang up from their shady seat.
+
+"Ye-es," she answered, just as the serene glance of
+Count Bunker fell humorously upon them.
+
+"You seem to have been plucking flowers,
+Tulliwuddle," he observed.
+
+"Flowers?  Oh, no."
+
+The Count glanced pointedly at his soiled knee.
+
+"Indeed!" said he.  "Don't I see traces of a
+flower-bed?"
+
+"I think I should go in," murmured Eva, and she
+was gone before the Count had time to frame a compensating
+speech.
+
+His friend Tulliwuddle looked at him with marked
+displeasure, yet seemed to find some difficulty in
+adequately expressing it.
+
+"I do not care for vat you said," he remarked
+stiffly.  "Nor for ze look now on your face."
+
+"Baron," said the Count imperturbably, "what did
+you tell me the Wraith said to you--something about
+'Beware of the ladies,' wasn't it?"
+
+"You do not onderstand.  Ze ghost" (he found
+some difficulty in pronouncing the spirit's chosen name)
+"did soppose naturally zat I vas ze real Lord Tollyvoddle,
+who is, as you have told me yourself, Bonker,
+somezing of a fast fish.  Ze varning vas to him
+obviously, so you should not turn it upon me."
+
+Bunker opened his eyes.
+
+"A deuced ingenious argument," he commented. 
+"It wouldn't have occurred to me if you hadn't
+explained.  Then you claim the privilege of wooing whom
+you wish?"
+
+"Wooing!  You forget zat I am married, Bonker."
+
+"Oh no, I remember perfectly."
+
+His tone disturbed the Baron.  Taking the Count's
+arm, he said to him with moving earnestness--
+
+"Have I not told you how constant I am--like ze
+magnet and ze pole?"
+
+"I have heard you employ the simile."
+
+"Ach, bot it is true!  I am inside my heart so
+constant as it is possible!  But I now represent
+Tollyvoddle, and for his sake most try to do my
+best."
+
+Again Count Bunker glanced at his knee.
+
+"And that is your best, then?"
+
+"Listen, Bonker, and try to onderstand--not jost
+to make jokes.  It appears to me zat Miss Gallosh vill
+make a good vife to Tollyvoddle.  She is so fair, so
+amiable, and so rich.  Could he do better?  Should I
+not lay ze foundations of a happy marriage mit
+her?  Soppose ve do get her instead of Miss Maddison,
+eh?"
+
+His artful eloquence seemed to impress his friend,
+for he smiled thoughtfully and did not reply at once. 
+More persuasively than ever the Baron continued--
+
+"I do believe mit patience and mit--er--mit
+kindness, Bonker, I might persuade Miss Gallosh to listen
+to ze proposal of Tollyvoddle.  And vould it not be
+better far to get him a lady of his own people, and not
+a stranger from America?  Ve vill not like Miss Maddison,
+I feel sure.  Vy troble mit her--eh, Bonker?"
+
+"But don't you think, Baron, that we ought to give
+Tulliwuddle his choice?  He may prefer an American
+heiress to a Scottish."
+
+"Not if he sees Eva Gallosh!"
+
+Again the Count gently raised his eyebrows in a
+way that the Baron could not help considering unsuitable
+to the occasion.
+
+"On the other hand, Baron, Miss Maddison will
+probably have five or ten times as much money as Miss
+Gallosh.  In arranging a marriage for another man,
+one must attend to such trifles as a few million dollars
+more or less."
+
+For the moment the Baron was silenced, but
+evidently not convinced.
+
+"Supposing I were to call upon the Maddisons
+as your envoy?" suggested Bunker, who, to tell the
+truth, had already begun to tire of a life of luxurious
+inaction.
+
+"Pairhaps in a few days we might gonsider it."
+
+"We have been here for a week already."
+
+"Ven vould you call?"
+
+"To-morrow, for instance."
+
+The Baron frowned; but argument was difficult.
+
+"You only jost vill go to see?"
+
+"And report to you."
+
+"And suppose she is ogly--or not so nice--or so
+on----zen vill I not see her, eh?"
+
+"But suppose she is tolerable?"
+
+"Zen vill ve give him a choice, and I vill continue
+to be polite to Miss Gallosh.  Ah, Bonker, she is so
+nice!  He vill not like Miss Maddison so vell! 
+Himmel, I do admire her!"
+
+The Baron's eyes shone with reminiscent affection.
+
+"To how many poles is the magnet usually
+constant?" inquired the Count with a serious air.
+
+The Baron smiled a little foolishly, and then, with
+a confidential air, replied--
+
+"Ach, Bonker, marriage is blessed and it is happy,
+and it is everyzing that my heart desires; only I jost
+sometimes vish it vas not qvite--qvite so uninterruptable!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+In a dog-cart borrowed from his obliging host,
+Count Bunker approached the present residence
+of Mr. Darius P. Maddison.  He saw, and--in
+his client's interest--noted with approval the
+efforts that were being made to convert an ordinary
+fishing-lodge into a suitable retreat for a gentleman
+worth so many million dollars.  "Corryvohr," as the
+house was originally styled, or "Lincoln Lodge," as
+the patriotic Silver King had re-named it, had already
+been enlarged for his reception by the addition of four
+complete suites of apartments, each suitable for a
+nobleman and his retinue, an organ hall, 10,000 cubic
+yards of scullery accommodation, and a billiard-room
+containing three tables.  But since he had taken up
+his residence there he had discovered the lack of
+several other essentials for a quiet "mountain life" (as
+he appropriately phrased it), and these defects were
+rapidly being remedied as our friend drove up.  The
+conservatory was already completed, with the exception
+of the orchid and palm houses; the aviary was
+practically ready, and several crates of the rarer
+humming-birds were expected per goods train that
+evening; while a staff of electricians could be seen
+erecting the private telephone by which Mr. Maddison
+proposed to keep himself in touch with the silver
+market.
+
+The Count had no sooner pressed the electric bell
+than a number of men-servants appeared, sufficient to
+conduct him in safety to a handsome library fitted with
+polished walnut, and carpeted as softly as the moss on
+a mountain-side.  Having sent in his card, he entertained
+himself by gazing out of the window and wondering
+what strange operation was being conducted on
+a slope above the house, where a grove of pines were
+apparently being rocked to and fro by a concourse of
+men with poles and pulleys.  But he had not to wait
+long, for with a promptitude that gave one some inkling
+of the secret of Mr. Maddison's business success,
+the millionaire entered.
+
+In a rapid survey the Count perceived a tall man in
+the neighborhood of sixty: gray-haired, gray-eyed,
+and gray-faced.  The clean-shaved and well-cut profile
+included the massive foundation of jaw which Bunker
+had confidently anticipated, and though his words
+sounded florid in a European ear, they were uttered
+in a voice that corresponded excellently with this
+predominant chin.
+
+"I am very pleased to see you, sir, very pleased
+indeed," he assured the Count not once but several times,
+shaking him heartily by the hand and eyeing him with
+a glance accustomed to foresee several days before his
+fellows the probable fluctuations in the price of anything.
+
+"I have taken the liberty of calling upon you in
+the capacity of Lord Tulliwuddle's confidential friend,"
+the Count began.  "He is at present, as you may
+perhaps have learned, visiting his ancestral possessions----"
+
+"My dear sir, for some days we have been expecting
+his lordship and yourself to honor us with a visit,"
+Mr. Maddison interposed.  "You need not trouble to
+introduce yourself.  The name of Count Bunker is
+already familiar to us."
+
+He bowed ceremoniously as he spoke, and the Count
+with no less politeness laid his hand upon his heart
+and bowed also.
+
+"I looked forward to the meeting with pleasure,"
+he replied.  "But it has already exceeded my anticipations."
+
+He would have still further elaborated these assurances,
+but with his invariable tact he perceived a shrewd
+look in the millionaire's eye that warned him he had to
+do with a man accustomed to flowery preliminaries
+from the astutest manipulators of a deal.
+
+"I am only sorry you should find our little cottage
+in such disorder," said Mr. Maddison.  "The contractor
+for the conservatory undertook to erect it in
+a week, and my only satisfaction is that he is now
+paying me a forfeit of 500 dollars a day.  As for the
+electricians in this country, sir, they are not incompetent
+men, but they must be taught to hustle if they
+are to work under American orders; and I don't quite
+see how they are to find a job anyways else."
+
+He turned to the window with a more satisfied air.
+
+"Here, however, you will perceive a tolerably
+satisfactory piece of work.  I guess those trees will be ready
+pretty near as soon as the capercailzies are ready for
+them."
+
+Count Bunker opened his eyes.
+
+"Do I understand that you are erecting a pine
+wood?"
+
+"You do.  That fir forest is my daughter's notion. 
+She thought ordinary plane-trees looked kind of
+unsuitable for our mountain home.  The land of Burns
+and of the ill-fated Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee,
+should have more appropriate foliage than that!  Well,
+sir, it took four hundred men just three days to remove
+the last traces of the last root of the last of those
+plane-trees."
+
+"And the pines, I suppose, you brought from a
+neighboring wood?" said the Count, patriotically
+endeavoring not to look too dumbfoundered.
+
+"No, sir.  Lord Tulliwuddle's factor was too slow
+for me--said he must consult his lordship before
+removing the timber on the estate.  I cabled to Norway:
+the trees arrived yesterday in Aberdeen, and I guess
+half of them are as near perpendicular by now as a
+theodolite can make them.  They are being erected, sir,
+on scientific principles."
+
+Restraining his emotion with a severe effort, Bunker
+quietly observed
+
+"Very good idea.  I don't know that it would have
+occurred to me to land them at Aberdeen."
+
+From the corner of his eye he saw that his composure
+had produced a distinct impression, but he
+found it hard to retain it through the Silver King's
+next statement.
+
+"You have taken a long lease of Lincoln Lodge, I
+presume?" he inquired.
+
+"One year," said Mr. Maddison.  "But I reckon to
+be comfortable if I'm spending twenty minutes at a
+railroad junction."
+
+"Ah!" responded the Count, "in that case shifting
+a forest must be child's-play."
+
+The millionaire smiled affably at this pleasantry and
+invited his guest to be seated.
+
+"You will try something American, I hope, Count
+Bunker?" he asked, touching the bell.
+
+Count Bunker, rightly conceiving this to indicate a
+cock-tail, replied that he would, and in as nearly seven
+and a half seconds as he could calculate, a tray
+appeared with two of these remarkable compounds. 
+Following his host's example, the Count threw his down
+at a gulp.
+
+"The same," said Mr. Maddison simply.  And in an
+almost equally brief space the same arrived.
+
+"Now," said he, when they were alone again, "I
+hope you will pardon me, Count, if I am discourteous
+enough to tell you that my time is uncomfortably
+cramped.  When I first came here I found that I was
+expected to stand upon the shore of the river for two
+hours on the chance of catching one salmon.  But I
+have changed all that.  As soon as I step outside my
+door, my ghillie brings me my rod, and if there ain't
+a salmon at the end for me to land, another ghillie will
+receive his salary.  Since lunch I have caught a fish,
+despatched fifteen cablegrams, and dictated nine
+letters.  I am only on holiday here, and if I don't get
+through double that amount in the next two hours I
+scarcely see my way to do much more fishing to-day. 
+That being so, let us come right to the point.  You
+bring some kind of proposition from Lord Tulliwuddle,
+I guess?"
+
+During his drive the Count had cogitated over a
+number of judicious methods of opening the delicate
+business; but his adaptability was equal to the occasion. 
+In as business-like a tone as his host, he replied--
+
+"You are quite right, Mr. Maddison.  Lord
+Tulliwuddle has deputed me to open negotiations for a
+certain matrimonial project."
+
+Mr. Maddison's expression showed his appreciation
+of this candor and delicacy.
+
+"Well," said he, "to be quite frank, Count, I should
+have thought all the better of his lordship if he had
+been a little more prompt about the business."
+
+"It is not through want of admiration for Miss
+Maddison, I assure you----"
+
+"No," interrupted Mr. Maddison, "it is because he
+does not realize the value of time--which is considerably
+more valuable than admiration, I can assure you. 
+Since I discussed the matter with Lord Tulliwuddle's
+aunt we have had several more buyers--I should say,
+suitors--in the market--er--in the field, Count Bunker. 
+But so far, fortunately for his lordship, my
+Eleanor has not approved of the samples sent, and if
+he still cares to come forward we shall be pleased to
+consider his proposition."
+
+The millionaire looked at him out of an impenetrable
+eye; and the Count in an equally guarded tone
+replied
+
+"I greatly approve of putting things on so sound
+a footing, and with equal frankness I may tell you--
+in confidence, of course--that Lord Tulliwuddle also
+is not without alternatives.  He would, however, prefer
+to offer his title and estates to Miss Maddison,
+provided that there is no personal objection to be
+found on either side."
+
+Mr. Maddison's eye brightened and his tone warmed.
+
+"Sir," said he, "I guess there won't be much
+objection to Eleanor Maddison when your friend has seen
+her.  Without exaggeration, I may say that she is the
+most beautiful girl in America, and that is to say,
+the most beautiful girl anywhere.  The precise amount
+of her fortune we can discuss, supposing the necessity
+arrives: but I can assure you it will be sufficient to set
+three of your mortgaged British aristocrats upon their
+legs again.  No, sir, the objection will not come from
+THAT side!"
+
+With a gentle smile and a deprecatory gesture the
+Count answered, "I am convinced that Miss Maddison
+is all--indeed, more than all--your eloquence has
+painted.  On the other hand, I trust that you will not
+be disappointed in my friend Tulliwuddle."
+
+Mr. Maddison crossed his legs and interlocked his
+fingers like a man about to air his views.  This, in fact,
+was what he proceeded to do.
+
+"My opinion of aristocracies and the pampered
+individuals who compose them is the opinion of an
+intelligent and enlightened democrat.  I see them from
+the vantage-ground of a man who has made his own
+way in the world unhampered by ancestry, who has
+dwelt in a country fortunately unencumbered by such
+hindrances to progress, and who has no personal
+knowledge of their defects.  You will admit that I
+speak with unusual opportunities of forming a judgment?"
+
+"You should have the impartiality of a missionary,"
+said Bunker gravely.
+
+"That is so, sir.  Now, in proposing to marry my
+daughter to a member of this class, I am actuated
+solely by a desire to take advantage of the opportunities
+such an alliance would confer.  I am still perfectly
+clear?"
+
+"Perfectly," replied Bunker, with the same
+profound gravity.
+
+"In consequence," resumed the millionaire, with the
+impressiveness of a logician drawing a conclusion from
+two irrefutable premises--"in consequence, Count
+Bunker, I demand--and my daughter demands--and
+my son demands, sir, that the nobleman should possess
+an unusual number of high-class, fire-proof, expert-
+guaranteed qualities.  That is only fair, you must
+admit?"
+
+"I agree with you entirely."
+
+Mr. Maddison glanced at the clock and sprang to
+his feet.
+
+"I have not the pleasure of knowing my neighbor,
+Mr. Gallosh," he said, resuming his brisk business
+tone; "but I beg you to convey to him and to his
+wife and daughter my compliments--and my daughter's
+compliments--and tell them that we hope they
+will excuse ceremony and bring Lord Tulliwuddle to
+luncheon to-morrow."
+
+Count Bunker expressed his readiness to carry this
+message, and the millionaire even more briskly resumed--
+
+"I shall now give myself the pleasure of presenting
+you to my son and daughter."
+
+With his swiftest strides he escorted his
+distinguished guest to another room, flung the door open,
+announced, "My dears, Count Bunker!" and pressed
+the Count's hand even as he was effecting this introduction.
+
+"Very pleased to have met you, Count.  Good day,"
+he ejaculated, and vanished on the instant.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+Raising his eyes after the profound bow
+which the Count considered appropriate to
+his character of plenipotentiary, he beheld
+at last the object of his mission; and
+whether or not she was the absolutely peerless beauty
+her father had vaunted, he at once decided that she
+was lovely enough to grace Hechnahoul, or any other,
+Castle.  Black eyes and a mass of coal-black hair, an
+ivory pale skin, small well-chiselled features, and that
+distinctively American plumpness of contour--these
+marked her face; while as for her figure, it was the
+envy of her women friends and the distraction of all
+mankind who saw her.
+
+"Fortunate Baron!" thought Bunker.
+
+Beside her, though sufficiently in the rear to mark
+the relative position of the sexes in the society they
+adorned, stood Darius P. Maddison, junior--or "Ri,"
+in the phrase of his relatives and friends--a broad-
+shouldered, well-featured young man, with keen eyes,
+a mouth compressed with the stern resolve to die richer
+than Mr. Rockefeller, and a pair of perfectly ironed
+trousers.
+
+"I am very delighted to meet you," declared the
+heiress.
+
+"Very honored to have this pleasure," said the
+brother.
+
+"While I enjoy both sensations," replied the Count,
+with his most agreeable smile.
+
+A little preliminary conversation ensued, in the
+course of which the two parties felt an increasing
+satisfaction in one another's society; while Bunker had
+the further pleasure of enjoying a survey of the room
+in which they sat.  Evidently it was Miss Maddison's
+peculiar sanctum, and it revealed at once her taste and
+her power of gratifying it.  The tapestry that covered
+two sides of the room could be seen at a glance to be
+no mere modern imitation, but a priceless relic of the
+earlier middle ages.  The other walls were so thickly
+hung with pictures that one could scarcely see the pale-
+green satin beneath; and among these paintings the
+Count's educated eye recognized the work of Raphael,
+Botticelli, Turner, and Gainsborough among other
+masters; while beneath the cornice hung a well-chosen
+selection from the gems of the modern Anglo-American
+school.  The chairs and sofa were upholstered in a
+figured satin of a slightly richer hue of green, and on
+several priceless oriental tables lay displayed in ivory,
+silver, crystal, and alabaster more articles of vertu
+than were to be found in the entire house of an average
+collector.
+
+"Fortunate Tulliwuddle!" thought Bunker.
+
+They had been conversing on general topics for a
+few minutes, when Miss Maddison turned to her brother
+and said, with a frankness that both pleased and
+entertained the Count--
+
+"Ri, dear, don't you think we had better come right
+straight to the point?  I feel sure Count Bunker is
+only waiting till he knows us a little better, and I
+guess it will save him considerable embarrassment if
+we begin."
+
+"You are the best judge, Eleanor.  I guess your
+notions are never far of being all right."
+
+With a gratified smile Eleanor addressed the
+Count.
+
+"My brother and I are affinities," she said.  "You
+can speak to him just as openly as you can to me. 
+What is fit for me to hear is fit for him."
+
+Assuring her that he would not hesitate to act upon
+this guarantee if necessary, the Count nevertheless
+diplomatically suggested that he would sooner leave it
+to the lady to open the discussion.
+
+"Well," she said, "I suppose we may presume you
+have called here as Lord Tulliwuddle's friend?"
+
+"You may, Miss Maddison."
+
+"And no doubt he has something pretty definite to
+suggest?"
+
+"Matrimony," smiled the Count.
+
+Her brother threw him a stern smile of approval.
+
+"That's right slick THERE!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle has made a very happy selection
+in his ambassador," said Eleanor, with equal cordiality. 
+"People who are afraid to come to facts tire me.  No
+doubt you will think it strange and forward of me to
+talk in this spirit, Count, but if you'd had to go
+through the worry of being an American heiress in a
+European state you would sympathize.  Why, I'm
+hardly ever left in peace for twenty-four hours--am
+I, Ri?"
+
+"That is so," quoth Ri.
+
+"What would you guess my age to be, Count
+Bunker?"
+
+"Twenty-one," suggested Bunker, subtracting two
+or three years on general principles.
+
+"Well, you're nearer it than most people.  Nineteen
+on my last birthday, Count!"
+
+The Count murmured his surprise and pleasure, and
+Ri again declared, "That is so."
+
+"And it isn't the American climate that ages one,
+but the terrible persecutions of the British aristocracy! 
+I can be as romantic as any girl, Count Bunker; why,
+Ri, you remember poor Abe Sellar and the stolen
+shoe-lace?"
+
+"Guess I do!" said Ri.
+
+"That was a romance if ever there was one!  But
+I tell you, Count, sentiment gets rubbed off pretty
+quick when you come to a bankrupt Marquis writing
+three ill-spelled sheets to assure me of the disinterested
+affection inspired by my photograph, or a divorced
+Duke offering to read Tennyson to me if I'll hire a
+punt!"
+
+"I can well believe it," said the Count
+sympathetically.
+
+"Well, now," the heiress resumed, with a candid
+smile that made her cynicism become her charmingly,
+"you see how it is.  I want a man one can RESPECT,
+even if he is a peer.  He may have as many titles as
+dad has dollars, but he must be a MAN!"
+
+"That is so," said Ri, with additional emphasis.
+
+"I can guarantee Lord Tulliwuddle as a model for
+a sculptor and an eligible candidate for canonization,"
+declared the Count.
+
+"I guess we want something grittier than that,"
+said Ri.
+
+"And what there is of it sounds almost too good
+news to be true," added his sister.  "I don't want a
+man like a stained-glass window, Count; because for
+one thing I couldn't get him."
+
+"If you specify your requirements we shall do
+our best to satisfy you," replied the Count imperturbably.
+
+"Well, now," said Eleanor thoughtfully, "I may
+just as well tell you that if I'm going to take a peer--
+and I must own peers are rather my fancy at present
+--it was Mohammedan pashas last year, wasn't it,
+Ri?" ("That is so," from Ri.)--"If I AM going to
+take a peer, I must have a man that LOOKS a peer.  I've
+been plagued with so many undersized and round-
+shouldered noblemen that I'm beginning to wonder
+whether the aristocracy gets proper nourishment. 
+How tall is Lord Tulliwuddle?"
+
+"Six feet and half an inch."
+
+"That's something more like!" said Ri; and his
+sister smiled her acquiescence.
+
+"And does he weigh up to it?" she inquired.
+
+"Fourteen, twelve, and three-quarters."
+
+"What's that in pounds, Ri?  We don't count people
+in stones in America."
+
+A tense frown, a nervous twitching of the lip,
+and in an instant the young financier produced the
+answer
+
+"Two hundred and nine pounds all but four ounces."
+
+"Well," said Eleanor, "it all depends on how he
+holds himself.  That's a lot to carry for a young
+man."
+
+"He holds himself like one of his native pine-trees,
+Miss Maddison!"
+
+She clapped her hands.
+
+"Now I call that just a lovely metaphor, Count
+Bunker!" she cried.  "Oh, if he's going to look like
+a pine, and walk like the pipers at the Torrydhulish
+gathering, and really be a chief like Fergus MacIvor
+or Roderick Dhu, I do believe I'll actually fall in love
+with him!"
+
+"Say, Count," interposed Ri, "I guess we've heard
+he's half German."
+
+"It was indeed in Germany that he learned his
+thorough grasp of politics, statesmanship, business,
+and finance, and acquired his lofty ambitions and
+indomitable perseverance."
+
+"He'll do, Eleanor," said the young man.  "That's
+to say, if he is anything like the prospectus."
+
+His sister made no immediate reply.  She seemed to
+be musing--and not unpleasantly.
+
+At that moment a motor car passed the window.
+
+"My!" exclaimed Eleanor, "I'd quite forgot! 
+That will be to take the Honorable Stanley to the
+station.  We must say good-by to him, I suppose"
+
+She turned to the Count and added in explanation--
+
+"The last to apply was the Honorable Stanley
+Pilkington--Lord Didcott's heir, you know.  Oh, if you
+could see him, you'd realize what I've had to go
+through!"
+
+Even as she spoke he was given the opportunity, for
+the door somewhat diffidently opened and an unhappy-
+looking young man came slowly into the room.  He
+was clearly to be classified among the round-shouldered
+ineligibles; being otherwise a tall and slender youth,
+with an amiable expression and a smoothly well-bred
+voice.
+
+"I've come to say good-by, Miss Maddison," he said,
+with a mournful air.  "I--I've enjoyed my visit very
+much," he added, as he timidly shook her hand.
+
+"So glad you have, Mr. Pilkington," she replied
+cordially.  "It has been a very great pleasure to
+entertain you.  Our friend Count Bunker--Mr. Pilkington."
+
+The young man bowed with a look in his eye that
+clearly said--
+
+"The nest candidate, I perceive."
+
+Then having said good-by to Ri, the Count heard
+him murmur to Eleanor--
+
+"Couldn't you--er--couldn't you just manage to
+see me of?"
+
+"With very great pleasure!" she replied in a hearty
+voice that seemed curiously enough rather to damp
+than cheer his drooping spirits.
+
+No sooner had they left the room together than
+Darius, junior, turned energetically to his guest, and
+said in a voice ringing with pride--
+
+"You may not believe me, Count, but I assure you
+that is the third fellow she has seen to the door inside
+a fortnight!  One Duke, one Viscount--who will expand
+into something more considerable some day--and
+this Honorable Pilkington!  Your friend, sir, will be
+a fortunate man if he is able to please my sister."
+
+"She seems, indeed, a charming girl."
+
+"Charming!  She is an angel in human form!  And
+I, sir, her brother, will see to it that she is not deceived
+in the man she chooses--not if I can help it!"
+
+The young man said this with such an air as Bunker
+supposed his forefathers to have worn when they
+hurled the tea into Boston harbor.
+
+"I trust that Lord Tulliwuddle, at least, will not
+fall under your displeasure, sir," he replied with an air
+of sincere conviction that exactly echoed his thoughts.
+
+"Oh, Ri!" cried Eleanor, running back into the
+room, "he was so sweet as he said good-by in the hall
+that I nearly kissed him!  I would have, only it might
+have made him foolish again.  But did you see his
+shoulders, Count!  And oh, to think of marrying a
+gentle thing like that!  Is Lord Tulliwuddle a firm
+man, Count Bunker?"
+
+"Adamant--when in the right," the Count assured
+her.
+
+A renewed air of happy musing in her eyes warned
+him that he had probably said exactly enough, and with
+the happiest mean betwixt deference and dignity he
+bade them farewell.
+
+"Then, Count, we shall see you all to-morrow," said
+Eleanor as they parted.  "Please tell your hosts that
+I am very greatly looking forward to the pleasure of
+knowing them.  There is a Miss Gallosh, isn't there?"
+
+The Count informed her that there was in fact such
+a lady.
+
+"That is very good news for me!  I need a girl
+friend very badly, Count; these proposals lose half
+their fun with only Ri to tell them to.  I intend to
+make a confidante of Miss Gallosh on the spot!"
+
+"H'm," thought the Count, as he drove away, "I
+wonder whether she will."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+As the plenipotentiary approached the Castle he
+was somewhat surprised to pass a dog-cart
+containing not only his fellow-guest, Mr.
+Cromarty-Gow, but Mr. Gow's luggage also,
+and although he had hitherto taken no particular
+interest in that gentleman, yet being gifted with the true
+adventurer's instinct for promptly investigating any
+unusual circumstance, he sought his host as soon as he
+reached the house, with a view to putting a careless
+question or two.  For no one, he felt sure, had been
+expected to leave for a few days to come.
+
+"Yes," said Mr. Gallosh, "the young spark's off
+verra suddenly.  We didn't expect him to be leaving
+before Tuesday.  But--well, the fact is--umh'm--oh,
+it's nothing to speak off."
+
+This reticence, however, was easily cajoled away by
+the insidious Count, and at last Mr. Gallosh frankly
+confided to him--
+
+"Well, Count, between you and me he seems to have
+had a kind of fancy for my daughter Eva, and then his
+lordship coming--well, you'll see for yourself how it
+was."
+
+"He considered his chances lessened?"
+
+"He told Rentoul they were clean gone."
+
+Count Bunker looked decidedly serious.
+
+"The devil!" he reflected.  "The Baron is exceeding
+his commission.  Tulliwuddle is a brisk young fellow,
+but to commit him to two marriages is neither Christian
+nor kind.  And, without possessing the Baron's remarkable
+enthusiasm for the sex, I feel sorry for whichever
+lady is not chosen to cut the cake."
+
+He inquired for his friend, and was somewhat relieved
+to learn that though he had gone out on the loch with
+Miss Gallosh, they had been accompanied by her brothers
+and sisters.
+
+"We still have half an hour before dressing," he
+said.  "I shall stroll down and meet them."
+
+His creditable anxiety returned when, upon the path
+to the loch shore, he met the two Masters and the two
+younger Misses Gallosh returning without their sister.
+
+"Been in different boats, have you?" said he, after
+they had explained this curious circumstance; "well, I
+hope you all had a good sail."
+
+To himself he uttered a less philosophical comment,
+and quickened his stride perceptibly.  He reached the
+shore, but far or near was never a sign of boat upon
+the waters.
+
+"Have they gone down!" he thought.
+
+Just then he became aware of a sound arising from
+beneath the wooded bank a short distance away.  It was
+evidently intended to be muffled, but the Baron's lungs
+were powerful, and there was no mistaking his deep
+voice as he sang--
+
+          " 'My loff she's like a red, red rose
+               Zat's newly sprong in June!
+          My loff she's like a melody
+               Zat's sveetly blayed in tune!
+
+Ach, how does he end?"
+
+Before his charmer had time to prompt him, the Count
+raised his own tolerably musical voice and replied--
+
+          " 'And fare thee weel, my second string!
+               And fare thee weel awhile!
+          I won t come back again, my love,
+               For tis ower mony mile!
+
+
+For an instant there followed a profound silence, and
+then the voice of the Baron replied, with somewhat
+forced mirth--
+
+"Vary goot, Bonker!  Ha, ha!  Vary goot!"
+
+Meanwhile Bunker, without further delay, was pushing
+his way through a tangle of shrubbery till in a moment
+he spied the boat moored beneath the leafy bank,
+and although it was a capacious craft he observed that
+its two occupants were both crowded into one end.
+
+"I am sent to escort you back to dinner," he said
+blandly.
+
+"Tell zem ve shall be back in three minutes," replied
+the Baron, making a prodigious show of preparation
+for coming ashore.
+
+"I am sorry to say that my orders were strictly to
+escort, not to herald you," said the Count apologetically.
+
+Fortifying himself against unpopularity by the
+consciousness that he was doing his duty, this well-
+principled, even if spurious, nobleman paced back towards
+the house with the lady between him and the indignant
+Baron.
+
+"Well, Tulliwuddle," he discoursed, in as friendly
+a tone as ever, "I left your cards with our American
+neighbors."
+
+"So?" muttered the Baron stolidly.
+
+"They received me with open arms, and I have taken
+the liberty of accepting on behalf of Mr., Mrs., and
+Miss Gallosh, and of our two selves, a very cordial
+invitation to lunch with them to-morrow."
+
+"Impossible!" cried the Baron gruffly.
+
+Eva turned a reproachful eye upon him.
+
+"Oh, Lord Tulliwuddle!  I should so like to go."
+
+The Baron looked at her blankly.
+
+"You vould!"
+
+"I have heard they are such nice people, and have
+such a beautiful place!"
+
+"I can confirm both statements," said the Count
+heartily.
+
+"Besides, papa and mamma would be very disappointed
+if we didn't go."
+
+"Make it as you please," said the Baron gloomily.
+
+His unsuspicious hosts heard of the invitation with
+such outspoken pleasure that their honored guest could
+not well renew his protest.  He had to suffer the
+arrangement to be made; but that night when he and
+Bunker withdrew to their own room, the Count perceived
+the makings of an argumentative evening.
+
+"Sometimes you interfere too moch," the Baron
+began without preamble.
+
+"Do you mind being a little more specific?" replied
+the Count with smiling composure.
+
+"Zere vas no hurry to lonch mit Maddison."
+
+"I didn't name the date."
+
+"You might have said next veek."
+
+"By next week Miss Maddison may be snapped up
+by some one else."
+
+"Zen vould Tollyvoddle be more lucky!  I have nearly
+got for him ze most charming girl, mit as moch money
+as he vants.  Ach, you do interfere!  You should gonsider
+ze happiness of Tollyvoddle."
+
+"That is the only consideration that affects yourself,
+Baron?"
+
+"Of course!  I cannot marry more zan vonce."
+(Bunker thought he perceived a symptom of a sigh.) 
+"And I most be faithful to Alicia.  I most!  Ach, yes,
+Bonker, do not fear for me!  I am so constant as--ach,
+I most keep faithful!"
+
+As he supplied this remarkable testimony to his own
+fidelity, the Baron paced the floor with an agitation
+that clearly showed how firmly his constancy was based.
+
+Nevertheless the Count was smiling oddly at something
+he espied upon the mantelpiece, and stepping up
+to it he observed--
+
+"Here is a singular phenomenon--a bunch of white
+heather that has got itself tied together with ribbon!"
+
+The Baron started, and took the tiny bouquet from
+his hand, his eyes sparkling with delight.
+
+"It must be a gift from----" he began, and then laid
+it down again, though his gaze continued fixed upon
+it.  "How did it gom in?" he mused.  "Ach! she most
+have brought it herself.  How vary nice!"
+
+He turned suddenly and met his friend's humorous
+eyes.
+
+"I shall be faithful, Bonker!  You can trust me!"
+he exclaimed; "I shall put it in my letter to Alicia, and
+send it mit my love!  See, Bonker!"
+
+He took a letter from his desk--its envelope still
+open--hurriedly slipped in the white heather, and licked
+the gum while his resolution was hot.  Then, having
+exhibited this somewhat singular evidence of his constancy,
+he sighed again.
+
+"It vas ze only safe vay," he said dolefully.  "Vas
+I not right, Bonker?"
+
+"Quite, my dear Baron," replied the Count sympathetically. 
+"Believe me, I appreciate your self-sacrifice. 
+In fact, it was to relieve the strain upon your too
+generous heart that I immediately accepted Mr. Maddison's
+invitation for to-morrow."
+
+"How so?" demanded the Baron with perhaps excusable
+surprise.
+
+"You will be able to decide at once which is the most
+suitable bride for Tulliwuddle, and then, if you like,
+we can leave in a day or two."
+
+"Bot I do not vish to leave so soon!"
+
+"Well then, while you stay, you can at least make
+sure that you are engaging the affections of the right
+girl."
+
+Though Bunker spoke with an air of desiring merely
+to assist his friend, the speech seemed to arouse some
+furious thinking in the Baron's mind.
+
+For some moments he made no reply, and then at
+last, in a troubled voice, he said--
+
+"I have already a leetle gommitted Tollyvoddle to
+Eva.  Ach, bot not moch!  Still it vas a leetle.  Miss
+Maddison--vat is she like?"
+
+To the best of his ability the Count sketched the
+charms of Eleanor Maddison--her enthusiasm for large
+and manly noblemen, and the probable effects of the
+Baron's stalwart form set off by the tartan which (in
+deference, he declared, to the Wraith's injunctions) he
+now invariably wore.  Also, he touched upon her father's
+colossal fortune, and the genuine Tulliwuddle's necessities.
+
+The Baron listened with growing interest.
+
+"Vell," he said, "I soppose I most make a goot
+impression for ze sake of Tollyvoddle.  For instance, ven
+we drive up----"
+
+"Drive? my dear Baron, we shall march!  Leave it
+to me; I have a very pretty design shaping in my head."
+
+"Aha!" smiled the Baron; "my showman again,
+eh?"
+
+His expression sobered, and he added as a final
+contribution to the debate--
+
+"But I may tell you, Bonker, I do not eggspect to
+like Miss Maddison.  Ah, my instinct he is vonderful! 
+It vas my instinct vich said.  'Chose Miss Gallosh for
+Tollyvoddle!' "
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+While the Baron was thus loyally doing
+his duty, his Baroness, being ignorant
+of the excellence of his purpose, and
+knowing only that he had deceived her
+in one matter, and that the descent to Avernus is easy,
+passed a number of very miserable days.  That heart-
+breaking "us both" kept her awake at nights and
+distraught throughout the day, and when for a little she
+managed to explain the phrase away, and tried to
+anchor her trust in Rudolph once more, the vision of the
+St. Petersburg window overlooking the crops would
+come to shatter her confidence.  She wrote a number of
+passionate replies, but as the Baron in making his
+arrangements with his Russian friend had forgotten to
+provide him with his Scotch address, these letters only
+reached him after the events of this chronicle had passed
+into history.  Strange to say, her only consolation was
+that neither her mother nor Sir Justin was able to supply
+any further evidence of any kind whatsoever.  One
+would naturally suppose that the assistance they had
+gratuitously given would have made her feel eternally
+indebted to them; but, on the contrary, she was actually
+inconsistent enough to resent their head-shakings nearly
+as much as her Rudolph's presumptive infidelity.  So
+that her lot was indeed to be deplored.
+
+At last a second letter came, and with trembling
+fingers, locked in her room, the forsaken lady tore the
+curiously bulky envelope apart.  Then, at the sight of
+the enclosure that had given it this shape, her heart
+lightened once more.
+
+"A sprig of white heather!" she cried.  "Ah, he
+loves me still!"
+
+With eager eyes she next devoured the writing
+accompanying this token; and as the Baron's head happened
+to be clearer when he composed this second epistle, and
+his friend's hints peculiarly judicious, it conveyed so
+plausible an account of his proceedings, and contained
+so many expressions of his unaltered esteem, that his
+character was completely reinstated in her regard.
+
+Having read every affectionate sentence thrice over,
+and given his exceedingly interesting statements of fact
+the attention they deserved, she once more took up the
+little bouquet and examined it more curiously and
+intently.  She even untied the ribbon, when, lo and
+behold! there fell a tiny and tightly folded twist of paper
+upon the floor.  Preparing herself for a delicious bit
+of sentiment, she tenderly unfolded and smoothed it out.
+
+"Verses!" she exclaimed rapturously; but the next
+instant her pleasure gave place to a look of the extremest
+mystification.
+
+"What does this mean?" she gasped.
+
+There was, in fact, some excuse for her perplexity,
+since the precise text of the enclosure ran thus:
+
+          "TO LORD TULLIWUDDLE.
+
+     "O Chieftain, trample on this heath
+     Which lies thy springing foot beneath!
+     It can recover from thy tread,
+     And once again uplift its head!
+     But spare, O Chief, the tenderer plant,
+     Because when trampled on, it can't!
+                              "EVA."
+
+
+Too confounded for coherent speculation, the Baroness
+continued to stare at this baffling effusion.  Who
+Lord Tulliwuddle and Eva were; why this glimpse into
+their drama (for such it appeared to be) should be
+forwarded to her; and where the Baron von Blitzenberg
+came into the story--these, among a dozen other questions,
+flickered chaotically through her mind for some
+minutes.  Again and again she studied the cryptogram,
+till at last a few definite conclusions began to crystallize
+out of the confusion.  That the "tenderer plant"
+symbolized the lady herself, that she was a person to
+be regarded with extreme suspicion, and that emphatically
+the bouquet was never originally intended for the
+Baroness von Blitzenberg, all became settled convictions. 
+The fact that she knew Tulliwuddle to be an
+existing peerage afforded her some relief; yet the longer
+she pondered on the problem of Rudolph's part in the
+episode, the more uneasy grew her mind.
+
+Composing her face before the mirror till it resumed
+its normal round-eyed placidity, she locked the letter
+and its contents in a safe place, and sought out her
+mother.
+
+"Did you get any letter, dear, by the last post?"
+inquired the Countess as soon as she had entered the
+room.
+
+"Nothing of importance, mamma."
+
+That so sweet and docile a daughter should stoop to
+deceit was inconceivable.  The Countess merely frowned
+her disappointment and resumed the novel which she
+was beguiling the hours between eating and eating
+again.
+
+"Mamma," said the Baroness presently, "can you
+tell me whether heather is found in many other European
+countries?"
+
+The Countess raised her firmly penciled eyebrows.
+
+"In some, I believe.  What a remarkable question,
+Alicia."
+
+"I was thinking about Russia," said Alicia with an
+innocent air.  "Do you suppose heather grows there?"
+
+The Countess remembered the floral symptoms displayed
+by Ophelia, and grew a trifle nervous.
+
+"My child, what is the matter?"
+
+"Oh, nothing," replied Alicia hastily.
+
+A short silence followed, during which she was conscious
+of undergoing a curious scrutiny.
+
+"By the way, mamma," she found courage to ask at
+length, "do you know anything about Lord Tulliwuddle?"
+
+Lady Grillyer continued uneasy.  These irrelevant
+questions undoubtedly indicated a mind unhinged.
+
+"I was acquainted with the late Lord Tulliwuddle."
+
+"Oh, he is dead, then?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+Alicia's face clouded for a moment, and then a ray
+of hope lit it again.
+
+"Is there a present Lord Tulliwuddle?"
+
+"I believe so.  Why do you ask?"
+
+"I heard some one speak of him the other day."
+
+She spoke so naturally that her mother began to feel
+relieved.
+
+"Sir Justin Wallingford can tell you all about the
+family, if you are curious," she remarked.
+
+"Sir Justin!"
+
+Alicia recoiled from the thought of him.  But presently
+her curiosity prevailed, and she inquired--
+
+"Does he know them well?"
+
+"He inherited a place in Scotland a number of years
+ago, you remember.  It is somewhere near Lord
+Tulliwuddle's place--Hech--Hech--Hech-something-or-
+other Castle.  He was very well acquainted with the
+last Tulliwuddle."
+
+"Oh," said Alicia indifferently, "I am not really
+interested.  It was mere idle curiosity."
+
+For the greater part of twenty-four hours she kept
+this mystery locked within her heart, till at last she
+could contain it no longer.  The resolution she came
+to was both desperate and abruptly taken.  At five
+minutes to three she was resolved to die rather than
+mention that sprig of heather to a soul; at five minutes
+past she was on her way to Sir Justin Wallingford's
+house.
+
+"It may be going behind mamma's back," she said
+to herself; "but she went behind mine when SHE consulted
+Sir Justin."
+
+It was probably in consequence of her urgent voice
+and agitated manner that she came to be shown straight
+into Sir Justin's library, without warning on either
+side, and thus surprised her counsellor in the act of
+softly singing a well-known hymn to the accompaniment
+of a small harmonium.  He seemed for a moment to be
+a trifle embarrassed, and the glance he threw at his
+footman appeared to indicate an early vacancy in his
+establishment; but as soon as he had recovered his customary
+solemnity his explanation reflected nothing but
+credit upon his character.
+
+"The fact is," said he, "that I am shortly going to
+rejoin my daughter in Scotland.  You are aware of her
+disposition, Baroness?"
+
+"I have heard that she is inclined to be devotional."
+
+"She is devotional," answered this excellent man. 
+"I have taken considerable pains to see to it.  As your
+mother and I have often agreed, there is no such safeguard
+for a young girl as a hobby or mania of this
+sort."
+
+"A hobby or mania?" exclaimed the Baroness in a
+pained voice.
+
+Sir Justin looked annoyed.  He was evidently
+surprised to find that the principles inculcated by his old
+friend and himself appeared to outlive the occasion for
+which they were intended--to wit, the protection of
+virgin hearts from undesirable aspirations till calm
+reason and a husband should render them unnecessary.
+
+"I use the terms employed by the philosophical," he
+hastened to explain; "but my own opinion is inclined
+to coincide with yours, my dear Alicia."
+
+This paternal use of her Christian name, coupled
+with the kindly tone of his justification, encouraged
+the Baroness to open her business.
+
+"Sir Justin," she began, "can I trust you--may I
+ask you not to tell my mother that I have visited you?"
+
+"If you can show me an adequate reason, you may
+rely upon my discretion," said the ex-diplomatist
+cautiously, yet with an encouraging smile.
+
+"In some things one would sooner confide in a man
+than a woman, Sir Justin."
+
+"That is undoubtedly true," he agreed cordially. 
+"You may confide in me, Baroness."
+
+"I have heard from my husband again.  I need not
+show you the letter; it is quite satisfactory--oh, quite,
+I assure you!  Only I found this enclosed with it."
+
+In breathless silence she watched him examine
+critically first the heather and then the verses.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle!" he exclaimed.  "Is there
+anything in the Baron's letter to throw any light upon
+this?"
+
+"Not one word--not the slightest hint."
+
+Again he studied the paper.
+
+"Oh, what does it mean?" she cried.  "I came to
+you because you know all about the Tulliwuddles. 
+Where is Lord Tulliwuddle now?"
+
+"I am not acquainted with the present peer," he
+ansevered meditatively.  "In fact, I know singularly little
+about him.  I did hear--yes, I heard from my daughter
+some rumor that he was shortly expected to visit his
+place in Scotland; but whether he went there or not I
+cannot say."
+
+"You can find out for me?"
+
+"I shall lose no time in ascertaining."
+
+The Baroness thanked him effusively, and rose to
+depart with a mind a little comforted.
+
+"And you won't tell mamma?"
+
+"I never tell a woman anything that is of any importance."
+
+The Baroness was confirmed in her opinion that Sir
+Justin was not a very nice man, but she felt an increased
+confidence in his judgment.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+From the gargoyled keep which the cultured
+enthusiasm of Eleanor and the purse of her
+father had recently erected at Lincoln Lodge,
+the brother and sister looked over a bend of
+the river, half a mile of valley road, a wave of forest
+country, and the greater billows of the bare hillsides
+towering beyond.  But out of all this prospect it was
+only upon the stretch of road that their eyes were bent.
+
+"Surely one should see their carriage soon!"
+exclaimed Eleanor.
+
+"Seems to me," said her brother, "that you're sitting
+something like a cat on the pounce for this Tulliwuddle
+fellow.  Why, Eleanor, I never saw you so excited since
+the first duke came along.  I thought that had passed
+right off."
+
+"Oh, Ri, I was reading 'Waverley' again last night,
+and somehow I felt the top of the keep was the only
+place to watch for a chief!"
+
+"Why, you don't expect him to be different from
+other people?"
+
+"Ri!  I tell you I'll cry if he looks like any one I've
+ever seen before!  Don't you remember the Count said
+he moved like a pine in his native forests?"
+
+"He won't make much headway like that," said Ri
+incisively.  "I'd sooner he moved like something more
+spry than a tree.  I guess that Count was talking
+through his hat."
+
+But his sister was not to be argued out of her exalted
+mood by such prosaic reasoning.  She exclaimed at his
+sluggish imagination, reiterated her faith in the
+insinuating count's assurances, and was only withheld
+from sending her brother down for a spy-glass by the
+reflection that she could not remember reading of its
+employment by any maiden in analogous circumstances.
+
+It was at this auspicious moment, when the heart of
+the expectant heiress was inflamed with romantic fancies
+and excited with the suspense of waiting, and before
+it had time to cool through any undue delay, that a
+little cloud of dust first caught her straining eyes.
+
+"He comes at last!" she cried.
+
+At the same instant the faint strains of the pibroch
+were gently wafted to her embattled tower.
+
+"He is bringing his piper!  Oh, what a duck he is!"
+
+"Seems to me he is bringing a dozen of them,"
+observed Ri.
+
+"And look, Ri!  The sun is glinting upon steel! 
+Claymores, Ri! oh, how heavenly!  There must be fifty
+men!  And they are still coming!  I do believe he has
+brought the whole clan!"
+
+Too petrified with delight to utter another exclamation,
+she watched in breathless silence the approach of
+a procession more formidable than had ever escorted
+a Tulliwuddle since the year of Culloden.  As they drew
+nearer, her ardent gaze easily distinguished a stalwart
+figure in plaid and kilt, armed to the teeth with target
+and claymore, marching with a stately stride fully ten
+paces before his retinue.
+
+"The chief!" she murmured.
+
+Now indeed she saw there was no cause to mourn, for
+any one at all resembling the Baron von Blitzenberg
+as he appeared at that moment she had certainly never
+met before.  Intoxicated with his finery and with the
+terrific peals of melody behind him, he pranced rather
+than walked up to the portals of Lincoln Lodge, and
+there, to the amazement and admiration alike of his
+clansmen and his expectant host, he burst forth into
+the following Celtic fragment, translated into English
+for the occasion by his assiduous friend from a hitherto
+undiscovered manuscript of Ossian:
+
+     "I am ze chieftain,
+       Nursed in ze mountains,
+       Behold me, Mac--ig--ig--ig ish!
+
+(Yet the Count had written this word very distinctly.)
+
+     "Oich for ze claymore!
+       Hoch for ze philabeg!
+       Sons of ze red deers,
+       Children of eagles,
+       I will supply you
+       Mit Sassenach carcases!"
+
+At this point came a momentary lull, the chieftain's
+eyes rolling bloodthirstily, but the rhapsody having
+apparently become congested within his fiery heart.
+His audience, however, were not given time to recover
+their senses, before a striking-looking individual,
+adorned with tartan trews and a feathered hat, in whom
+all were pleased to recognize Count Bunker, whispered
+briefly in his lordship's ear, and like a river in spate
+he foamed on:
+
+     "Donald and Ronald
+       Avake from your slumbers!
+       Maiden so lovely,
+       Smile mit your bright eyes!
+       Ze heather is blooming!
+       Ze vild cat is growling!
+       Hech Dummeldirroch!
+       Behold Tollyvoddle,
+       Ze Lord of ze Mountains!"
+ 
+
+Hardly had the reverberations of the chieftain's voice
+died away, when the Count, uttering a series of presumably
+Gaelic cries, advanced with the most dramatic
+air, and threw his broad-sword upon the ground. 
+The Baron laid his across it, the pipes struck up a
+less formidable, but if anything more exciting air, and
+the two noblemen, springing simultaneously from the
+ground, began what the Count confidently trusted their
+American hosts would accept as the national sworddance.
+
+This lasted for some considerable time, and gave the
+Count an opportunity of testifying his remarkable
+agility and the Baron of displaying the greater part
+of his generously proportioned limbs, while the lung
+power of both became from that moment proverbial in
+the glen.
+
+At the conclusion of this ceremony the chieftain,
+crimson, breathless, and radiant, a sight for gods and
+ladies, advanced to greet his host.
+
+"Very happy to see you, Lord Tulliwuddle," said
+Mr. Maddison.  "Allow me to offer you my very sincere
+congratulations on your exceedingly interesting
+exhibition.  Welcome to Lincoln Lodge, your lordship! 
+My daughter--my son."
+
+Eleanor, almost as flushed as the Baron by her headlong
+rush from the keep at the conclusion of the sword-
+dance, threw him such a smile as none of her admirers
+had ever enjoyed before; while he, incapable of speech
+beyond a gasped "Ach!" bowed so low that the Count
+had gently to adjust his kilt.  Then followed the
+approach of the Gallosh family, attired in costumes of
+Harris tweed and tartan selected and arranged under
+the artistic eye of Count Bunker, and escorted, to their
+huge delight, by six picked clansmen.  Their formal
+presentation having been completed by a last skirl on
+the bagpipes, the whole party moved in procession to
+the banqueting-hall.
+
+"A complete success, I flatter myself," thought
+Count Bunker, with excusable complacency.
+
+To the banquet itself it is scarcely possible for a
+mere mortal historian to pay a fitting tribute.  Every
+rarity known to the gourmet that telegraph could summon
+to the table in time was served in course upon
+course.  Even the sweetmeats in the little gold dishes
+cost on an average a dollar a bon-bon, while the wine
+was hardly less valuable than liquid radium.  Or at
+least such was the sworn information subsequently supplied
+by Count Bunker to the reporter of "The Torrydhulish Herald."
+
+Eleanor was in her highest spirits.  She sat between
+the Baron and Mr. Gallosh, delighted with the honest
+pleasure and admiration of the merchant, and all the
+time becoming more satisfied with the demeanor and
+conversation of the chief.  In fact, the only disappointment
+she felt was connected with the appearance of
+Miss Gallosh.  Much as she had desired a confidante,
+she had never demanded one so remarkably beautiful,
+and she could not but feel that a very much plainer
+friend would have served her purpose quite as well--
+and indeed better.  Once or twice she intercepted a
+glance passing between this superfluously handsome
+lady and the principal guest, until at last it occurred
+to her as a strange and unseemly thing that Lord Tulliwuddle
+should be paying so long a visit to his shooting
+tenants.  Eva, on her part, felt a curiously similar
+sensation.  These American gentlemen were as pleasant
+as report had painted them, but she now discovered an
+odd antipathy to American women, or at least to their
+unabashed method of making themselves agreeable to
+noblemen.  It confirmed, indeed, the worst reports she
+had heard concerning the way in which they raided the
+British marriage market.
+
+Being placed beside one of these lovely girls and
+opposite the other, the Baron, one would think, would
+be in the highest state of contentment; but though still
+flushed with his triumphant caperings over the broadswords,
+and exhibiting a graciousness that charmed his
+hosts, he struck his observant friend as looking a trifle
+disturbed at soul.  He would furtively glance across the
+table and then as furtively throw a sidelong look at
+his neighbor, and each time he appeared to grow more
+thoughtful.  And yet he did not look precisely unhappy
+either.  In fact, there was a gleam in his eye during
+each of these glances which suggested that both fell
+upon something he approved of.
+
+The after-luncheon procedure had been carefully
+arranged between the two adventurers.  The Count was
+to keep by the Baron's side, and, thus supported,
+negotiations were to be delicately opened.  Accordingly,
+when the party rose, the Count whispered a word in
+Mr. Maddison's ear.  The millionaire answered with a
+grave, shrewd look, and his daughter, as if perfectly
+grasping the situation, led the Galloshes out to inspect
+the new fir forest.  And then the two noblemen and the
+two Dariuses faced one another over their cigars.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+"Well, gentlemen," said Mr. Maddison,
+"pleasure is pleasure, and business is
+business.  I guess we mean to do a little
+of both to-day, if you are perfectly
+disposed.  What do you say, Count?"
+
+"I consider that an occasion selected by you, Mr.
+Maddison, is not to be neglected."
+
+The millionaire bowed his acknowledgment of the
+compliment, and turned to the Baron, who, it may be
+remarked, was wearing an expression of thoughtful
+gravity not frequently to be noted at Hechnahoul.
+
+"You desire to say a few words to me, Lord
+Tulliwuddle, I understand.  I shall be pleased to hear them."
+
+With this both father and son bent such earnest
+brows on the Baron and waited for his answer in such
+intense silence, that he began to regret the absence of
+his inspiring pipers.
+
+"I vould like ze honor to address mine--mine----"
+
+He threw an imploring glance at his friend, who,
+without hesitation, threw himself into the breach.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle feels the natural diffidence of a
+lover in adequately expressing his sentiments.  I understand
+that he craves your permission to lay a certain
+case before a certain lady.  I am right, Tulliwuddle?"
+
+"Pairfectly," said the Baron, much relieved; "to
+lay a certain case before a certain lady.  Zat is so, yes,
+exactly."
+
+Father and son glanced at one another.
+
+"Your delicacy does you honor, very great honor,"
+said Mr. Maddison; "but business is business, Lord
+Tulliwuddle, and I should like to hear your proposition
+more precisely stated.  In fact, sir, I like to know just
+where I am."
+
+"That's just about right," assented Ri.
+
+"I vould perhaps vish to marry her."
+
+"Perhaps!" exclaimed the two together.
+
+Again the Count adroitly interposed--
+
+"You mean that you do not intend to thrust your
+attentions upon an unwilling lady?"
+
+"Yes, yes; zat is vat I mean."
+
+"I see," said Mr. Maddison slowly.  "H'm, yes."
+
+"Sounds what you Scotch call 'canny,' " commented
+Ri shrewdly.
+
+"Well," resumed the millionaire, "I have nothing
+to say against that; provided--provided, I say, that
+you stipulate to marry the lady so long as she has no
+objections to you.  No fooling around--that's all we
+want to see to.  Our time, sir, is too valuable."
+
+"That is so," said Ri.
+
+The Baron's color rose, and a look of displeasure
+came into his eyes, but before he had time to make a
+retort that might have wrecked his original's hopes,
+Bunker said quickly--
+
+"Tulliwuddle places himself in your hands, with the
+implicit confidence that one gentleman reposes in another."
+
+Gulping down his annoyance, the Baron assented--
+
+"Yes, I vill do zat."
+
+Again father and son looked at one another, and this
+time exchanged a nod.
+
+"That, sir, will satisfy us," said Mr. Maddison. 
+"Ri, you may turn off the phonograph."
+
+And thereupon the cessation of a loud buzzing sound,
+which the visitors had hitherto attributed to flies, showed
+that their host now considered he had received a sufficient
+guarantee of his lordship's honorable intentions.
+
+"So far, so good," resumed Mr. Maddison.  "I may
+now inform you, Lord Tulliwuddle, that the reports
+about you which I have been able to gather read kind
+of mixed, and before consenting to your reception
+within my daughter's boudoir we should feel obliged
+if you would satisfy us that the worst of them are not
+true--or, at least, sir, exaggerated."
+
+This time the Baron could not restrain an exclamation
+of displeasure.
+
+"Vat, sir!" he cried, addressing the millionaire. 
+"Do you examine me on my life!"
+
+"No, sir," said Ri, frowning his most determined
+frown.  "It is to ME you will be kind enough to give any
+explanation you have to offer!  Dad may be the spokesman,
+but I am the inspirer of these interrogations. 
+My sister, sir, the purest girl in America, the most
+beautiful creature beneath the star-spangled banner of
+Columbia, is not going to be the companion of dissolute
+idleness and gilded dishonor--not, sir, if _I_ know it."
+
+Too confounded by this unusual warning to think
+of any adequate retort, the Baron could only stare his
+sensations; while Mr. Maddison, taking up the conversation
+the instant his son had ceased, proceeded in a
+deliberate and impressive voice to say--
+
+"Yes, sir, my son--and I associate myself with him
+--my son and I, sir, would be happy to learn that it
+is NOT the case as here stated" (he glanced at a paper
+in his hand), "namely, Item 1, that you sup rather too
+frequently with ladies--I beg your pardon, Count
+Bunker, for introducing the theme--with ladies of the
+theatrical profession."
+
+"I!" gasped the Baron.  "I do only vish I sometimes
+had ze cha----"
+
+"Tulliwuddle!" interrupted the Count.  "Don't let
+your natural indignation carry you away!  Mr. Maddison,
+that statement is not true.  I can vouch for it."
+
+"Ach, of course it is not true," said the Baron more
+calmly, as he began to realize that it was not his own
+character that was being aspersed.
+
+"I am very glad to hear it," continued Mr. Maddison,
+who apparently did not share the full austerity of
+his son's views, since without further question he hurried
+on to the next point.
+
+"Item 2, sir, states that at least two West End firms
+are threatening you with proceedings if you do not
+discharge their accounts within a reasonable time."
+
+"A lie!" declared the Baron emphatically.
+
+"Will you be so kind as to favor us with the name
+of the individual who is thus libelling his lordship?"
+demanded the Count with a serious air.
+
+Mr. Maddison hastily put the paper back in his
+pocket, and with a glance checked his son's gesture of
+protest.
+
+"Guess we'd better pass on to the next thing, Ri. 
+I told you it wasn't any darned use just asking.  But
+you boys always think you know better than your
+Poppas," said he; and then, turning to the Count, "It
+isn't worth while troubling, Count; I'll see that these
+reports get contradicted, if I have to buy up a daily
+paper and issue it at a halfpenny.  Yes, sir, you can
+leave it to me."
+
+The Count glanced at his friend, and they exchanged
+a grave look.
+
+"Again we place ourselves in your hands," said
+Bunker.
+
+Though considerably impressed with these repeated
+evidences of confidence on the part of two such
+important personages, their host nevertheless maintained
+something of his inquisitorial air as he proceeded--
+
+"For my own satisfaction, Lord Tulliwuddle, and
+meaning to convey no aspersion whatsoever upon your
+character, I would venture to inquire what are your
+views upon some of the current topics.  Take any one
+you like, sir, so long as it's good and solid, and let me
+hear what you have to say about it.  What you favor
+us with will not be repeated beyond this room, but
+merely regarded by my son and myself as proving that
+we are getting no dunder-headed dandy for our Eleanor,
+but an article of real substantial value--the kind of
+thing they might make into a Lord-lieutenant or a
+Viceroy in a bad year."
+
+Tempting in every way as this suggestion sounded,
+his lordship nevertheless appeared to find a little initial
+difficulty in choosing a topic.
+
+"Speak out, sir," said Mr. Maddison in an encouraging
+tone.  "Our standard for noblemen isn't anything
+remarkably high.  With a duke I'd be content
+with just a few dates and something about model
+cottages, and, though a baron ought to know a little more
+than that, still we'll count these feudal bagpipers and
+that ancestral hop-scotch performance as a kind of set-
+off to your credit.  Suppose you just say a few words
+on the future of the Anglo-Saxon race.  What you've
+learned from the papers will do, so long as you seem
+to understand it."
+
+Perceiving that his Teutonic friend looked a trifle
+dismayed at this selection, Count Bunker suggested the
+Triple Alliance as an alternative.
+
+"That needs more facts, I guess," said the millionaire;
+"but it will be all the more creditable if you can
+manage it."
+
+The Baron cleared his throat to begin, and as he
+happened (as the Count was well aware) to have the
+greatest enthusiasm for this policy, and to have recently
+read the thirteen volumes of Professor Bungstrumpher
+on the subject, he delivered a peroration so remarkable
+alike for its fervor, its facts, and its phenomenal length,
+that when, upon a gentle hint from the Count, he at
+last paused, all traces of objection had vanished from
+the minds of Darius P. Maddison, senior and junior.
+
+"I need no longer detain you, Lord Tulliwuddle,"
+said the millionaire respectfully.  "Ri, fetch your sister
+into her room.  Your lordship, I have received an
+intellectual treat.  I am very deeply gratified, sir.  Allow
+me to conduct you to my daughter's boudoir."
+
+Flushed with his exertions and his triumph though
+the Baron was, he yet remembered so vividly the ordeal
+preceding the oration that as they went he whispered
+in his friend's ear
+
+"Ah, Bonker, stay mit me, I pray you!  If she should
+ask more questions!
+
+"Mr. Maddison, ze Count will stay mit me."
+
+Though a little surprised at this arrangement, which
+scarcely accorded with his lordship's virile appearance
+and dashing air, Mr. Maddison was by this time too
+favorably disposed to question the wisdom of any
+suggestion he might make, and accordingly the two friends
+found themselves closeted together in Miss Maddison's
+sanctum awaiting the appearance of the heiress.
+
+"Shall I remain through the entire interview?"
+asked the Count.
+
+"Oh yes, mine Bonker, you most!  Or--vell, soppose
+it gets unnecessary zen vill I cry 'By ze Gad!' and you
+vill know to go."
+
+" 'By the Gad'?  I see."
+
+"Or--vell, not ze first time, but if I say it tree times,
+zen vill you make an excuse."
+
+"Three times?  I understand, Baron."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+In the eye of the heiress, as in her father's, might
+be noted a shade of surprise at finding two
+gentlemen instead of one.  But though the Count
+instantly perceived his superfluity, and though
+it had been his greatest ambition throughout his life
+to add no shade to the dullness with which he frequently
+complained that life was overburdened, yet his sense of
+obligation to his friend was so strong that he preferred
+to bore rather than desert.  As the only compensation
+he could offer, he assumed the most retiring look of
+which his mobile features were capable, and pretended
+to examine one of the tables of curios.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle, I congratulate you on the very
+happy impression you have made!" began Eleanor with
+the most delightful frankness.
+
+But his lordship had learned to fear the Americans,
+even bearing compliments.
+
+"So?" he answered stolidly.
+
+"Indeed you have!  Ri is just wild about your
+cleverness."
+
+"Zat is kind of him."
+
+"He declares you are quite an authority on European
+politics.  Now you will be able to tell me----"
+
+"Ach, no!  I shall not to-day, please!" interrupted
+the Baron hurriedly.
+
+The heiress seemed disconcerted.
+
+"Oh, not if you'd rather not, Lord Tulliwuddle."
+
+"Not to-day."
+
+"Well!"
+
+She turned with a shrug and cast her eyes upon the
+wall.
+
+"How do you like this picture?  It's my latest toy. 
+I call it just sweet!"
+
+He cautiously examined the painting.
+
+"It is vary pretty."
+
+"Do you know Romney's work?"
+
+The Baron shrank back.
+
+"Not again to-day, please!"
+
+Miss Maddison opened her handsome eyes to their
+widest.
+
+"My word!" she cried.  "If these are Highland
+manners, Lord Tulliwuddle!"
+
+In extreme confusion the Baron stammered--
+
+"I beg your pardon!  Forgif me--but--ach, not
+zose questions, please!"
+
+Relenting a little, she inquired
+
+"What may I ask you, then?  Do tell me!  You
+see I want just to know all about you."
+
+With an affrighted gesture the Baron turned to his
+friend.
+
+"Bonker," said he, "she does vant to know yet
+more about me!  Vill you please to tell her."
+
+The Count looked up from the curios with an
+expression so bland that the air began to clear even
+before he spoke.
+
+"Miss Maddison, I must explain that my friend's
+proud Highland spirit has been a little disturbed by
+some inquiries, made in all good faith by your father. 
+No offence, I am certain, was intended; erroneous
+information--a little hastiness in jumping to conclusions
+--a sensitive nature wounded by the least insinuation--
+such were the unfortunate causes of Tulliwuddle's
+excusable reticence.  Believe me, if you knew
+all, your opinion of him would alter very, very
+considerably!"
+
+The perfectly accurate peroration to this statement
+produced an immediate effect.
+
+"What a shame!" cried Eleanor, her eyes sparkling
+brightly.  "Lord Tulliwuddle, I am so sorry!"
+
+The Baron looked into these eyes, and his own mien
+altered perceptibly.  For an instant he gazed, and then
+in a low voice remarked--
+
+"By ze Gad!"
+
+"Once!" counted the conscientious Bunker.
+
+"Lord Tulliwuddle," she continued, "I declare I
+feel so ashamed of those stupid men, I could just wring
+their necks!  Now, just to make us quits, you ask me
+anything in the world you like!"
+
+Over his shoulder the Baron threw a stealthy glance
+at his friend, but this time he did not invoke his
+assistance.  Instead, he again murmured very distinctly--
+
+"By ze Gad!"
+
+"Twice!" counted Bunker.
+
+"Miss Maddison," said the Baron to the flushed and
+eager girl, "am I to onderstand zat you now are satisfied
+zat I am not too vicked, too suspeecious, too unvorthy
+of your charming society?  I do not say I am
+yet vorthy--bot jost not too bad!"
+
+Had the Baroness at that moment heard merely the
+intonation of his voice, she would undoubtedly have
+preferred a Chinese prison.
+
+"Indeed, Lord Tulliwuddle, you may."
+
+"By ze Gad!" announced the Baron, in a voice
+braced with resolution.
+
+"May I take the liberty of inspecting the aviary?"
+said the Count.
+
+"With the very greatest pleasure," replied the
+heiress kindly.
+
+His last distinct impression as he withdrew was of
+the Baron giving his mustache a more formidable
+twirl.
+
+"A very pretty little scene," he reflected, as he
+strolled out in search of others.  "Though, hang me,
+I'm not sure if it ended in the right man leaving the
+stage!"
+
+This "second-fiddle feeling," as he styled it
+humorously to himself, was further increased by the demeanor
+of Miss Gallosh, to whom he now endeavored to make
+himself agreeable.  Though sharing the universal respect
+felt for the character and talents of the Count,
+she was evidently too perturbed at seeing him appear
+alone to appreciate his society as it deserved.  Ever
+since luncheon poor Eva's heart had been sinking. 
+The beauty, the assurance, the cleverness, and the
+charm of the fabulously wealthy American heiress had
+filled her with vague misgivings even while the gentlemen
+were safely absent; but when Miss Maddison was
+summoned away, and her father and brother took her
+place, her uneasiness vastly increased.  Now here was
+the last buffer removed between the chieftain and her
+audacious rival (so she already counted her).  What
+drama could these mysterious movements have been
+leading to?
+
+In vain did Count Bunker exercise his unique
+powers of conversation.  In vain did he discourse on the
+beauties of nature as displayed in the wooded valley
+and the towering hills, and the beauties of art as
+exhibited in the aviary and the new fir forest.  Eva's
+thoughts were too much engrossed with the beauties
+of woman, and their dreadful consequences if improperly
+used.
+
+"Is--is Miss Maddison still in the house?" she
+inquired, with an effort to put the question carelessly.
+
+"I believe so," said the Count in his kindest voice.
+
+"And--and--that isn't Lord Tulliwuddle with my
+father, is it?"
+
+"I believe not," said the Count, still more sympathetically.
+
+She could no longer withhold a sigh, and the Count
+tactfully turned the conversation to the symbolical
+eagle arrived that morning from Mr. Maddison's native
+State.
+
+They had passed from the aviary to the flower
+garden, when at last they saw the Baron and Eleanor
+appear.  She joined the rest of the party, while he,
+walking thoughtfully in search of his friend, advanced
+in their direction.  He raised his eyes, and then, to
+complete Eva's concern, he started in evident
+embarrassment at discovering her there also.  To do him
+justice, he quickly recovered his usual politeness.  Yet
+she noticed that he detained the Count beside him and
+showed a curious tendency to discourse solely on the
+fine quality of the gravel and the advantages of having
+a brick facing to a garden wall.
+
+"My lord," said Mr. Gallosh, approaching them,
+"would you be thinking of going soon?  I've noticed
+Mr. Maddison's been taking out his watch verra frequently."
+
+"Certainly, certainly!" cried my lord.  "Oh, ve
+have finished all ve have come for."
+
+Eva started, and even Mr. Gallosh looked a trifle
+perturbed.
+
+"Yes," added the Count quickly, "we have a very
+good idea of the heating system employed.  I quite
+agree with you: we can leave the rest to your engineer."
+
+But even his readiness failed to efface the effects of
+his friend's unfortunate admission.
+
+Farewells were said, the procession reformed, the
+pipers struck up, and amidst the heartiest expressions
+of pleasure from all, the chieftain and his friends
+marched off to the spot where (out of sight of Lincoln
+Lodge) the forethought of their manager had
+arranged that the carriages should be waiting.
+
+"Well," said Bunker, when they found themselves
+in their room again, "what do you think of Miss
+Maddison?"
+
+The Baron lit a cigar, gazed thoughtfully and with
+evident satisfaction at the daily deepening shade of
+tan upon his knees, and then answered slowly--
+
+"Vell, Bonker, she is not so bad."
+
+"Ah," commented Bunker.
+
+"Bot, Bonker, it is not vat I do think of her.  Ach,
+no!  It is not for mein own pleasure.  Ach, nein! 
+How shall I do my duty to Tollyvoddle?  Zat is vat
+I ask myself."
+
+"And what answer do you generally return?"
+
+"Ze answer I make is," said the Baron gravely and
+with the deliberation the point deserved--"Ze answer
+is zat I shall vait and gonsider vich lady is ze best for
+him."
+
+"The means you employ will no doubt include a
+further short personal interview with each of them?"
+
+"Vun short!  Ach, Bonker, I most investigate
+mit carefulness.  No, no; I most see zem more zan zat."
+
+"How long do you expect the process will take
+you?"
+
+For the first time the Baron noticed with surprise a
+shade of impatience in his friend's voice.
+
+"Are you in a horry, Bonker?"
+
+"My dear Baron, I grudge no man his sport--
+particularly if he is careful to label it his duty.  But, to
+tell the truth, I have never played gamekeeper for so
+long before, and I begin to find that picking up your
+victims and carrying them after you in a bag is less
+exhilarating to-day than it was a week ago.  I wouldn't
+curtail your pleasure for the world, my dear fellow! 
+But I do ask you to remember the poor keeper."
+
+"My dear friend," said the Baron cordially, "I shall
+remember!  It shall take bot two or tree days to do
+my duty.  I shall not be long."
+
+          "A day or two of sober duty,
+            Then, Hoch! for London, home, and beauty!"
+
+trolled the Count pleasantly.
+
+The Baron did not echo the "Hoch"; but after
+retaining his thoughtful expression for a few moments,
+a smile stole over his face, and he remarked in an
+absent voice--
+
+"Vun does not alvays need to go home to find
+beauty."
+
+"Yes," said the Count, "I have always held it to
+be one of the advantages of travel that one learns to
+tolerate the inhabitants of other lands."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+"Ach, you are onfair," exclaimed the Baron. 
+"Really?" said Eva, with a sarcastic
+intonation he had not believed possible in so
+sweet a voice.
+
+It was the day following the luncheon at Lincoln
+Lodge, and they were once more seated in the shady
+arbor: this time the Count had guaranteed not only to
+leave them uninterrupted by his own presence, but to
+protect the garden from all other intruders.  Everything,
+in fact, had presaged the pleasantest of tete-a-
+tetes.  But, alas! the Baron was learning that if
+Amaryllis pouts, the shadiest corner may prove too
+warm.  Why, he was asking himself, should she exhibit
+this incomprehensible annoyance?  What had he done? 
+How to awake her smiles again?
+
+"I do not forget my old friends so quickly," he
+protested.  "No, I do assure you!  I do not onderstand
+vy you should say so."
+
+"Oh, we don't profess to be old FRIENDS, Lord
+Tulliwuddle!  After all, there is no reason why you
+shouldn't turn your back on us as soon as you see a
+newer--and more amusing--ACQUAINTANCE."
+
+"But I have not turned my back!"
+
+"We saw nothing else all yesterday."
+
+"Ah, Mees Gallosh, zat is not true!  Often did I
+look at you!"
+
+"Did you?  I had forgotten.  One doesn't treasure
+every glance, you know."
+
+The Baron tugged at his mustache and frowned.
+
+"She vill not do for Tollyvoddle," he said to himself.
+
+But the next instant a glance from Eva's brilliant
+eyes--a glance so reproachful, so appealing, and so
+stimulating, that there was no resisting it--diverted
+his reflections into quite another channel.
+
+"Vat can I do to prove zat I am so friendly as
+ever?" he exclaimed.
+
+"So FRIENDLY?" she repeated, with an innocently
+meditative air.
+
+"So vary parteecularly friendly!"
+
+Her air relented a little--just enough, in fact, to
+make him ardently desire to see it relent still further.
+
+"You promise things to me, and then do them for
+other people's benefit."
+
+The Baron eagerly demanded a fuller statement of
+this abominable charge.
+
+"Well," she said, "you told me twenty times you
+would show me something really Highland--that you'd
+kill a deer by torchlight, or hold a gathering of the
+clans upon the castle lawn.  All sorts of things you
+offered to do for me, and the only thing you have done
+has been for the sake of your NEW friends!  You gave
+THEM a procession and a dance."
+
+"But you did see it too!" he interrupted eagerly.
+
+"As part of your procession," she retorted scornfully. 
+"We felt much obliged to you--especially as
+you were so attentive to us afterwards!"
+
+"I did not mean to leave you," exclaimed the Baron
+weakly.  "It was jost zat Miss Maddison----"
+
+"I am not interested in Miss Maddison.  No doubt
+she is very charming; but, really, she doesn't interest
+me at all.  You were unavoidably prevented from talking
+to us--that is quite sufficient for me.  I excuse
+you, Lord Tulliwuddle.  Only, please, don't make me
+any more promises."
+
+"Eva!  Ach, I most say 'Eva' jost vunce more! 
+I am going to leave my castle, to leave you, and say
+good-by."
+
+She started and looked quickly at him.
+
+"Bot before I go I shall keep my promise!  Ve shall
+have ze pipers, and ze kilts, and ze dancing, and toss
+ze caber, and fling ze hammer, and it shall be on ze
+castle lawn, and all for your sake!  Vill you not forgive
+me and be friends?"
+
+"Will it really be all for my sake?"
+
+She spoke incredulously, yet looked as if she were
+willing to be convinced.
+
+"I swear it vill!"
+
+The latter part of this interview was so much more
+agreeable than the beginning that when the distant
+rumble of the luncheon gong brought it to an end at
+last they sighed, and for fully half a minute lingered
+still in silence.  If one may dare to express in crude
+language a maiden's unspoken, formless thought, Eva's
+might be read--"There is yet a moment left for him
+to say the three short words that seem to hang upon
+his tongue!"  While on his part he was reflecting that
+he had another duologue arranged for that very afternoon,
+and that, for the simultaneous suitor of two
+ladies, an open mind was almost indispensable.
+
+"Then you are going for a drive with the Count
+Bunker this afternoon?" she asked, as they strolled
+slowly towards the house.
+
+"For a leetle tour in my estate," he answered easily.
+
+"On business, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes, vorse luck!"
+
+He knew not whether to feel more relieved or
+embarrassed to find that he evidently rose in her
+estimation as a conscientious landlord.
+
+ .   .    .    .    .    .
+
+"You are having a capital day's sport, Baron," said
+the Count gaily, as they drew near Lincoln Lodge.
+
+During their drive the Baron had remained unusually
+silent.  He now roused himself and said in a
+guarded whisper--
+
+"Bonker, vill you please to give ze coachman some
+money not to say jost vere he did drive us."
+
+"I have done so," smiled the Count.
+
+His friend gratefully grasped his hand and curled
+his mustache with an emboldened air.
+
+A similar display of address on the part of Count
+Bunker resulted in the Baron's finding himself some ten
+minutes later alone with Miss Maddison in her sanctuary. 
+But, to his great surprise, he was greeted with
+none of the encouraging cordiality that had so charmed
+him yesterday.  The lady was brief in her responses,
+critical in her tone, and evidently disposed to quarrel
+with her admirer on some ground at present entirely
+mysterious.  Indeed, so discouraging was she that at
+length he exclaimed--
+
+"Tell me, Miss Maddison--I should not have gom
+to-day?  You did not vish to see me.  Eh?"
+
+"I certainly was perfectly comfortable without you,
+Lord Tulliwuddle," said the heiress tartly.
+
+"Shall I go avay?"
+
+"You have come here entirely for your own pleasure;
+and the moment you begin to feel tired there is
+nothing to hinder you going home again."
+
+"You vere more kind to me yesterday," said the
+Baron sadly.
+
+"I did not learn till after you had gone how much
+I was to blame for keeping you so long away from
+your friends.  Please do not think I shall repeat the
+offence."
+
+There was an accent on the word "friends" that
+enlightened the bewildered nobleman, even though quickness
+in taking a hint was not his most conspicuous
+attribute.  That the voice of gossip had reached the
+fair American was only too evident; but though
+considerably annoyed, he could not help feeling at the
+same time flattered to see the concern he was able to
+inspire.
+
+"My friends!" said he with amorous artfulness.
+
+"Do you mean Count Bunker?  He is ze only FRIEND
+I have here mit me."
+
+"The ONLY friend?  Indeed!"
+
+"Zat is since I see you vill not treat me as soch."
+
+Upon these lines a pretty little passage-of-arms
+ensued, the Baron employing with considerable effect the
+various blandishments of which he was admitted a past
+master; the heiress modifying her resentment by degrees
+under their insidious influence.  Still she would
+not entirely quit her troublesome position, till at last
+a happy inspiration came to reinforce his assaults. 
+Why, he reflected, should an entertainment that would
+require a considerable outlay of money and trouble
+serve to win the affections of only one girl?  With the
+same espenditure of ammunition it might be possible
+to double the bag.
+
+"Miss Maddison," he said with a regretful air, "I
+did come here to-day in ze hope----But ach!"
+
+So happily had he succeeded in whetting her curiosity
+that she begged--nay, insisted--that he should
+finish his sentence.
+
+"If you had been kind I did hope zat you vould
+allow me to give in your honor an entertainment at
+my castle."
+
+"An entertainment!" she cried, with a marked
+increase of interest.
+
+"Jost a leetle EXPOSITION of ze Highland sport, mit
+bagpipes and caber and so forth; unvorthy of your
+notice perhaps, bot ze best I can do."
+
+Eleanor clapped her hands enthusiastically.
+
+"I should just love it!"
+
+The triumphant diplomatist smiled complacently.
+
+"Bonker vill arrange it all nicely," he said to
+himself.
+
+And there rose in his fancy such a pleasing and
+gorgeous picture of himself in the panoply of the
+North, hurling a hammer skywards amidst the plaudits
+of his clan and the ravished murmurs of the ladies,
+that he could not but congratulate himself upon this
+last master-stroke of policy.  For if instead of ladies
+there were only one lady, exactly half the pleasure
+would be lacking.  So generous were this nobleman's
+instincts!
+
+During their drive to Lincoln Lodge the Baron had
+hesitated to broach his new project to his friend for
+the very reason that, after the glow of his first enthusiastic
+proposal to Eva was over, it seemed to him a
+vast undertaking for a limited object; but driving
+home he lost no time in confiding his scheme to the
+Count.
+
+"The deuce!" cried Bunker.  "That will mean
+three more days here at least!"
+
+"Vat is tree days, mine Bonker?"
+
+"My dear Baron, I am the last man in the world to
+drop an unpleasant hint; yet I can't help thinking we
+have been so unconscionably lucky up till now that it
+would be wise to retire before an accident befalls us."
+
+"Vat kind of accident?"
+
+"The kind that may happen to the best regulated
+adventurer."
+
+The Baron pondered.  When Bunker suggested caution
+it indeed seemed time to beat a retreat; yet--
+those two charming ladies, and that alluring tartan
+tableau!
+
+"Ach, let ze devil take ze man zat is afraid!" he
+exclaimed at last.  "Bonker, it vill be soch fun!"
+
+"Watching you complete two conquests?"
+
+"Be not impatient, good Bonker!"
+
+"My dear fellow, if you could find me one girl--
+even one would content me--who would condescend to
+turn her eyes from the dazzling spectacle of Baron
+Tulliwuddle, and cast them for so much as half an hour
+a day upon his obscure companion, I might see some
+fun in it too."
+
+The Baron, with an air of patronizing kindness that
+made his fellow-adventurer's lot none the easier to bear,
+answered reassuringly--
+
+"Bot I shall leave all ze preparations to be made by
+you; you vill not have time zen to feel lonely."
+
+"Thank you, Baron; you have the knack of conferring
+the most princely favors."
+
+"Ach, I am used to do so," said the Baron simply,
+and then burst out eagerly, "Some feat you must
+design for me at ze sports so zat I can show zem my
+strength, eh?"
+
+"With the caber, for instance?"
+
+The Baron had seen the caber tossed, and he shook
+his head.
+
+"He is too big."
+
+"I might fit a strong spring in one end."
+
+But the Baron still seemed disinclined.  His friend
+reflected, and then suddenly exclaimed--
+
+"The village doctor keeps some chemical apparatus,
+I believe!  You'll throw the hammer, Baron.  I can
+manage it."
+
+The Baron appeared mystified by the juxtaposition
+of ideas, but serenely expressed himself as ready to
+entrust this and all other arrangements for the Hechnahoul
+Gathering to the ingenious Count, as some small
+compensation for so conspicuously outshining him.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+The day of the Gathering broke gray and still,
+and the Baron, who was no weather prophet,
+declared gloomily--
+
+"It vill rain.  Donnerwetter!"
+
+A couple of hours later the sun was out, and the
+distant hills shimmering in the heat haze.
+
+"Himmel!  Ve are alvays lucky, Bonker!" he cried,
+and with gleeful energy brandished his dumb-bells in
+final preparation for his muscular exploits.
+
+"We certainly have escaped hanging so far," said
+the Count, as he drew on the trews which became his
+well-turned leg so happily.
+
+His arrangements were admirable and complete, and
+by twelve o'clock the castle lawn looked as barbarically
+gay as the colored supplement to an illustrated paper. 
+Pipes were skirling, skirts fluttering, flags flapping;
+and as invitations had been issued to various magnates
+in the district, whether acquainted with the present
+peer or not, there were to be seen quite a number of
+dignified personages in divers shades of tartan, and
+parasols of all the hues in the rainbow.  The Baron
+was in his element.  He judged the bagpipe competition
+himself, and held one end of the tape that measured
+the jumps, besides delighting the whole assembled
+company by his affability and good spirits.
+
+"Your performance comes next, I see," said Eleanor
+Maddison, throwing him her brightest smile.  "I can't
+tell you how I am looking forward to seeing you do it!"
+
+The Baron started and looked at the programme in
+her hand.  He had been too excited to study it carefully
+before, and now for the first time he saw the
+announcement (in large type)--
+
+"7. Lord Tulliwuddle throws the 85-lb. hammer."
+
+The sixth event was nearly through, and there--
+there evidently was the hammer in question being carried
+into the ring by no fewer than three stalwart
+Highlanders!  The Baron had learned enough of the
+pastimes of his adopted country to be aware that this
+gigantic weapon was something like four times as
+heavy as any hammer hitherto thrown by the hardiest
+Caledonian.
+
+"Teufel!  Bonker vill make a fool of me," he
+muttered, and hastily bursting from the circle of
+spectators, hurried towards the Count, who appeared to be
+busied in keeping the curious away from the Chieftain's
+hammer.
+
+"Bonker, vat means zis?" he demanded.
+
+"Your hammer," smiled the Count.
+
+"A hammer zat takes tree men----"
+
+"Hush!" whispered the Count.  "They are only
+holding it down!"
+
+The Baron laid his hand upon the round enormous
+head, and started.
+
+"It is not iron!" he gasped.  "It is of rubber."
+
+"Filled with hydrogen," breathed the Count in his
+ear.  "Just swing it once and let go--and, I say, mind
+it doesn't carry you away with it."
+
+The chief bared his arms and seized the handle; his
+three clansmen let go; and then, with what seemed to
+the breathless spectators to be a merely trifling effort
+of strength, he dismissed the projectile upon the most
+astounding journey ever seen even in that land of
+brawny hammer-hurlers.  Up, up, up it soared, over
+the trees; high above the topmost turret of the castle,
+and still on and on and ever upwards till it became a
+mere speck in the zenith, and at last faded utterly from
+sight.
+
+Then, and not till then, did the pent-up applause
+break out into such a roar of cheering as Hechnahoul
+had never heard before in all its long history.
+
+"Eighty-five pounds of pig-iron gone straight to
+heaven!" gasped the Silver King.  "Guess that beats
+all records!"
+
+"America must wake up!" frowned Ri.
+
+Meanwhile the Baron, after bowing in turn towards
+all points of the compass, turned confidentially to his
+friend.
+
+"Vill not ze men that carried it----?"
+
+"I've told 'em you'd give 'em a couple of sovereigns
+apiece."
+
+The Baron came from an economical nation.
+
+"Two to each!"
+
+"My dear fellow, wasn't it worth it?"
+
+The Baron grasped his hand.
+
+"Ja, mine Bonker, it vas!  I vill pay zem."
+
+Radiant and smiling, he returned to receive the
+congratulations of his guests, dreaming that his triumph
+was complete, and that nothing more arduous remained
+than pleasant dalliance alternately with his Eleanor
+and his Eva.  But he speedily discovered that hurling
+an inflated hammer heavenwards was child's play as
+compared with the simultaneous negotiation of a double
+wooing.  The first person to address him was the millionaire,
+and he could not but feel a shiver of apprehension
+to note that he was evidently in the midst of a
+conversation with Mr. Gallosh.
+
+"I must congratulate you, Lord Tulliwuddle," said
+Mr. Maddison, "and I must further congratulate my
+daughter upon the almost miraculous feat you have
+performed for her benefit.  You know, I dare say"
+--here he turned to Mr. Gallosh--"that this very
+delightful entertainment was given primarily in my
+Eleanor's honor?"
+
+"Whut!" exclaimed the merchant.  "That's--eh--
+that's scarcely the fac's as we've learned them.  But
+his lordship will be able to tell you best himself."
+
+His lordship smiled affably upon both, murmured
+something incoherent, and passed on hastily towards
+the scarlet parasol of Eleanor.  But he had no sooner
+reached it than he paused and would have turned had
+she not seen him, for under a blue parasol beside her
+he espied, too late, the fair face of Eva, and too clearly
+perceived that the happy maidens had been comparing
+notes, with the result that neither looked very happy
+now.
+
+"I hope you do enjoy ze sports," he began, endeavoring
+to distribute this wish as equally as possible.
+
+"Miss Gallosh has been remarkably fortunate in her
+weather," said Eleanor, and therewith gave him an
+uninterrupted view of her sunshade.
+
+"Miss Maddison has seen you to great advantage,
+Lord Tulliwuddle," said Eva, affording him the next
+instant a similar prospect of silk.
+
+The unfortunate chief recoiled from this ungrateful
+reception of his kindness.  Only one refuge, one mediator,
+he instinctively looked for; but where could the
+Count have gone?
+
+"Himmel!  Has he deserted me?" he muttered,
+frantically elbowing his way in search of him.
+
+But this once it happened that the Count was
+engaged upon business of his own.  Strolling outside the
+ring of spectators, with a view to enjoying a cigar and
+a little relaxation from the anxieties of stage-management,
+his attention had been arrested in a singular and
+flattering way.  At that place where he happened to be
+passing stood an open carriage containing a girl and
+an older lady, evidently guests from the neighborhood
+personally unknown to his lordship, and just as he went
+by he heard pronounced in a thrilling whisper--"THAT
+must be Count Bunker!"
+
+The Count was too well-bred to turn at once, but
+it is hardly necessary to say that a few moments later
+he casually repassed the carriage; nor will it astonish
+any who have been kind enough to follow his previous
+career with some degree of attention to learn that when
+opposite the ladies he paused, looked from them to the
+enclosure and back again, and presently raising his
+feathered bonnet, said in the most ingratiating tones--
+
+"Pardon me, but I am requested by Lord Tulliwuddle
+to show any attention I can to the comfort of
+his guests.  Can you see well from where you are?"
+
+The younger lady with an eager air assured him that
+they saw perfectly, and even in the course of the three
+or four sentences she spoke he was able to come to
+several conclusions regarding her: that her companion
+was in a subsidiary and doubtless salaried position; that
+she herself was decidedly attractive to look upon;
+that her voice had spoken the whispered words; and
+that her present animated air might safely be attributed
+rather to the fact that she addressed Count Bunker
+than to the subject-matter of her reply.
+
+No one possessed in a higher degree than the Count
+the nice art of erecting a whole conversation upon the
+foundation of the lightest phrase.  He contrived a
+reply to the lady's answer, was able to put the most
+natural question next, to follow that with a happy
+stroke of wit, and within three minutes to make it
+seem the most obvious thing in the world that he should
+be saying
+
+"I am sure that Lord Tulliwuddle will never forgive
+me if I fail to learn the names of any visitors who have
+honored him to-day."
+
+"Mine," said the girl, her color rising slightly, but
+her glance as kind as ever, "is Julia Wallingford. 
+This is my friend Miss Minchell."
+
+The Count bowed.
+
+"And may I introduce myself as a friend of Tulliwuddle's,
+answering to the name of Count Bunker."
+
+Again Miss Wallingford's color rose.  In a low and
+ardent voice she began
+
+"I am so glad to meet you!  Your name is
+already----"
+
+But at that instant, when the Count was bending
+forward to catch the words and the lady bending down
+to utter them, a hand grasped him by the sleeve, and
+the Baron's voice exclaimed
+
+"Come, Bonker, quickly here to help me!"
+
+He would fain have presented his lordship to the
+ladies, but the Baron was too hurried to pause, and
+with a parting bow he was reluctantly borne off to
+assist his friend out of his latest dilemma.
+
+"Pooh, my dear Baron!" he cried, when the
+situation was explained to him; "you couldn't have done
+more damage to their hearts if you had hurled your
+hammer at them!  A touch of jealousy was all that
+was needed to complete your conquests.  But for me
+you have spoiled the most promising affair imaginable. 
+There goes their carriage trotting down the drive! 
+And I shall probably never know whether my name
+was already in her heart or in her prayers.  Those are
+the two chief receptacles for gentlemen's names, I
+believe--aren't they, Baron?"
+
+On his advice the rival families were left to the
+soothing influences of a good dinner and a night's
+sleep, and he found himself free to ponder over his
+interrupted adventure.
+
+"Undoubtedly one feels all the better for a little
+appreciation," he reflected complacently.  "I wonder
+if it was my trews that bowled her over?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+The Count next morning consumed a solitary
+breakfast, his noble friend having risen some
+hours previously and gone for an early walk
+upon the hill.  But he was far from feeling
+any trace of boredom, since an open letter beside his
+plate appeared to provide him with an ample fund of
+pleasant and entertaining reflections.
+
+"I have not withered yet," he said to himself. 
+"Here is proof positive that some blossom, some aroma
+remains!"
+
+The precise terms of this encouraging epistle were
+these:
+
+                         "THE LASH, near NETHERBRIG.
+                              "Tuesday night.
+
+
+"DEAR COUNT BUNKER,--Forgive what must seem to
+you INCREDIBLE boldness (!), and do not think worse of
+me than I deserve.  It seems such a pity that you should
+be so near and yet that I should lose this chance of
+gratifying my great desire.  If you knew how I prized
+the name of Bunker you would understand; but no doubt
+I am only one among many, and you do understand
+better than I can explain.
+
+"My father is away from home, and the WORLD dictates
+prudence; but I know your views on conventionality
+are those I too have learned to share, so will you
+come and see me before you leave Scotland?
+
+"With kindest regards and in great haste because
+I want you to get this to-morrow morning.  Believe me,
+yours very sincerely,
+                         "JULIA WALLINGFORD."
+
+
+"P.S.--If it would upset your arrangements to come
+only for the day, Miss Minchell agrees with me that
+we could easily put you up.--J. W."
+
+
+"By Jingo!" mused the Count, "that's what I call
+a sporting offer.  Her father away from home, and
+Count Bunker understanding better than she can explain! 
+Gad, it's my duty to go!"
+
+But besides the engaging cordiality of Miss Wallingford's
+invitation, there was something about the letter
+that puzzled almost as much as it cheered him.
+
+"She prizes the name of Bunker, does she?  Never
+struck me it was very ornamental; and in any case the
+compliment seems a trifle stretched.  But, hang it! this
+is looking a gift-horse in the mouth.  Such ardor deserves
+to be embraced, not dissected."
+
+He swiftly debated how best to gratify the lady. 
+Last night it had been his own counsel, and likewise the
+Baron's desire, to leave by the night mail that very
+evening, with their laurels still unfaded and blessings
+heaped upon their heads.  Why not make his next stage
+The Lash?
+
+"Hang it, the Baron has had such a good innings
+that he can scarcely grudge me a short knock," he said
+to himself.  "He can wait for me at Perth or
+somewhere."
+
+And, ringing the bell, he wrote and promptly
+despatched this brief telegram:
+
+"Delighted.  Shall spend to-night in passing.  Bunker."
+
+Hardly was this point settled when the footman re-
+entered to inform him that Mr. Maddison's motor car
+was at the door waiting to convey him without delay
+to Lincoln Lodge.  Accompanying this announcement
+came the Silver King's card bearing the words, "Please
+come and see me at once."
+
+The Count stroked his chin, and lit a cigarette.
+
+"There is something fresh in the wind," thought he.
+
+In the course of his forty-miles-an-hour rush through
+the odors of pine woods, he had time to come to a pretty
+correct conclusion regarding the business before him,
+and was thus enabled to adopt the mien most suitable
+to the contingency when he found himself ushered into
+the presence of the millionaire and his son.  The set
+look upon their faces, the ceremonious manner of their
+greeting, and the low buzzing of the phonograph, audible
+above the tinkle of a musical box ingeniously
+intended to drown it, confirmed his guess even before a
+word had passed.
+
+"Be seated, Count," said the Silver King; and the
+Count sat.
+
+"Now, sir," he continued, "I have sent for you,
+owing, sir, to the high opinion I have formed of your
+intelligence and business capabilities."
+
+The Count bowed profoundly.
+
+"Yes, sir, I believe, and my son believes, you to be a
+white man, even though you are a Count."
+
+"That is so," said Ri.
+
+"Now, sir, you must be aware--in fact, you ARE
+aware--of the matrimonial project once entertained
+between my daughter and Lord Tulliwuddle."
+
+"Once!" exclaimed the Count in protest.
+
+"ONCE!" echoed Ri in his deepest voice.
+
+"Hish, Ri!  Let your poppa do the talking this
+time," said the millionaire sternly, though with an
+indulgent eye.
+
+"But--er--ONCE?" repeated the Count, as if bewildered
+by the past tense implied; though to himself he
+murmured--"I knew it!"
+
+"When I gave my sanction to Lord Tulliwuddle's
+proposition, I did so under the impression that I was
+doing a deal with a man, sir, of integrity and honor. 
+But what do I find?"
+
+"Yes, what?" thundered Ri.
+
+"I find, sir, that his darned my-lordship--and be
+damned to his titles----"
+
+"Mr. Maddison!" expostulated the Count gently.
+
+"I find, Count, I find that Lord Tulliwuddle, under
+pretext of paying my Eleanor a compliment, has provided
+an entertainment--a musical and athletic entertainment--
+for another woman!"
+
+The Count sprang to his feet.
+
+"Impossible!" he cried.
+
+"It is true!"
+
+"Name her!"
+
+"She answers, sir, to the plebeian cognomen of Gallosh."
+
+"A nobody!" sneered Ri.
+
+"In trade!" added his father scornfully.
+
+Had the occasion been more propitious, the Count
+could scarcely have refrained from commenting upon
+this remarkably republican criticism; but, as it was, he
+deemed it more advisable to hunt with the hounds.
+
+"That canaille!" he shouted.  "Ha, ha!  Lord
+Tulliwuddle would never so far demean himself!"
+
+"I have it from old Gallosh himself," declared Mr.
+Maddison.
+
+"And that girl Gallosh told Eleanor the same,"
+added Ri.
+
+"Pooh!" cried the Count.  "A mere invention."
+
+"You are certain, sir, that Lord Tulliwuddle gave
+them no grounds whatever for supposing such a thing?"
+
+"I pledge my reputation as Count of the Austrian
+Empire, that if my friend be indeed a Tulliwuddle he
+is faithful to your charming daughter!"
+
+Father and son looked at him shrewdly.
+
+"Being a Tulliwuddle, or any other sort of pampered
+aristocrat, doesn't altogether guarantee faithfulness,"
+observed the Silver King.
+
+"If he has deceived you, he shall answer to ME!"
+declared the Count.  "And between ourselves, as nature's
+gentleman to nature's gentleman, you may assure Miss
+Maddison that there is not the remotest likelihood of
+this scheming Miss Gallosh ever becoming my friend's
+bride!"
+
+The two Dariuses were sensibly affected by this
+assurance.
+
+"As nature's gentleman to nature's gentleman!"
+repeated the elder with unction, wringing his hand.
+
+His son displayed an equal enthusiasm, and the Count
+departed with an enhanced reputation and the lingering
+fragrance of a cocktail upon his tongue.
+
+"Now I think we are in comparatively smooth water,"
+he said to himself as he whizzed back to the castle.
+
+At the door he was received by the butler.
+
+"Mr. Gallosh is waiting for you in the library, my
+lord," said he, adding confidentially (since the Count
+had endeared himself to all), "He's terrible impatient
+for to see your lordship."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+Evidently Mr. Gallosh, while waiting for the
+Count's return, had so worked up his wrath
+that it was ready to explode on a hair-trigger
+touch; and, as evidently, his guest's extreme
+urbanity made it exceedingly difficult to carry out his
+threatening intentions.
+
+"I want a word with you, Count.  I've been wanting
+a word with you all morning," he began.
+
+"Believe me, Mr. Gallosh, I appreciate the compliment."
+
+"Where were you? I mean it was verra annoying
+not to find you when I wanted you."
+
+The merchant was so evidently divided between anxiety
+to blurt out his mind while it was yet hot from the
+making up, and desire not to affront a guest and a man
+of rank, that the Count could scarcely restrain a smile.
+
+"It is equally annoying to myself.  I should have
+enjoyed a conversation with you at any hour since breakfast."
+
+"Umph," replied his host.
+
+"What can I do for you now?"
+
+Mr. Gallosh looked at him steadfastly.
+
+"Count Bunker," said he, "I am only a plain
+man----"
+
+"The ladies, I assure you, are not of that opinion,"
+interposed the Count politely.
+
+Mr. Gallosh seemed to him to receive this compliment
+with more suspicion than pleasure.
+
+"I'm saying," he repeated, "that I'm only a plain
+man of business, and you and your friend are what
+you'd call swells."
+
+"God forbid that I should!" the Count interjected
+fervently.  " 'Toffs,' possibly--but no matter, please
+continue."
+
+"Well, now, so long as his lordship likes to treat me
+and my family as kind of belonging to a different sphere,
+I'm well enough content.  I make no pretensions, Count,
+to be better than what I am."
+
+"I also, Mr. Gallosh, endeavor to affect a similar
+modesty.  It's rather becoming, I think, to a fine-looking
+man."
+
+"It's becoming to any kind of man that he should
+know his place.  But I was saying, I'd have been content
+if his lordship had been distant and polite and that
+kind of thing.  But was he?  You know yourself, Count,
+how he's behaved!"
+
+"Perfectly politely, I trust."
+
+"But he's not been what you'd call distant, Count
+Bunker.  In fac', the long and the short of it is just
+this--what's his intentions towards my Eva?"
+
+"Is it Mrs. Gallosh who desires this information?"
+
+"It is.  And myself too; oh, I'm not behindhand
+where the reputation of my daughters is concerned!"
+
+"Mrs. G. has screwed him up to this," said the
+Count to himself.  Aloud, he asked with his blandest
+air--
+
+"Was not Lord Tulliwuddle available himself?"
+
+"No; he's gone out."
+
+"Alone?"
+
+"No, not alone."
+
+"In brief, with Miss Gallosh?"
+
+"Quite so; and what'll he be saying to her?"
+
+"He is a man of such varied information that it's
+hard to guess."
+
+"From all I hear, there's not been much variety so
+far," said Mr. Gallosh drily.
+
+"Dear me!" observed the Count.
+
+His host looked at him for a few moments.
+
+"Well?" he demanded at length.
+
+"Pardon me if I am stupid, but what comment do
+you expect me to make?"
+
+"Well, you see, we all know quite well you're more
+in his lordship's confidence than any one else in the
+house, and I'd take it as a favor if you'd just give me
+your honest opinion.  Is he just playing himself--or
+what?"
+
+The worthy Mr. Gallosh was so evidently sincere, and
+looked at him with such an appealing eye, that the Count
+found the framing of a suitable reply the hardest task
+that had yet been set him.
+
+"Mr. Gallosh, if I were in Tulliwuddle's shoes I can
+only say that I should consider myself a highly fortunate
+individual; and I do sincerely believe that that is
+his own conviction also."
+
+"You think so?"
+
+"I do indeed."
+
+Though sensibly relieved, Mr. Gallosh still felt vaguely
+conscious that if he attempted to repeat this statement
+for the satisfaction of his wife, he would find it
+hard to make it sound altogether as reassuring as when
+accompanied by the Count's sympathetic voice.  He
+ruminated for a minute, and then suddenly recalled
+what the Count's evasive answers and sympathetic
+assurances had driven from his mind.  Yet it was, in fact,
+the chief occasion of concern.
+
+"Do you know, Count Bunker, what his lordship has
+gone and done?"
+
+"Should one inquire too specifically?" smiled the
+Count; but Mr. Gallosh remained unmoved.
+
+"You can bear me witness that he told us he was
+giving this gathering in my Eva's honor?"
+
+"Undoubtedly."
+
+"Well, he went and told Miss Maddison it was for
+her sake?"
+
+"Incredible!"
+
+"It's a fact!"
+
+"I refuse to believe my friend guilty of such perfidy! 
+Who told you this?"
+
+"The Maddisons themselves."
+
+"Ha, ha!" laughed the Count, as heartily as he had
+laughed at Lincoln Lodge; "don't you know these
+Americans sometimes draw the long bow?"
+
+"You mean to say you don't believe they told the
+truth?"
+
+"My dear Mr. Gallosh, I would answer you in
+the oft-quoted words of Horace--'Arma virumque
+cano.'  The philosophy of a solar system is some
+times compressed within an eggshell.  Say nothing
+and see!"
+
+He shook his host heartily by the hand as he spoke,
+and Mr. Gallosh, to his subsequent perplexity, found
+the interview apparently at a satisfactory conclusion.
+
+"And now," said the Count to himself, " 'Bolt!' is
+the word."
+
+As he set about his packing in the half-hour that yet
+remained before luncheon, he was surprised to note that
+his friend had evidently left no orders yet concerning
+any preparations for his departure.
+
+"Confound him!  I thought he had made up his
+mind last night!  Ah, there he comes--and singing, too,
+by Jingo!  If he wants another day's dalliance----"
+
+At this point his reflections were interrupted by the
+entrance of the jovial Baron himself.  He stopped and
+stared at his friend.
+
+"Vat for do you pack up?"
+
+"Because we leave this afternoon."
+
+"Ach, Bonker, absurd!  To-morrow--yes, to-morrow
+ve vill leave."
+
+Bunker folded his arms and looked at him seriously.
+
+"I have had two interviews this morning--one with
+Mr. Maddison, the other with Mr. Gallosh.  They were
+neither of them pleased with you, Baron."
+
+"Not pleased?  Vat did zey say?"
+
+Depicting the ire of these gentlemen in the most vivid
+terms, the Count gave him a summary of his morning's
+labors.
+
+"Pooh, pooh!  Tuts, tuts!" exclaimed the Baron. 
+"I vill make zat all right; never do you fear.  Eva, she
+does smile on me already.  Eleanor, she vill also ven I
+see her.  Leave it to me."
+
+"You won't go to-day?"
+
+"To-morrow, Bonker, I swear I vill for certain!"
+
+Bonker pondered.
+
+"Hang it!" he exclaimed.  "The worst of it is, I've
+pledged myself to go upon a visit."
+
+The Baron listened to the tale of his incipient romance
+with the greatest relish.
+
+"Bot go, my friend!  Bot go!" he cried, "and
+zen come back here to-morrow and ve vill leave togezzer."
+
+"Leave you alone, with the barometer falling and the
+storm-cone hoisted?  I don't like to, Baron."
+
+"Bot to leave zat leetle girl--eh, Bonker?  How is
+zat?"
+
+"Was ever a man so torn between two duties!"
+exclaimed the conscientious Count.
+
+"Ladies come first!" quoth the Baron.
+
+Bunker was obviously strongly tending to this opinion
+also.
+
+"Can I trust you to guide your own destinies without me?"
+
+The Baron drew himself up with a touch of indignation.
+
+"Am I a child or a fool?  I have guided mine destiny
+vary vell so far, and I zink I can still so do.  Ven vill
+you go to see Miss Wallingford?"
+
+"I'll hire a trap from the village after lunch and be
+off about four," said the Count.  "Long live the ladies! 
+Learn wisdom by my example!  Will this tie conquer
+her, do you think?"
+
+In this befitting spirit he drove off that afternoon,
+and the Baron, after waving his adieus from the door,
+strode brimful of confidence towards the drawing-room. 
+His thoughts must have gone astray, for he turned by
+accident into the wrong room--a small apartment hardly
+used at all; and before he had time to turn back he
+stopped petrified at the sight of a picture on the wall. 
+There could be no mistake--it was the original of that
+ill-omened print he had seen in the Edinburgh hotel,
+"The Execution of Lord Tulliwuddle." The actual
+title was there plain to see.
+
+"Zen it vas not a hoax!" he gasped.
+
+His first impulse was to look for a bicycle and tear
+after the dog-cart.
+
+"But can I ride him in a kilt?" he reflected.
+
+By the time he had fully debated this knotty point
+his friend was miles upon his way, and the Baron was
+left ruefully to lament his rashness in parting with such
+an ally.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+During the horrid period of suspense that
+followed her visit to Sir Justin, the Baroness
+von Blitzenberg naturally enough felt
+disinclined to go much into society, and in
+fact rarely went out at all during the Baron's absence,
+except to the houses of one or two of her mother's
+particular friends.  Even then she felt much more inclined
+to stay at home.
+
+"Need we go to Mrs. Jerwin-Speedy's to-night?"
+she said one afternoon.
+
+"Certainly," replied the Countess decisively.
+
+Alicia sighed submissively; but this attitude was
+abruptly changed into one of readiness, nay, even of alacrity,
+when her mother remarked--
+
+"By the way, she is an aunt of the present
+Tulliwuddle.  I believe it was you who were asking about him
+the other day."
+
+"Was I?" said the Baroness carelessly; but she
+offered no further objections to attending Mrs. Jerwin-
+Speedy's reception.
+
+She found there a large number of people compressed
+into a couple of small rooms, and she soon felt so lost in
+the crush of strangers, and the chances of obtaining
+any information about Lord Tulliwuddle or his Eva
+seemed so remote, that she soon began to wish herself
+comfortably at home again, even though it were only to
+fret.  But fortune, which had so long been unkind to
+her and indulgent to her erring spouse, chose that night
+as the turning-point in her tide of favors.  Little
+dreaming how much hung on a mere introduction, Mrs.
+Jerwin-Speedy led up to the Baroness an apparently
+nervous and diffident young man.
+
+"Let me introduce my nephew, Lord Tulliwuddle--
+the Baroness von Blitzenberg," said she; and having
+innocently hurled this bomb, retired from further
+participation in the drama.
+
+With young and diffident men Alicia had a pleasant
+instinct for conducting herself as smilingly as though
+they were the greatest wits about the town.  The envious
+of her sex declared that it was because she scarcely
+recognized the difference; but be that as it may, it
+served her on this occasion in the most admirable stead. 
+She detached the agitated peer from the thickest of the
+throng, propped him beside her against the wall, and by
+her kindness at length unloosed his tongue.  Then it
+was she began to suspect that his nervous manner must
+surely be due to some peculiar circumstance rather than
+mere constitutional shyness.  Made observant by her
+keen curiosity, she noticed at first a worried, almost
+hunted, look in his eyes and an extreme impatience of
+scrutiny by his fellow-guests; but as he gained
+confidence in her kindness and discretion these passed away,
+and he appeared simply a garrulous young man, with
+a tolerably good opinion of himself.
+
+"Poor fellow!  He is in trouble of some kind. 
+Something to do with Eva, of course!" she said to
+her sympathetically.
+
+The genuine Tulliwuddle had indeed some cause for
+perturbation.  After keeping himself out of the way
+of all his friends and most of his acquaintances ever
+since the departure of his substitute, hearing nothing
+of what was happening at Hechnahoul, and living in
+daily dread of the ignominious exposure of their plot,
+he had stumbled by accident against his aunt, explained
+his prolonged absence from her house with the utmost
+difficulty, and found himself forced to appease her
+wounded feelings by appearing where he least wished
+to be seen--in a crowded London reception-room. 
+No wonder the unfortunate young man seemed nervous
+and ill at ease.
+
+As for Alicia, she was consumed with anxiety to know
+why he was here and not in Scotland, as Sir Justin had
+supposed; and, indeed, to learn a number of things. 
+And now they were rapidly getting on sufficiently
+familiar terms for her to put a tactful question or two. 
+Encouraged by her sympathy, he began to touch upon
+his own anxieties.
+
+"A young man ought to get married, I suppose," he
+remarked confidentially.
+
+The Baroness smiled.
+
+"That depends on whether he likes any one well
+enough to marry her, doesn't it?"
+
+He sighed.
+
+"Do you think--honestly now," he said solemnly,
+"that one should marry for love or marry for money?"
+
+"For love, certainly!"
+
+"You really think so?  You'd advise--er--advise
+a fellow to blow the prejudices of his friends, and
+that sort of thing?"
+
+"I should have to know a little more about the case."
+
+He was evidently longing for a confidant.
+
+"Suppose er--one girl was ripping, but--well--
+on the stage, for instance."
+
+"On the stage!" exclaimed the Baroness.  "Yes,
+please go on.  What about the other girl?"
+
+"Suppose she had simply pots of money, but the
+fellow didn't know much more about her?"
+
+"I certainly shouldn't marry a girl I didn't know
+a good deal about," said the Baroness with conviction.
+
+Lord Tulliwuddle seemed impressed with this opinion.
+
+"That's just what I have begun to think," said he,
+and gazed down at his pumps with a meditative air.
+
+The Baroness thought the moment had come when
+she could effect a pretty little surprise.
+
+"Which of them is called Eva?" she asked archly.
+
+To her intense disappointment he merely stared.
+
+"Don't you really know any girl called Eva?"
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Can't think of any one."
+
+Suspicion, fear, bewilderment, made her reckless.
+
+"Have you been in Scotland--at your castle, as I
+heard you were going?"
+
+A mighty change came over the young man.  He
+backed away from her, stammering hurriedly
+
+"No--yes--I--er--why do you ask me that?"
+
+"Is there any other Lord Tulliwuddle?" she
+demanded breathlessly.
+
+He gave her one wild look, and then without so
+much as a farewell had turned and elbowed his way
+out of the room.
+
+"It's all up!" he said to himself.  "There's no use
+trying to play that game any longer--Essington has
+muddled it somehow.  Well, I'm free to do what I
+like now!"
+
+In this state of mind he found himself in the street,
+hailed the first hansom, and drove headlong from the
+dangerous regions of Belgravia.
+
+ .   .    .    .    .    .
+
+Till the middle of the next day the Baroness still
+managed to keep her own counsel, though she was now
+so alarmed that she was twenty times on the point of
+telling everything to her mother.  But the arrival of
+a note from Sir Justin ended her irresolution.  It
+ran thus:
+
+
+"MY DEAR ALICIA,--I have just learned for certain
+that Lord T. is at his place in Scotland.  Singularly
+enough, he is described as apparently of foreign
+extraction, and I hear that he is accompanied by a
+friend of the name of Count Bunker.  I am just setting
+out for the North myself, and trust that I may
+be able to elucidate the mystery.  Yours very truly,
+                    "JUSTIN WALLINGFORD."
+
+
+"Foreign extraction!  Count Bunker!" gasped the
+Baroness; and without stopping to debate the matter
+again, she rushed into her mother's arms, and there
+sobbed out the strange story of her second letter and
+the two Lord Tulliwuddles.
+
+It were difficult to say whether anger at her daughter's
+deceit, indignation with the treacherous Baron,
+or a stern pleasure in finding her worst prognostications
+in a fair way to being proved, was the uppermost
+emotion in Lady Grillyer's mind when she had
+listened to this relation.  Certainly poor Alicia could
+not but think that sympathy for her troubles formed
+no ingredient in the mixture.
+
+"To think of your concealing this from me for so
+long!" she cried: "and Sir Justin abetting you!  I
+shall tell him very plainly what I think of him!  But
+if my daughter sets an example in treachery, what can
+one expect of one's friends?"
+
+"After all, mamma, it was my own and Rudolph's
+concern more than your's!" exclaimed Alicia, flaring
+up for an instant.
+
+"Don't answer me, child!" thundered the Countess. 
+"Fetch me a railway time-table, and say nothing that
+may add to your sin!"
+
+"A time-table, mamma?  What for?"
+
+"I am going to Scotland," pronounced the Countess.
+
+"Then I shall go too!"
+
+"Indeed you shall not.  You will wait here till I
+have brought Rudolph back to you."
+
+The Baroness said nothing aloud, but within her
+wounded heart she thought bitterly
+
+"Mamma seems to forget that even worms will turn
+sometimes!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+"A decidedly delectable residence," said
+Count Bunker to himself as his dog-cart
+approached the lodge gates of The Lash. 
+"And a very proper setting for the pleasant
+scenes so shortly to be enacted.  Lodge, avenue,
+a bogus turret or two, and a flagstaff on top of 'em--
+by Gad, I think one may safely assume a tolerable
+cellar in such a mansion."
+
+As he drove up the avenue between a double line of
+ancient elms and sycamores, his satisfaction increased
+and his spirits rose ever higher.
+
+"I wonder if I can forecast the evening: a game of
+three-handed bridge, in which I trust I'll be lucky
+enough to lose a little silver, that'll put 'em in good-
+humor and make old Miss What-d'ye-may-call-her the
+more willing to go to bed early; then the departure
+of the chaperon; and then the tete-a-tete!  I hope
+to Heaven I haven't got rusty!"
+
+With considerable satisfaction he ran over the outfit
+he had brought, deeming it even on second thoughts
+a singularly happy selection: the dining coat with pale-
+blue lapels, the white tie of a new material and cut
+borrowed from the Baron's finery, the socks so ravishingly
+embroidered that he had more than once caught
+the ladies at Hechnahoul casting affectionate glances
+upon them.
+
+"A first-class turn-out," he thought.  "And what a
+lucky thing I thought of borrowing a banjo from
+young Gallosh!  A coon song in the twilight will break
+the ground prettily."
+
+By this time they had stopped before the door, and
+an elderly man-servant, instead of waiting for the
+Count, came down the steps to meet him.  In his
+manner there was something remarkably sheepish and
+constrained, and, to the Count's surprise, he thrust
+forth his hand almost as if he expected it to be shaken. 
+Bunker, though a trifle puzzled, promptly handed him
+the banjo case, remarking pleasantly--
+
+"My banjo; take care of it, please."
+
+The man started so violently that he all but dropped
+it upon the steps.
+
+"What the deuce did he think I said?" wondered
+the Count.  " 'Banjo' can't have sounded 'dynamite.' "
+
+He entered the house, and found himself in a pleasant
+hall, where his momentary uneasiness was at once
+forgotten in the charming welcome of his hostess. 
+Not only she, but her chaperon, received him with a
+flattering warmth that realized his utmost expectations.
+
+"It was so good of you to come!" cried Miss Wallingford.
+
+"So very kind," murmured Miss Minchell.
+
+"I knew you wouldn't think it too unorthodox!"
+added Julia.
+
+"I'm afraid orthodoxy is a crime I shall never swing
+for," said the Count, with his most charming smile.
+
+"I am sure my father wouldn't REALLY mind," said
+Julia.
+
+"Not if Sir Justin shared your enthusiasm, dear,"
+added Miss Minchell.
+
+"I must teach him to!"
+
+"Good Lord!" thought the Count.  "This is
+friendly indeed."
+
+A few minutes passed in the exchange of these
+preliminaries, and then his hostess said, with a pretty
+little air of discipleship that both charmed and slightly
+puzzled him
+
+"You do still think that nobody should dine later
+than six, don't you?  I have ordered dinner for six
+to-night."
+
+"Six!" exclaimed the Count, but recovering himself,
+added, "An ideal hour--and it is half-past five now. 
+Perhaps I had better think of dressing."
+
+"What YOU call dressing!" smiled Julia, to his
+justifiable amazement.  "Let me show you to your
+room."
+
+She led him upstairs, and finally stopped before an
+open door.
+
+"There!" she said, with an air of pride.  "It is
+really my father's bedroom when he is at home, but
+I've had it specially prepared for YOU!  Is it just as
+you would like?"
+
+Bunker was incapable of observing anything very
+particularly beyond the fact that the floor was
+uncarpeted, and as nearly free from furniture as a
+bedroom floor could well be.
+
+"It is ravishing!" he murmured, and dismissed her
+with a well-feigned smile.
+
+Bereft even of expletives, he gazed round the apartment
+prepared for him.  It was a few moments before
+he could bring himself to make a tour of its vast
+bleakness.
+
+"I suppose that's what they call a truckle-bed,"
+he mused.  "Oh, there is one chair--nothing but cold
+water-towels made of vegetable fibre apparently. 
+The devil take me, is this a reformatory for bogus
+noblemen!"
+
+He next gazed at the bare whitewashed wall.  On it
+hung one picture--the portrait of a strangely attired
+man.
+
+"What n shocking-looking fellow!" he exclaimed,
+and went up to examine it more closely.
+
+Then, with a stupefying shock, he read this legend
+beneath it
+
+"Count Bunker.  Philosopher, teacher, and martyr."
+
+For a minute he stared in rapt amazement, and then
+sharply rang the bell.
+
+"Hang it," he said to himself, "I must throw a
+little light on this somehow!"
+
+Presently the elderly man-servant appeared, this
+time in a state of still more obvious confusion.  For
+a moment he stared at the Count--who was too discomposed
+by his manner to open his lips--and then,
+once more stretching out his hand, exclaimed in a
+choked voice and a strong Scotch accent--
+
+"How are ye, Bunker!"
+
+"What the deuce!" shouted the Count, evading the
+proffered hand-shake with an agile leap.
+
+The poor fellow turned scarlet, and in an humble
+voice blurted out--
+
+"She told me to do it!  Miss Julia said ye'd like me
+to shake hands and just ca' ye plain Bunker.  I beg
+your pardon, sir; oh, I beg your pardon humbly!"
+
+The Count looked at him keenly.
+
+"He is evidently telling the truth," he thought.
+
+Thereupon he took from his pocket half a sovereign.
+
+"My good fellow," he began.  "By the way, what's
+your name?"
+
+"Mackenzie, sir."
+
+"Mackenzie, my honest friend, I clearly perceive
+that Miss Wallingford, in her very kind efforts to
+gratify my unconventional tastes, has put herself to
+quite unnecessary trouble.  She has even succeeded in
+surprising me, and I should be greatly obliged if you
+would kindly explain to me the reasons for her conduct,
+so far as you can."
+
+At this point the half-sovereign changed hands.
+
+"In the first place," resumed the Count, "what is
+the meaning of this remarkably villainous portrait
+labelled with my name?"
+
+"That, sir," stammered Mackenzie, greatly taken
+aback by the inquiry.  "Why, sir, that's the famous
+Count Bunker--your uncle, sir, is he no'?"
+
+Bunker began to see a glimmer of light, though the
+vista it illumined was scarcely a much pleasanter
+prospect than the previous bank of fog.  He remembered
+now, for the first time since his journey north,
+that the Baron, in dubbing him Count Bunker, had
+encouraged him to take the title on the ground that
+it was a real dignity once borne by a famous personage;
+and in a flash he realized the pitfalls that awaited
+a solitary false step.
+
+"THAT my uncle!" he exclaimed with an air of
+pleased surprise, examining the portrait more attentively;
+"by Gad, I suppose it is!  But I can't say it
+is a flattering likeness.  'Philosopher, teacher, and
+martyr'--how apt a description!  I hadn't noticed
+that before, or I should have known at once who it
+was."
+
+Still Mackenzie was looking at him with a perplexed
+and uneasy air.
+
+"Miss Wallingford, sir, seems under the impression
+that you would be wanting jist the same kind of things
+as he likit," he remarked diffidently.
+
+The Count laughed.
+
+"Hence the condemned cell she's put me in?  I see! 
+Ha, ha!  No, Mackenzie, I have moved with the times. 
+In fact, my uncle's philosophy and teachings always
+struck me as hardly suitable for a gentleman."
+
+"I was thinking that mysel'," observed Mackenzie.
+
+"Well, you understand now how things are, don't
+you?  By the way, you haven't put out my evening
+clothes, I notice."
+
+"You werena to dress, sir, Miss Julia said."
+
+"Not to dress!  What the deuce does she expect me
+to dine in?"
+
+With a sheepish grin Mackenzie pointed to something
+upon the bed which the Count had hitherto taken to be
+a rough species of quilt.
+
+"She said you might like to wear that, sir."
+
+The Count took it up.
+
+"It appears to be a dressing-gown!" said he.
+
+"She said, sir, your uncle was wont to dine in
+it."
+
+"Ah!  It's one of my poor uncle's eccentricities,
+is it?  Very nice of Miss Wallingford; but all the same
+I think you can put out my evening clothes for me; and,
+I say, get me some hot water and a couple of towels
+that feel a little less like sandpaper, will you?  By the
+way--one moment, Mackenzie!--you needn't mention
+anything of this to Miss Wallingford.  I'll explain it
+all to her myself."
+
+It is remarkable how the presence or absence of a
+few of the very minor accessories of life will affect the
+humor even of a man so essentially philosophical as
+Count Bunker.  His equanimity was most marvelously
+restored by a single jugful of hot water, and by the
+time he came to survey his blue lapels in the mirror the
+completest confidence shone in his humorous eyes.
+
+"How deuced pleased she'll be to find I'm a white
+man after all," he reflected.  "Supposing I'd really
+turned out a replica of that unshaved heathen on the
+wall--poor girl, what a dull evening she'd have spent! 
+Perhaps I'd better break the news gently for the
+chaperon's sake, but once we get her of to bed I rather
+fancy the fair Julia and I will smile together over my
+dear uncle's dressing-gown!"
+
+And in this humor he strode forth to conquer.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+Count Bunker could not but observe that
+Miss Wallingford's eyes expressed more surprise
+than pleasure when he entered the drawing-
+room, and he was confirmed in his resolution
+to let his true character appear but gradually. 
+Afterwards he could not congratulate himself too
+heartily on this prudent decision.
+
+"I fear," he said, "that I am late." (It was in
+fact half-past six by now.)  "I have been searching
+through my wardrobe to find some nether garments at
+all appropriate to the overall--if I may so term it--
+which you were kind enough to lay out for me.  But I
+found mustard of that particular shade so hard to
+match that I finally decided in favor of this more
+conventional habit.  I trust you don't mind?"
+
+Both the ladies, though evidently disappointed,
+excused him with much kindness, and Miss Minchell
+alluded directly to his blue lapels as evidence that even
+now he held himself somewhat aloof from strict orthodoxy.
+
+"May we see any allusion to your uncle, the late
+Count Bunker, in his choice of color?" she asked in a
+reverently hushed voice.
+
+"Yes," replied the Count readily; "my aunt's stockings
+were of that hue."
+
+From the startled glances of the two ladies it became
+plain that the late Count Bunker had died a bachelor.
+
+"My other aunt," he exclaimed unabashed; yet
+nevertheless it was with decided pleasure that he heard
+dinner announced immediately afterwards.
+
+"They seem to know something about my uncle,"
+he said to himself.  "I must glean a few particulars
+too."
+
+A horrible fear lest his namesake might have dined
+solely upon herbs, and himself be expected to follow his
+example, was pleasantly dissipated by a glance at the
+menu; but he confessed to a sinking of his heart when
+he observed merely a tumbler beside his own plate and
+a large brown jug before him.
+
+"Good heavens!" he thought, "do they imagine an
+Austrian count is necessarily a beer drinker?"
+
+With a sigh he could not quite smother, he began to
+pour the contents into his glass, and then set it down
+abruptly, emitting a startled exclamation.
+
+"What is the matter?" cried Julia sympathetically.
+
+Her eyes (he was embarrassed to note) followed his
+every movement like a dog's, and her apprehension
+clearly was extreme.
+
+"This seems to be water," smiled the Count, with an
+effort to carry off their error as pleasantly for them as
+possible.
+
+"Isn't it good water?" asked Julia with an air of
+concern.
+
+It was the Count's turn to open his eyes.
+
+"You have concluded then that I am a teetotaler?"
+
+"Of course, we know you are!"
+
+"If we may judge by your prefaces," smiled Miss
+Minchell.
+
+The Count began to realize the hazards that beset
+him; but his spirit stoutly rose to meet the shock of the
+occasion.
+
+"There is no use in attempting to conceal my
+idiosyncrasies, I see," he answered.  "But to-night, will
+you forgive me if I break through the cardinal rule
+of my life and ask you for a little stimulant?  My
+doctor----"
+
+"I see!" cried Miss Wallingford compassionately. 
+"Of course, one can't dispute a doctor's orders.  What
+would you like?"
+
+"Oh, anything you have.  He did recommend champagne--
+if it was good; but anything will do."
+
+"A bottle of the VERY best champagne, Mackenzie!"
+
+The dinner now became an entirely satisfactory meal. 
+Inspired by his champagne and by the success of his
+audacity in so easily surmounting all difficulties, the
+Count delighted his hostesses by the vivacity and originality
+of his conversation.  On the one hand, he chose
+topics not too flippant in themselves and treated them
+with a becomingly serious air; on the other, he carefully
+steered the talk away from the neighborhood of his
+uncle.
+
+"By the time I fetch out my banjo they'll have
+forgotten all about him," he said to himself complacently.
+
+Knowing well the importance of the individual factor
+in all the contingencies of life, he set himself, in the
+meanwhile, to study with some attention the two ladies
+beside him.  Miss Minchell he had already summarized
+as an agreeable nonentity, and this impression was only
+confirmed on better acquaintance.  It was quite evident,
+he perceived, that she was dragged practically
+unresisting in Miss Wallingford's wake--even to the
+length of abetting the visit of an unknown bachelor in
+the absence of Miss Wallingford's parent.
+
+As for Julia, he decided that she was even better-
+looking and more agreeable than he had at first
+imagined; though, having the gayest of hearts himself,
+he was a trifle disconcerted to observe the uniform
+seriousness of her ideas.  How one could reconcile her
+ecstatic enthusiasm for the ideal with her evident
+devotion to himself he was at a loss to conceive.
+
+"However, we will investigate that later," he
+thought.
+
+But first came a more urgent question:  Had his
+uncle and his "prefaces" committed him to forswear
+tobacco?  He resolved to take the bull by the horns.
+
+"I hope you will not be scandalized to learn that I
+have acquired the pernicious habit of smoking?" he said
+as they rose from the table.
+
+"I told you he was smoking a cigar at Hechnahoul!"
+cried Miss Minchell with an air of triumph.
+
+"I thought you were mistaken," said Julia, and the
+Count could see that he had slipped a little from his
+pedestal.
+
+This must not be permitted; yet he must smoke.
+
+"Of course I don't smoke REAL tobacco!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Oh, in that case," cried Julia, "certainly then you
+may smoke in the drawing-room.  What is it you use?"
+
+"A kind of herb that subdues the appetites, Miss
+Wallingford."
+
+He could see at a glance that he was more firmly on
+his pedestal than ever.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+"I have been longing for this moment!" said
+Julia softly.
+
+The Count and she were seated over the
+drawing-room fire, Bunker in an easy-chair,
+smoking one of the excellent cigars which he had so
+grievously slandered, Julia upon a stool by his knees,
+her face suffused with the most intense expression of
+rapture.  Miss Minchell was in the background,
+shrouded in shadow, purporting to be enjoying a nap;
+yet the Count could not but think that in so large a
+house a separate apartment might well have been provided
+for her.  Her presence, he felt, circumscribed
+his actions uncomfortably.
+
+"So have I!" he murmured, deeming this the most
+appropriate answer.
+
+"Now we can talk about HIM!"
+
+He started, but preserved his composure.
+
+"Couldn't we keep HIM till morning?" he suggested.
+
+"But that is why you are here!"
+
+She spoke as if this were self-evident; while the
+Count read himself a thousand lessons upon the errors
+vanity is apt to lead one into.  Yet his politeness
+remained unruffled.
+
+"Of course," he answered.  "Of course!  But you
+see my knowledge of him----"
+
+He was about to say that it was very slight, when,
+fortunately for him, she interrupted with an eager--
+
+"I know!  I know!  You were more than a son to
+him!"
+
+"The deuce and all!" thought the Count.  "That
+was a narrow squeak!"
+
+"Do you know," she continued in the same tone,
+"I have actually had the audacity to translate one of
+his books--your preface and all."
+
+"I understand the allusion now," thought Bunker.
+
+Aloud he had the presence of mind to inquire--
+
+"Which was it?"
+
+" 'Existence Seriously Reviewed.' "
+
+"You couldn't have made a better choice," he assured
+her.
+
+"And now, what can you tell me about him?" she
+cried.
+
+"Suppose we talk about the book instead,"
+suggested Bunker, choosing what seemed the lesser of two
+evils.
+
+"Oh, do!"
+
+She rose impetuously, brought with a reverent air a
+beautifully written and neatly tied-up manuscript, and
+sat again by his knee.  Looking over his shoulder he
+could see that the chaperon was wide awake and prepared
+to listen rapturously also.
+
+"I have so often longed to have some one with me who
+could explain things--the very deep things, you know. 
+But to think of having you--the Editor and nephew! 
+It's too good to be true."
+
+"Only eight o'clock," he said to himself, glancing at
+the clock.  "I'm in for a night of it."
+
+The vision of a game of bridge and a coon song on
+the banjo from that moment faded quite away, and the
+Count even tucked his feet as far out of sight as possible,
+since those entrancing socks served to remind him
+too poignantly of what might have been.
+
+"What exactly did he mean by this?" began Julia,
+" 'Let Potentates fear!  Let Dives tremble!  The
+horny hand of the poor Man in the Street is stretched
+forth to grasp his birthright!' "
+
+"For 'birthright' read 'pocket-book.'  There's a
+mistake in the translation," he answered promptly. 
+"It appears to be an indirect argument for an increase
+in the Metropolitan police."
+
+"Are you sure?  I thought--surely it alludes to
+Socialism!"
+
+"Of course; and the best advertisement for Socialism
+is a collision with the bobbies.  My uncle was a remarkably
+subtle man, I assure you."
+
+"How very ingenious!" exclaimed Miss Minchell
+from the background.
+
+Julia did her best to feel convinced; but it was in a
+distinctly less ecstatic voice that she read her next extract.
+
+" 'Alcohol, riches, and starched linen are the moths
+and worms of society.'  I suppose he means that they
+eat away its foundations?"
+
+"On the contrary, he was an enthusiastic entomologist. 
+He merely meant to imply that it isn't every
+one who can appreciate a glass of port and a clean
+shirt."
+
+"But he didn't appreciate those things himself!"
+
+"No; poor fellow.  He often wished he could,
+though."
+
+"Did he really?"
+
+"Oh, you've no idea how tired he grew of flannel and
+ginger-beer!  Many a time he's said to me, 'My boy,
+learn to take what's set before you, even at an alderman's
+table.'  Ah, his was a generous creed, Miss
+Wallingford!"
+
+"Yes, I suppose it was," said Julia submissively.
+
+His advantage in being able to claim an intimate personal
+knowledge of the late philosopher's tastes encouraged
+the Count greatly.  Realizing that a nephew
+could not well be contradicted, he was emboldened to
+ask whether there were any more points on which his
+authority could be of assistance.
+
+"Oh yes," said she, "only--only somehow you seem
+to throw a different light on everything."
+
+"Naturally, dear," chimed in Miss Minchell, "a
+personal explanation always makes things seem different."
+
+Julia sighed, but summed up her courage to read
+out--
+
+" 'When woman is prized according to her intellect
+and man according to his virtue; oh, then mankind will
+return to Eden!' "
+
+"That," said he, "is one of the rare instances of
+my uncle's pessimism."
+
+"Of his pessimism!  How can you say that?"
+
+"He meant to imply that mankind would have to wait
+for some considerable time.  But do not feel dismayed. 
+My own opinion is that so long as woman is fair and
+man has the wit to appreciate her, we ARE in Eden."
+
+The gracious tone in which he delivered this dictum,
+and the moving smile that accompanied it, appeared to
+atone completely for his relative's cynical philosophy. 
+With a smile and a sigh Julia murmured--
+
+"Do you really think so?"
+
+"I do," said the Count fervently; "and now suppose
+we were to have a little music?"
+
+"Oh yes!" cried Miss Minchell; "do you perform,
+Count Bunker?"
+
+"I sometimes sing a little to the guitar."
+
+"To the guitar!" said Julia.  "How delicious! 
+Have you brought it?"
+
+"I have been so bold," he smiled, and promptly went
+to fetch this instrument.
+
+In a few minutes he returned with an apologetic air.
+
+"I find that by some error they have sent me away
+with a banjo instead," he exclaimed.  "But I dare say
+I could manage an accompaniment on that if you
+would condescend to listen to me."
+
+He felt so exceedingly disinclined for expounding a
+philosophy any longer that he gave them no time to
+dissent, even had they wished to, but on the instant
+struck up that pathetic ditty--
+
+          "Down by whar de beans grow blue."
+
+
+And no sooner had he finished it than (barely waiting
+for his meed of applause) he further regaled them
+with--
+
+          "Twould make a fellow
+            Turn green and yellow!
+
+
+Finally, as a tit-bit, he contributed--
+
+          "When hubby s gone to Brighton,
+            And I ve sent the cook to bed,
+            Oh who's that a-knocking on the window!"
+
+
+At the conclusion of this concert he knew not whether
+to feel more relieved or chagrined to observe that his
+fair hostess had her eyes fixed upon the clock.  Thanking
+him with a slightly embarrassed air, she threw a
+pointed glance at Miss Minchell, and the two ladies rose.
+
+"I am afraid you will think we keep very early
+hours," she began.
+
+"It is one of the best rules in my uncle's philosophy,"
+he interposed.
+
+Yet though glad enough to have come so triumphantly
+to the end of his ordeal, he could not bring himself
+to let his charming disciple leave him in a wounded
+or even disappointed mood.  As soon as Miss Minchell
+had passed through the door he quietly laid his hand
+upon Julia's arm, and with a gesture beckoned her back
+into the room.
+
+"Pardon my seeming levity, Miss Wallingford,"
+he said in a grave and gentle voice, "but you know not
+what emotions I had to contend with!  I thank you for
+your charming sympathy, and I beg you to accept
+in my uncle's name that salute by which his followers
+distinguish the faithful."
+
+And he thereupon kissed the blushing girl with a
+heartiness that restored her confidence in him completely.
+
+"Well," he said to himself as he retired with his
+candle, "I've managed to get a fair penn'orth out of
+it after all."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+In spite of the Spartan transformation which Sir
+Justin's bedroom had undergone, our adventurer
+enjoyed an excellent night's rest.  So fast
+asleep was he at the hour of eight next morning
+that it took him a few seconds to awake to the full
+possession of his faculties, even when disturbed by a loud
+exclamation at his bedside.  He then became aware of
+the presence of an entire stranger in his room--a tall
+and elderly man, with a long nose and a grizzled beard. 
+This intruder had apparently just drawn up the blind,
+and was now looking about him with an expression of
+the greatest concern.
+
+"Mackenzie!" he cried, in the voice of one accustomed
+to be heard with submission, "What have you
+been doing to my room?"
+
+The butler, too confused for coherent speech, was
+in the act of bringing in a small portmanteau.
+
+"I--I mentioned, Sir Justin, your room was hardly
+ready for ye, sir.  Perhaps, sir, if ye'd come into the
+pink room----"
+
+"What the deuce, there's hardly a stick of furniture
+left!  And whose clothes are these?"
+
+"Mine," answered the Count suavely.
+
+The stranger started violently, and turned upon the
+bed an eye at first alarmed, then rapidly becoming lit
+with indignation.
+
+"Who--who is this?" he shouted.
+
+"That, sir--that----" stammered Mackenzie.
+
+"Is Count Bunker," said the Count, who remained
+entirely courteous in spite of the inconvenience of this
+intrusion.  "Have I the pleasure of addressing Sir
+Justin Wallingford?"
+
+"You have, sir."
+
+"In that case, Mackenzie will be able to give you a
+satisfactory account of my presence; and in half an
+hour or so I shall have the pleasure of joining you
+downstairs."
+
+The Count, with a polite smile, turned over in bed, as
+though to indicate that the interview was now at an
+end.  But his visitor apparently had other views.
+
+"I should be obliged by some explanation from
+yourself of your entry into my house," said he, steadily
+keeping his eye upon the Count.
+
+"Now how the deuce shall I get out of this hole
+without letting Julia into another?" wondered Bunker;
+but before he could speak, Mackenzie had blurted out--
+
+"Miss Wallingford, sir--the gentleman is a friend
+of hers, sir."
+
+"What!" thundered Sir Justin.
+
+"I assure you that Miss Wallingford was actuated
+by the highest motives in honoring me with an
+invitation to The Lash," said Bunker earnestly.
+
+He had already dismissed an ingenious account of
+himself as a belated wanderer, detained by stress of
+weather, as certain to be contradicted by Julia herself,
+and decided Instead on risking all upon his supposed
+uncle's saintly reputation.
+
+"How came she to invite you, sir?" demanded Sir
+Justin.
+
+"As my uncle's nephew, merely."
+
+Sir Justin stared at him in silence, while he brought
+the full force of his capacious mind to bear upon the
+situation.
+
+"Your name, you say, is Bunker?" he observed at
+length.
+
+"Count Bunker," corrected that nobleman.
+
+"Ah!  Doubtless, then, you are the same gentleman
+who has been residing with Lord Tulliwuddle?"
+
+"I am unaware of a duplicate."
+
+"And the uncle you allude to----?"
+
+By a wave of his hand the Count referred him to the
+portrait upon the wall.  Sir Justin now stared at it.
+
+"Bunker--Count Bunker," he repeated in a musing
+tone, and then turned to the present holder of that dignity
+with a look in his eye which the adventurer disliked
+exceedingly.
+
+"I will confer with you later," he observed. 
+"Mackenzie, remove my portmanteau."
+
+In a voice inaudible to the Count he gave another
+order, which was followed by Mackenzie also removing
+the Count's clothes from their chair.
+
+"I say, Mackenzie!" expostulated Bunker, now
+beginning to feel seriously uneasy; but heedless of his
+protest the butler hastened with them from the room.
+
+Then, with a grim smile and a surprising alacrity
+of movement, Sir Justin changed the key into the outside
+of the lock, passed through the door, and shut and
+locked it behind him.
+
+"The devil!" ejaculated Count Bunker.
+
+Here was a pretty predicament!  And the most
+ominous feature about it appeared to him to be the
+deliberation with which his captor had acted.  It seemed
+that he had got himself into a worse scrape than he
+could estimate.
+
+He wasted no time in examining his prison with an
+eye to the possibility of an escape, but it became very
+quickly evident that he was securely trapped.  From
+the windows he could not see even a water-pipe within
+hail, and the door was unburstably ponderous.  Besides,
+a gentleman attired either in pajamas or evening
+dress will naturally shrink from flight across country
+at nine o'clock in the morning.  It seemed to the Count
+that he was as well in bed as anywhere else, and upon
+this opinion he acted.
+
+In about an hour's time the door was cautiously
+unlocked, and a tray, containing some breakfast, laid upon
+the floor; but at the same time he was permitted to see
+that a cordon of grooms and keepers guarded against
+his flight.  He showed a wonderful appetite, all
+circumstances considered, smoked a couple of cigars, and
+at last decided upon getting up and donning his evening
+clothes.  Thereafter nothing occurred, beyond the
+arrival of a luncheon tray, till the afternoon was well
+advanced; by which time even his good spirits had
+become a trifle damped, and his apprehensions
+considerably increased.
+
+At last his prison door was again thrown open, this
+time by Sir Justin himself.
+
+"Come in, my dear," he said in a grave voice; and
+with a downcast eye and scarlet cheek the fair Julia
+met her guest again.
+
+Her father closed the door, and they seated
+themselves before their prisoner, who, after a profound
+obeisance to the lady, faced them from the edge of his
+bed with an air of more composure than he felt.
+
+"I await your explanation, Sir Justin," he began,
+striking at once the note which seemed to him (so far
+as he could guess) most likely to be characteristic of an
+innocent and much-injured man.
+
+"You shall have it," said Sir Justin grimly.  "Julia,
+you asked this person to my house under the impression
+that he was the nephew of that particularly obnoxious
+fanatic, Count Herbrand Bunker, and still engaged
+upon furthering his relative's philanthropic and other
+visionary schemes."
+
+"But isn't he----" began Julia with startled eyes.
+
+"I am Count Bunker," said our hero firmly.
+
+"The nephew in question?" inquired Sir Justin.
+
+"Certainly, sir."
+
+Again Sir Justin turned to his daughter.
+
+"I have already told you what I think of your
+conduct under any circumstances.  What your feelings
+will be I can only surmise when I inform you that I
+have detained this adventurer here until I had time to
+despatch a wire and receive an answer from Scotland
+Yard."
+
+Both Count and Julia started.
+
+"What, sir!" exclaimed Bunker.
+
+Quite unmoved by his protest, his captor continued,
+this time addressing him--
+
+"My memory, fortunately, is unusually excellent,
+and when you told me this morning who you were
+related to, I recalled at once something I had heard of
+your past career.  It is now confirmed by the reply I
+received to my telegram."
+
+"And what, Sir Justin, does Scotland Yard have to
+say about me?"
+
+"Julia," said her parent, "this unhappy young man
+did indeed profess for some time a regard for his
+uncle's teachings, and even, I believe, advocated them
+in writing.  In this way he obtained the disposal of
+considerable funds contributed by unsuspicious persons
+for ostensibly philanthropic purposes.  About two
+years ago these funds and Count Bunker simultaneously
+disappeared, and your estimable guest was last heard
+of under an assumed name in the republic of Uruguay."
+
+Uncomfortable as his predicament was, this picture
+of himself as the fraudulent philanthropist was too
+much for Bunker's sense of humor, and to the extreme
+astonishment of his visitors he went off into a fit of
+laughter so hearty and prolonged that it was some time
+before he recovered his gravity.
+
+"My dear friends," he exclaimed at last, "I am not
+that Bunker at all!  In fact I was only created a few
+weeks ago.  Bring me back my clothes, and in return
+I'll tell you a deuced sight funnier story even than
+that."
+
+Sir Justin rose and led his daughter to the door.
+
+"You will have an opportunity to-morrow," he
+replied stiffly.  "In the meantime I shall leave you to the
+enjoyment of the joke."
+
+"But, my dear sir----"
+
+Sir Justin turned his back, and the door closed upon
+him again.
+
+Count Bunker's position was now less supportable
+than ever.
+
+"Escape I must," he thought.
+
+And hardly had he breathed the word when a gleam of
+his old luck seemed to return.  He was standing by the
+window, and presently he observed a groom ride up on
+a bicycle, dismount, and push it through an outhouse
+door.  Then the man strolled off, and he said to himself,
+with an uprising of his spirits--
+
+"There's my steed--if I could once get to it!"
+
+Then again he thought the situation over, and
+gradually the prospect of a midnight ride on a bicycle over
+a road he had only once traversed, clad in his emblazoned
+socks and blue-lapelled coat, appeared rather less
+entertaining than another night's confinement.  So he lit his
+last cigar, threw himself on the bed, and resigned himself
+to the consolations of an innocent heart and a
+practical philosophy.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+The clearness of the Count's conscience may be
+gauged when it is narrated that no sooner
+had he dismissed the stump of his cigar toward
+the grate than he dropped into a peaceful
+doze and remained placidly unconscious of his perils
+for the space of an hour or more.  He was then awakened
+by the sound of a key being gently turned, and
+his opening eyes rested upon a charming vision of Julia
+Wallingford framed in the outline of the door.
+
+"Hush!" she whispered; "I--I have brought a note
+for you!"
+
+Smoothing his hair as he met her, the Count thanked
+her with an air of considerable feeling, and took from
+her hand a twisted slip of paper.
+
+"It was brought by a messenger--a man in a kilt,
+who came in a motor car.  I didn't know whether father
+would let you have it, so I brought it up myself."
+
+"Is the messenger waiting?"
+
+"No; he went straight off again."
+
+Unrolling the scrap he read this brief message
+scrawled in pencil and evidently in dire haste--
+
+
+"All is lost!  I am prisoner!  Go straightway to
+London for help from my Embassy.
+                         "R. VON B."
+
+
+"Good heavens!" he exclaimed aloud.
+
+"Is it bad news?" asked Julia, with a solicitude that
+instantly suggested possibilities to his fertile brain.
+
+"Horribly!" he said.  "It tells of a calamity that
+has befallen a very dear friend of mine!  Oh, Rudolph,
+Rudolph!  And I a helpless prisoner!"
+
+As he anticipated, this outburst of emotion was not
+without its effect.
+
+"I am so sorry!" she said.  "I--I don't believe,
+Count Bunker, you are as guilty as father says!"
+
+"I swear to you I am not!"
+
+"Can I--help you?"
+
+He thought swiftly.
+
+"Is there any one about the house just now?"
+
+"Oh yes; the keeper is stationed in the hall!"
+
+"Miss Wallingford, if you would atone for a deep
+injury which you have inadvertently done an innocent
+man, bring me fifty feet of stout rope!  And, I say,
+see that the door of the bicycle house is left unlocked. 
+Will you do this?"
+
+"I--I'll try."
+
+A sound on the stairs alarmed her, and with a fleeting
+smile of sympathy she was gone and the door locked
+upon him again.
+
+Again the time passed slowly by, and he was left to
+ponder over the critical nature of the situation as revealed
+by the luckless Baron's intelligence.  Clearly he
+must escape to-night, at all hazards.
+
+"What's that?  My rope?" he wondered.
+
+But it was only the arrival of his dinner, brought as
+before upon a tray and set just within the door, as
+though they feared for the bearer's life should he venture
+within reach of this desperate adventurer from
+Uruguay.
+
+"A very large dish for a very small appetite," he
+thought, as he bore his meal over to the bed and drew
+his chair up before it.
+
+It looked indeed as though a roasted goose must be
+beneath the cover.  He raised it, and there, behold!  lay
+a large coil of excellent new rope.  The Count chuckled.
+
+"Commend me to the heart and the wit of women! 
+What man would ever have provided so dainty a dish
+as this?  Unless, indeed" (he had the breadth of mind
+to add) "it happened to be a charming adventuress
+who was in trouble."
+
+Drinking the half pint of moderate claret which they
+had allowed him to the happiness and prosperity of all
+true-hearted women, he could not help regretting that
+his imprisoned confederate should be so unlikely to enjoy
+similar good fortune.
+
+"He went too far with those two dear girls.  A
+woman deceived as he has deceived them will never forgive
+him.  They'd stand sentry at his cell-door sooner
+than let the poor Baron escape," he reflected
+commiserately, and sighed to think of the disastrous effect
+this mishap might have both upon his friend's diplomatic
+career and domestic felicity.
+
+While waiting for the dusk to deepen, and endeavoring
+to console himself for the lack of cigars with the
+poor remedy of cigarettes, he employed his time profitably
+in tying a series of double knots upon the line of
+rope.  Then at last, when he could see the stars bright
+above the trees and hear no sound in the house, he
+pulled his bed softly to the open window, and to it
+fastened one end of his rope securely.  The other he
+quietly let drop, and losing not an instant followed it
+hand under hand, murmuring anathemas on the rough
+wall that so scraped his evening trousers.
+
+On tiptoe he stole to the door through which the
+bicycle had gone.  It yielded to a push, and once inside
+he ventured to strike a match.
+
+"By Gad!  I've a choice of half a dozen," he exclaimed.
+
+It need scarcely be said that he selected the best;
+and after slitting with his pocket-knife the tires of all
+the others, he mounted and pedalled quietly down the
+drive.  The lodge gates stood open; the road, a trifle
+muddy but clear of all traffic, stretched visible for a
+long way in the starlight; the breeze blew fair behind
+him.
+
+"May Providence guide me to the station," he
+prayed, and rode off into the night.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+Suppose the clock be set back four-and-twenty
+hours, and behold now the Baron von Blitzenberg,
+the diplomatist and premier baron of
+Bavaria, engaged in unhappy argument with
+himself.  Unhappy, because his reason, though so
+carefully trained from the kindergarten upward, proved
+unable to combat the dismal onsets of superstition.
+
+"Pooh! who cares for an old picture?"  Reason
+would reiterate.
+
+"It is an omen," said Superstition simply; and Reason
+stood convicted as an empty braggart.
+
+But if Time be the great healer, Dinner is at least a
+clever quack, and when he and old Mr. Rentoul had
+consumed well-nigh a bottle and a half of their host's
+port between them, the outlook became much less
+gloomy.  A particularly hilarious evening in the drawing-
+room completed the triumph of mind over what he
+was now able to term "jost nonsense," and he slept
+that night as soundly as the Count was simultaneously
+slumbering in Sir Justin's bed-room.  And there was
+no unpleasant awakening in the Baron's case.  On the
+contrary, all nature seemed in a conspiracy to make
+the last day of his adventure pleasant.  The sun shone
+brightly, his razors had an excellent edge, sausages
+were served for breakfast, and when he joined the
+family afterwards he found them as affectionately
+kind as a circle of relations.  In fact, the Baron had
+dropped more than one hint the night before of such a
+nature that they had some reason for supposing
+relationship imminent.  It is true Eva was a little
+disappointed that the actual words were not yet said, and
+when he made an airy reference to paying a farewell
+call that morning upon their neighbors at Lincoln
+Lodge, she exhibited so much disapproval in her air
+that he said at once--
+
+"Ach, vell, I shall jost go after lonch and be back
+in an hour and a half.  I jost vish to say good-bye,
+zat is all."
+
+Little guessing how much was to hang upon this
+postponement, he drove over after luncheon with a
+mind entirely reassured.  With only an afternoon to
+be safely passed, no mishap, he was sure, could possibly
+happen now.  If indeed the Maddisons chose to be
+offended with him, why, then, his call would merely be
+the briefer and he would recommend Eva for the post
+of Lady Tulliwuddle without qualification.  It was his
+critics who had reason to fear, not he.
+
+Miss Maddison was at home, the staff of footmen
+assured him, and, holding his head as high as a chieftain
+should, he strode into her sanctuary.
+
+"Do I disturb you?"
+
+He asked this with a quicker beating heart.  Not
+Eleanor alone, but her father and Ri confronted him,
+and it was very plain to see that a tempest was in the
+brewing.  Her eyes were bright with tears and
+indignation; their brows heavy with formidable frowns. 
+At the first moment of his entering, extreme astonishment
+at seeing him was clearly their dominant emotion,
+and as evidently it rapidly developed into a sentiment
+even less hospitable.
+
+"Why, this beats the devil!" ejaculated Mr. Maddison;
+and for a moment this was the sole response to
+his inquiry.
+
+The next to speak was Ri--
+
+"Show it him, Poppa!  Confront him with the
+evidence!"
+
+With ominous deliberation the millionaire picked up
+a newspaper from the floor, where apparently it had
+been crumpled and flung, smoothed out the creases, and
+approached the Baron till their noses were in danger
+of collision.  While executing this manoeuvre the silence
+was only broken by the suppressed sobbing of his
+daughter.  Then at last he spoke.
+
+"Our mails, sir, have just arrived.  This, sir, is
+'The Times' newspaper, published in the city of London
+yesterday morning."
+
+He shook it in the Baron's face with a sudden
+vehemence that caused that nobleman to execute an
+abrupt movement backward.
+
+"Take it," continued the millionaire--"take it, sir,
+and explain this if you can!"
+
+So confused had the Baron's mind become already
+that it was with difficulty he could decipher the following
+petrifying announcement--
+
+"Tulliwuddle--Herringay.--In London, privately,
+Lord Tulliwuddle to Constance, daughter of Robert
+Herringay."
+
+The Baron's brain reeled.
+
+"Here is another paragraph that may interest you,"
+pursued Mr. Maddison, turning the paper outside in
+with an alarmingly vigorous movement, and presenting
+a short paragraph for the Baron's inspection.  This
+ran--
+
+               "PEER AND ACTRESS.
+
+
+"As announced in our marriage column, the wedding
+took place yesterday, privately, of Lord Tulliwuddle,
+kinsman and heir of the late peer of that name, so well
+known in London and Scottish society, and Miss Constance
+Herringay, better known as 'Connie Fitz Aubyn,'
+of the Gaiety Theatre.  It is understood that the
+young couple have departed for the Mediterranean."
+
+In a few seconds given him to prepare his mind, the
+Baron desperately endeavored to imagine what the
+resourceful Bunker would say or do under these awful
+circumstances.
+
+"Well, sir?" said Mr. Maddison.  
+
+"It is a lie!"
+
+"A lie?"
+
+Ri laughed scornfully.
+
+"Mean to say no such marriage took place?"
+
+"It vas not me."
+
+"Who was it, then?"
+
+"Anozzer man, perhaps."
+
+"Another Lord Tulliwuddle?" inquired the millionaire.
+
+"Zey have made a mistake mit ze name.  Yes, zat is
+how."
+
+"Can it be possible?" cried Eleanor eagerly, her
+grief for the moment forgotten.
+
+"No," said her father; "it is not possible.  The
+announcement is confirmed by the paragraph.  A mistake
+is inconceivable."
+
+The Baron thought he perceived a brilliant idea.
+
+"Ach, it is ze ozzer Tollvoddle!" he exclaimed.
+"So! zat is it, of course."
+
+"You mean to say there is another peerage of Tulliwuddle?"
+
+"Oh, yes."
+
+"Fetch Debrett, Ri!"
+
+But Ri had already not only fetched Debrett, but
+found the place.
+
+"A darned lie.  Thought so," he observed succinctly.
+
+The luckless diplomatist was now committed to perdition.
+
+"It is not in ze books," he exclaimed.  "It is bot a
+baronetcy."
+
+"A baronetcy!"
+
+"And illegitimate also."
+
+"Sir," burst forth Ri, "you are a thundering liar! 
+Is this your marriage notice?"
+
+The Baron changed his tactics.
+
+"Yes!" he declared.
+
+Eleanor screamed.
+
+"Don't fuss, Eleanor," said her father kindly. 
+"That ain't true, anyhow.  Why, the day before yesterday
+he was throwing that darned hammer."
+
+"Which came down last night in our yard with the
+head burst!" added Ri contemptuously.  "Found you
+out there too!"
+
+"Is that so!" exclaimed his father.
+
+"That is so, sir!"
+
+The three looked at him, and it was hard to say
+whether indignation or contempt was more prominent
+in their faces.  This was more than he could endure.
+
+"I vill not be so looked at!" he cried; "I vill leave
+you!"
+
+"No you won't!" said Ri.
+
+And the Baron saw his retreat cut of by the athletic
+and determined young man.
+
+"Before you leave, we have one or two questions to
+ask you," said Mr. Maddison.  "Are you Lord Tulliwuddle,
+or are you not?"
+
+"Yes!--No!" replied the Baron.
+
+"Which, sir?"
+
+Expanding his chest, he made the awe-inspiring
+announcement--
+
+"I am moch greater zan Tollyvoddle!  I am ze
+Baron Rudolph von Blitzenberg!"
+
+"Another darned lie!" commented Ri.
+
+Mr. Maddison laughed sardonically; while Eleanor,
+with flashing eyes, now joined in the attack upon the
+hapless nobleman.
+
+"You wretched creature!  Isn't it enough to have
+shammed to be one peer without shamming to be another?"
+
+"Bot I am!  Ja, I swear to you!  Can you not see
+zat I am noble?"
+
+"Curiously enough we can't," replied Mr. Maddison.
+
+But his daughter's scepticism was a little shaken by
+the fervor of his assurances.
+
+"But, Poppa, perhaps he may be a German peer."
+
+"German waiter, more likely!" sneered Ri.  "What
+shall we do with him?  Tar and feathers, I guess, would
+just about suit his complaint."
+
+"No, Ri, no," said his father cautiously.  "Remember
+we are no longer beneath the banner of freedom. 
+In this benighted country it might lead into trouble. 
+Guess we can find him accommodation, though, in that
+bit of genuine antique above the harness-room.  It's
+fitted with a very substantial lock.  We'll make Dugald
+M'Culloch responsible for this BARON till the police
+take him over."
+
+Vain were the Baron's protests; and upon the
+appearance of Dugald M'Culloch, fisherman and facto-
+tum to the millionaire, accompanied by three burly
+satellites, vain, he perceived, would be the most
+desperate resistance.  He plead the privileges of a foreign
+diplomatist, threatened a descent of the German army
+upon Lincoln Lodge, guaranteed an intimate acquaintance
+with the American ambassador--"Who vill make
+you sorry for zis!" but all without moving Mr.
+Maddison's resolution.  Even Eleanor whispered a word for
+him and was repulsed, for he overheard her father
+replying to her--
+
+"No, no, Eleanor; no more a diplomatist than you
+would have been Lady Tulliwuddle.  Guess I know
+what I'm doing."
+
+Whereupon the late Lord Tulliwuddle, kilt and all,
+was conveyed by a guard of six tall men and deposited
+in the bit of genuine antique above the harness-room. 
+This proved to be a small chamber in a thick-walled
+wing of the original house, now part of the back premises;
+and there, with his face buried in his hands, the
+poor prisoner moaned aloud--
+
+"Oh, my life, she is geblasted!  I am undone!  Oh,
+I am lost!"
+
+"Will it be so bad as that, indeed?"
+
+He looked up with a start, and perceived Dugald,
+his jailor, gazing upon him with an expression of
+indescribable sagacity.
+
+"The master will be sending me with his car to tell
+the folks at Hechnahoul," added Dugald.
+
+Still the Baron failed to comprehend the exchange
+of favors suggested by his jailor's sympathetic
+voice.
+
+"Go, zen!" he muttered, and bent his head.
+
+"You will not be wishing to send no messages to
+your friends?"
+
+At last the prisoner understood.  For a sovereign
+Dugald promised to convey a note to the Count; for
+five he undertook to bribe the chauffeur to convey him
+to The Lash, when he learned where that gentleman
+was to be found.  And he further decided to be faithful
+to his trust, since, as he prudently reflected--
+
+"If he will be a real chentleman after all it shall not
+be well to be hard with him.  And if he will not be,
+nobody shall know."
+
+The Baron felt a trifle less hopeless now, yet so black
+did the prospect remain that he firmly believed he
+should never be able to raise his head again and meet
+the gaze of his fellow-men; not at least if he stayed in
+that room till the police arrived.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+Not even the news of Flodden brought direr
+dismay to Hechnahoul than Mr. Maddison's
+brief note.  Lord Tulliwuddle an impostor? 
+That magnificent young man a fraud?  So
+much geniality, brawn, and taste for the bagpipes
+merely the sheep's clothing that hid a wandering wolf? 
+Incredible!  Yet, on second thoughts, how very much
+more thrilling than if he had really been an ordinary
+peer!  And what a judgment on the presumption of
+Mr. and Mrs. Gallosh!  Hard luck on Eva, of course
+--but, then, girls who aspire to marry out of their
+own station must expect this kind of thing.
+
+The latter part of this commentary was naturally
+not that of the pretender's host and hostess.  In the
+throes of their anger and chagrin their one consoling
+reflection was that no friends less tried than Mr. and
+Mrs. Rentoul happened to be there to witness their
+confusion.  Yet other sufferers since Job have found
+that the oldest friends do not necessarily of er the most
+acceptable consolation.
+
+"Oh, oh! I feel like to die of grief!" wailed poor
+Mrs. Gallosh.
+
+"Aye; it's an awful smack in the eye for you," said
+Mr. Rentoul sagely.
+
+"Smack in the eye!" thundered his host.  "It's a
+criminal offence--that's what it is!  It's a damned
+swindle!  It's a----"
+
+"Oh, hush, hush!" interrupted Mrs. Rentoul in a
+shocked voice.  "What words for a lady to hear! 
+After all, you must remember you never made any
+inquiries."
+
+"Inquiries!  What for should I be making inquiries
+about my guests?  YOU never dropped a word of such
+a thing!  Who'd have listened if I had?  It was just
+Lord Tulliwuddle this and Lord Tulliwuddle that from
+morning to night since ever he came to the Castle."
+
+"Duncan's so simple-minded," groaned Mrs. Gallosh.
+
+"And what were you, I'd like to know?  What were
+you?" retorted her justly incensed spouse.  "Never
+a word did I hear, but just that he was such an aristocratic
+young man, and any one could see he had blue
+blood in his veins, and stuff of that kind!"
+
+"I more than once had my own doubts about that,"
+said the alcohol expert with a knowing wink.  "There
+was something about him----  Ah, well, he was not
+exactly my own idea of a lord."
+
+"YOUR idea?" scoffed his oldest and best of friends. 
+"What do YOU know of lords, I'd like to know?"
+
+"Well, well," answered the sage peaceably, "maybe
+we've neither of us had much opportunity of judging
+of the nobility.  It's just more bad luck than anything
+else that you should have gone to the expense of setting
+up in style in a lord's castle and then having
+this downcome.  If I'd had similar ambeetions it might
+have been me."
+
+This soft answer was so far from turning away
+wrath, that Mrs. Rentoul again felt compelled to stem
+the tide of her host's eloquence.
+
+"Oh, hush!" she exclaimed; "I'd have fancied you'd
+be having no thoughts beyond your daughter's affliction."
+
+"My Eva! my poor Eva!  Where is the suffering
+child?" cried Mrs. Gallosh.  "Duncan, what'll she be
+doing?"
+
+"Making a to-do like the rest of the women-folk,"
+replied her husband, with rather less sympathy than
+the occasion seemed to demand.
+
+In point of fact Eva had disappeared from the
+company immediately after hearing the contents of Mr.
+Maddison's letter, and whatever she had been doing,
+it had not been weeping alone, for at that moment she
+ran into the room, her face agitated, but rather, it
+seemed, with excitement than grief.
+
+"Papa, lend me five pounds," she panted.
+
+"Lend you--five pounds!  And what for, I'd like
+to know?"
+
+"Don't ask me now.  I--I promise to tell you later
+--some time later."
+
+"I'll see myself----!  I mean, you're talking nonsense."
+
+Eva's lip trembled.
+
+"Hi, hist! Eva, my dear," said Mr. Rentoul; "if
+you're wanting the money badly, and your papa doesn't
+see his way----"
+
+He concluded his sentence with a wink and a dive
+into his trousers-pocket, and a minute later Eva had
+fled from the room again.
+
+This action of the sage, being at total variance to
+his ordinary habits (which indeed erred on the economical
+side), was attributed by his irate host--with a
+certain show of reason--to the mere intention of annoying
+him; and the conversation took a more acrimonious
+turn than ever.  In fact, when Eva returned
+a few minutes later she was just in time to hear her
+father thunder in an infuriated voice--
+
+"A German waiter, is he?  Aye, that's verra probable,
+verra probable indeed.  In fact I might have
+known it when I saw you and him swilling a bottle and
+a half of my best port together!  Birds of a feather
+--aye, aye, exactly!"
+
+The crushing retort which the sage evidently had
+ready to heap upon the fire of this controversy was
+anticipated by Miss Gallosh.
+
+"He isn't a German waiter, papa!  He is a German
+BARON--and an ambassador, too!"
+
+The four started and stared at her.
+
+"Where did you learn that?" demanded her father.
+
+"I've been talking to the man who brought the
+letter, and he says that Lord Tulli--I mean the Baron
+--declares positively that he is a German nobleman!"
+
+"Tuts, fiddlesticks!" scoffed her father.
+
+"Verra like a whale," pronounced the sage.
+
+"I wouldn't believe what HE said," declared Mrs.
+Gallosh.
+
+"One can SEE he isn't," said Mrs. Rentoul.
+
+"The kind of Baron that plays in a German band,
+perhaps," added her husband, with a whole series of
+winks to give point to this mot.
+
+"He's just a scoundrelly adventurer!" shouted Mr.
+Gallosh.
+
+"I hope he'll get penal servitude, that's what I
+hope," said his wife with a sob.
+
+"And, judging from his appearance, that'll be no
+new experience for him," commented the sage.
+
+So remarkably had their judgment of the late Lord
+Tulliwuddle waxed in discrimination.  And, strange to
+say, his only defender was the lady he had injured
+most.
+
+"I still believe him a gentleman!" she cried, and
+swept tearfully from the room.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV
+
+While his late worshippers were trampling
+his memory in the mire, the Baron von
+Blitzenberg, deserted and dejected, his
+face still buried in his hands, endured
+the slow passage of the doleful afternoon.  Unlike the
+prisoner at The Lash, who, by a coincidence that happily
+illustrates the dispensations of Providence, was
+undergoing at the same moment an identical ordeal,
+the Baron had no optimistic, whimsical philosophy to
+fall back upon.  Instead, he had a most tender sense
+of personal dignity that had been egregiously outraged--
+and also a wife.  Indeed, the thought of Alicia
+and of Alicia's parent was alone enough to keep his
+head bowed down.
+
+"Ach, zey most not know," he muttered.  "I shall
+give moch money--hondreds of pound--not to let zem
+find out.  Oh, what for fool have I been!"
+
+So deeply was he plunged in these sorrowful meditations,
+and so constantly were they concerned with the
+two ladies whose feelings he wished to spare, that when
+a hum of voices reached his ear, one of them strangely
+--even ominously--familiar, he only thought at first
+that his imagination had grown morbidly vivid.  To
+dispel the unpleasant fancies suggested by this imagined
+voice, he raised his head, and then the next
+instant bounded from his chair.
+
+"Mein Gott!" he muttered, "it is she."
+
+Too thunderstruck to move, he saw his prison door
+open, and there, behold! stood the Countess of Grillyer,
+a terrible look upon her high-born features, a Darius
+at either shoulder.  In silence they surveyed one another,
+and it was Mr. Maddison who spoke first.
+
+"Guess this is a friend of yours," he observed.
+
+One thought and one only filled the prisoner's mind
+--she must leave him, and immediately.
+
+"No, no; I do not know her!" he cried.
+
+"You do not know me?" repeated the Countess in
+a voice rich in promise.
+
+"Certainly I do not."
+
+"She knows you all right," said the millionaire.
+
+"Says she does," put in Ri in a lower voice; "but
+I wouldn't lay much money on her word either."
+
+"Rudolph!  You pretend you do not know me?"
+cried the Countess between wrath and bewilderment.
+
+"I never did ever see sochlike a voman before,"
+reiterated the Baron.
+
+"What do you say to that, ma'am?" inquired Mr.
+Maddison.
+
+"I say--I blush to say--that this wretched young
+man is my son-in-law," declared the Countess.
+
+As she had come to the house inquiring merely for
+Lord Tulliwuddle, and been conducted straight to the
+prisoner's cell, the stupefying effect of this announcement
+may readily be conceived.
+
+"What!" ejaculated the Dariuses.
+
+"It is not true!  She is mad!  Take her avay,
+please!" shouted the Baron, now desperate in his
+resolution to say or do anything, so long as he got rid of
+his formidable relative.
+
+The Countess staggered back.
+
+"Is he demented?" she inquired.
+
+"Say, ma'am," put in Ri, "are you the mother of
+Miss Constance Herringay?"
+
+"Of----?  I am Lady Grillyer!"
+
+"See here, my good lady, that's going a little
+too far," said the millionaire not unkindly.  "This
+friend of yours here first calls himself Lord
+Tulliwuddle, and then the Baron von something or other. 
+Well, now, that's two of the aristocracy in this under-
+sized apartment already.  There's hardly room for
+a third--see?  Can't you be plain Mrs. Smith for a
+change?"
+
+The Countess tottered.
+
+"Fellow!" she said in a faint voice, "I--I do not
+understand you."
+
+"Thought that would fetch her down," commented
+Ri.
+
+"Lead her back to ze train and make her go to
+London!" pleaded the Baron earnestly.
+
+"You stick to it, you don't know her?" asked Mr.
+Maddison shrewdly.
+
+"No, no, I do not!"
+
+"Is her name Lady Grillyer?"
+
+"Not more zan it is mine!"
+
+"Rudolph!" gasped the Countess inarticulately.
+"He is--he WAS my son!"
+
+"Stoff and nonsense!" roared the Baron.  "Remove
+her!--I am tired."
+
+"Well," said Mr. Maddison, "I guess I don't much
+believe either of you; but whether you know each other
+or not, you make such a remarkably fine couple that
+I reckon you'd better get acquainted now.  Come, Ri."
+
+And before either Countess or Baron could interpose,
+their captors had slipped out, the key was turned,
+and they were left to the dual enjoyment of the antique
+apartment.
+
+"Teufel!" shouted the Baron, kicking the door
+frantically.  "Open him, open him!  I vill pay you a
+hondred pound!  Goddam!  Open!"
+
+But only the gasps of the Countess answered him.
+
+It is generally conceded that if you want to see the
+full depths of brutality latent in man, you must
+thoroughly frighten him first.  This condition the Countess
+of Grillyer had exactly succeeded in fulfilling, with the
+consequence that the Baron, hitherto the most complacent
+and amiable of sons-in-law, seemed ambitious
+of rivalling the Turk.  When he perceived that no
+answer to his appeals was forthcoming, dark despair
+for a moment overcame him.  Then the fiendishly
+ingenious idea struck him--might not a woman's screams
+accomplish what his own lungs were unable to effect? 
+Turning an inflamed and frowning countenance upon
+the lady who had intrusted her daughter's happiness
+to his hands, he addressed her in a deep hissing voice--
+
+"Shcream, shcream, voman!  Shcream loudly, or I
+vill knock you!"
+
+But the Countess was made of stern stuff.  Outraged
+and frightened though she was, she yet retorted
+huskily--
+
+"I will not scream, Rudolph!  I--I demand an
+explanation first!"
+
+Executing a step of the sword-dance within a yard
+of her, he reiterated
+
+"Shcream so zat zey may come back!"
+
+She blinked, but held her ground.
+
+"I insist upon knowing what you mean, Rudolph! 
+I insist upon your telling me!  What are you doing
+here in that preposterous kilt?"
+
+The Baron's wits brightened with the acuteness of
+the emergency.
+
+"Ha!" he cried, "I vill take my kilt off--take him
+off before your eyes this instant if you do not
+shcream!"
+
+But she merely closed her eyes.
+
+"If you dare!  If you dare, Rudolph, I shall inform
+your Emperor!  And I will not look!  I cannot see
+you!"
+
+Whether in deference to imperial prejudices, or
+because a kiltless man would be thrown away upon a lady
+who refused to look at him, the Baron regretfully
+desisted from this project.  At his wits' end, he besought
+her--
+
+"Make zem take you avay, so zat you vill be safe
+from my rage!  I do not trost myself mit you.  I am
+so violent as a bull!  Better zat you should go; far
+better--do you not see?"
+
+"No, Rudolph, no!" replied the adamant lady.  "I
+have come to guard you against your own abandoned
+nature, and I shall only leave this room when you do!"
+
+She sat down and faced him, palpitating, but immovable;
+and against such obstinacy the unhappy Rudolph
+gave up the contest in despair.
+
+"But I shall not talk mit her; oh, Himmel, nein!"
+he said to himself; and in pursuance of this policy sat
+with his back turned to her while the shadows of evening
+gradually filled the room.  In vain did she address
+him: he neither answered nor moved.  Indeed, to
+discourage her still further, he even summoned up a
+forced gaiety of demeanor, and in a low rumble of
+discords sang to himself the least respectable songs he
+knew.
+
+"His mind is certainly deranged," thought the
+Countess.  "I must not let him out of my sight.  Ah,
+poor Alicia!"
+
+But in time, when the dusk was thickening so fast
+that her son-in-law's broad back had already grown
+indistinct of outline, and no voice or footstep had come
+near their prison, her thoughts began to wander from
+his case to her own.  The outrageous conduct of those
+Americans in discrediting her word and incarcerating
+her person, though overshadowed at the time by the
+yet greater atrocity of the Baron's behavior, now
+loomed up in formidable proportions.  And the gravity
+of their offence was emphasized by an unpleasant
+sensation she now began to experience with considerable
+acuteness.
+
+"Do they mean to starve us as well as insult us?"
+she wondered.
+
+The Baron's thoughts also seemed to have drifted
+into a different channel.  He no longer sang; he
+fidgeted in his chair; he even softly groaned; and at
+last he actually changed his attitude so far as to survey
+the dim form of his mother-in-law over one
+shoulder.
+
+"Oh, ze devil!" he exclaimed aloud.  "I am so
+hongry!"
+
+"That is no reason why you should also be profane,"
+said the Countess severely.
+
+"I did not speak to you," retorted the Baron, and
+again a constrained silence fell on the room.
+
+The Baron was the first to break it.
+
+"Ha!" he cried.  "I hear a step."
+
+"Thank God!" exclaimed the Countess devoutly.
+
+In the blaze of a stable lantern there entered to them
+Dugald M'Culloch, jailor.
+
+"Will you be for any supper?" he inquired, with a
+politeness he felt due to prisoners with purses.
+
+"I do starve!" replied the Baron.
+
+"And I am nearly fainting!" cried the Countess.
+
+Both rose with an alacrity astonishing in people so
+nearly exhausted, and made as though they would pass
+out.  With a deprecatory gesture Dugald arrested
+them.
+
+"I will bring your supper fery soon," said he.
+
+"Here?" gasped the Countess.
+
+"It is the master's orders."
+
+"Tell him I vill have him ponished mit ze law, if he
+does not let me come out!" roared the Baron.
+
+Their jailor was courtesy itself; but it was in their
+prison that they supped--a silent meal, and very plain. 
+And, bitterest pill of all, they were further informed
+that in their prison they must pass the night.
+
+"In ze same room!" cried the Baron frantically. 
+"Impossible!  Improper!"
+
+Even his mother-in-law's solicitude shrank from this
+vigil; but with unruffled consideration for their comfort
+their guardian and his assistants made up two
+beds forthwith.  The Baron, subdued to a fierce and
+snarling moodiness, watched their preparations with a
+lurid eye.
+
+"Put not zat bed so near ze door," he snapped.
+
+In his ear his jailor whispered, "That one's for you,
+sir, and dinna put off your clothes!"
+
+The Baron started, and from that moment his air
+of resignation began to affront the Countess as deeply
+as his previous violence.  When they were again alone,
+stretched in black darkness each upon their couch, she
+lifted up her voice in a last word of protest--
+
+"Rudolph! have you no single feeling for me left? 
+Why didn't you stab that man?"
+
+But the Baron merely retorted with a lifelike
+affectation of snoring.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI
+
+For a long time the Baron lay wide awake,
+every sense alert, listening for the creak of
+a footstep on the wooden stair that led up
+from the harness-room to his prison.  What
+else could the strange words of Dugald have meant,
+save that some friend proposed to climb those stairs
+and gently open that stubborn door?  And in this
+opinion he had been confirmed when he observed that on
+Dugald's departure the key turned with a silence
+suggesting a recently oiled lock.  His bed lay along the
+wall, with the head so close to the door that any one
+opening it and stretching forth a hand could tweak
+him by the nose without an effort (supposing that
+were the object of their visit).  Clearly, he thought,
+it was not thus arranged without some very special
+purpose.  Yet when hour after hour passed and nothing
+happened, he began to sleep fitfully, and at last,
+worn out with fruitless waiting, dropped into a
+profound slumber.
+
+He was in the midst of a harassing dream or drama,
+wherein Bunker and Eva played an incoherent part
+and he himself passed wearily from peril to peril, when
+the stage suddenly was cleared, his eyes started open,
+and he became wakefully conscious of a little ray of
+light that fell upon his face.  Before he could raise
+his head a soft voice whispered urgently,
+
+"Don't move!"
+
+With admirable self-control he obeyed implicitly.
+
+"Who is zere?" he whispered back.
+
+The voice seemed for a moment to hesitate, and then
+answered--
+
+"Eleanor Maddison!"
+
+He started so audibly that again she breathed peremptorily--
+
+"Hush!  Lie still till I come back.  You--you
+don't deserve it, but I want to save you from the disgrace
+of arrest."
+
+"Ach, zank you--mine better angel!" he murmured,
+with a fervor that seemed not unpleasing to his rescuer.
+
+"You really are a nobleman in trouble?"
+
+"I swear I am!"
+
+"And didn't mean anything really wrong?"
+
+"Never--oh, never!"
+
+More kindly than before she murmured--
+
+"Well, I guess I'll take you out, then.  I've bribed
+Dugald, so that's all right.  When my car's ready
+I'll send him up for you.  You just lie still till he
+comes."
+
+From which it appears that Count Bunker's appreciation
+of the sex fell short of their meed.
+
+Hardly daring to breathe for fear of awakening
+his fellow-prisoner, trembling with agitation, and
+consumed by a mad impatience for action, the Baron
+passed five of the longest minutes he had ever endured. 
+At the end of that time he heard a stealthy step upon
+the stairs, and with infinite precautions threw off his
+bedclothes and sat upright, ready for instant departure. 
+But how slowly and with what a superfluity of
+precaution his jailor moved!  When the door at length
+opened he wondered that no ray of light fell this
+time.
+
+"Dugald!" he whispered eagerly.
+
+"Hush!" replied a softer voice than Dugald's; as
+soft, indeed, as Eleanor's, yet clearly different.
+
+"Who is zat?" he gasped.
+
+"Eva Gallosh!" said the silken voice.  "Oh, is that
+you?"
+
+"Yes--yes--it is me."
+
+"And are you really a Baron and an ambassador?"
+
+"Oh yes--yes--certainly I am."
+
+"Then--then I've come to help you to escape!  I've
+bribed Dugald--and I've got a dog-cart here.  Come
+quickly--but oh, be very quiet!"
+
+For a moment the Baron actually hesitated to flee
+from that loathed apartment.  It seemed to him that
+if Fortune desired to provide him with opportunities
+of escape she might have had the sense to offer these
+one at a time.  For how could he tell which of these
+overtures to close with?  A wrong decision might be
+fatal; yet time unquestionably pressed.
+
+"Mein Gott!" he muttered irresolutely, "vich shall
+I do?"
+
+At that moment the other bed creaked, and, to his
+infinite horror, he heard a suspicious voice demand--
+
+"Is that you talking, Rudolph?"
+
+Poor Eva, who was quite unaware of the presence
+of another prisoner, uttered a stifled shriek; with a cry
+of "Fly, quickly!" the Baron leaped from his bed,
+and headlong down the wooden stairs they clattered
+for freedom.
+
+A dim vision of the thrice-bribed Dugald, screeching,
+"The car's ready for ye, sir!" but increased their
+speed.
+
+Outside, a motor car stood panting by the door, and
+in the youthful driver, turning a pale face toward
+them in the lamp's radiance, the Baron had just time
+to recognize his first fair deliverer.
+
+"Good-bye!" he whispered to his second, and flung
+himself in.
+
+Some one followed him; the door was slammed, and
+with a mighty throbbing they began to move.
+
+"Rudolph!  Rudolph!" wailed a voice behind them.
+
+"Zank ze goodness SHE is not here!" exclaimed the
+Baron.
+
+"Whisht! whisht!" he could hear Dugald expostulate.
+
+With a violent start he turned to the fellow-passenger
+who had followed him in.
+
+"Are you not Dugald?" he demanded hoarsely.
+
+"No--it's--it's me!  I dursn't wait for my dog-
+cart!"
+
+"Eva!" he murmured.  "Oh, Himmel!  Vat shall
+I do?"
+
+Only a screen of glass separated his two rescuers,
+and the one had but to turn her head and look inside,
+or the other to study with any attention the roll of
+hair beneath their driver's cap, in order to lead to most
+embarrassing consequences.  Not that it was his fault
+he should receive such universal sympathy: but would
+these charming ladies admit his innocence?
+
+"How thoughtful of Dugald to have this car----"
+began Eva.
+
+"Hush!" he muttered hoarsely.  "Yes, it was
+thoughtful, but you most not speak too loudly."
+
+"For fear----?" she smiled, and turned her eyes
+instinctively toward their driver.
+
+"Excuse me," he muttered, sweeping her as gently
+as possible from her seat and placing her upon the
+floor.
+
+"It vill not do for zem to see you," he explained in
+a whisper.
+
+"How awful a position," he reflected.  "Oh, I hope
+it may still be dark ven we get to ze station."
+
+But with rising concern he presently perceived that
+the telegraph posts along the roadside were certainly
+grown plainer already; he could even see the two thin
+wires against a paling sky; the road behind was visible
+for half a mile; the hill-tops might no longer be
+confounded with the clouds-day indubitably was breaking. 
+Also he recollected that to go from Lincoln
+Lodge to Torrydhulish Station one had to make a vast
+detour round half the loch; and, further, began to
+suspect that though Miss Maddison's driving was beyond
+reproach her knowledge of topography was
+scarcely so dependable.  In point of fact she increased
+the distance by at least a third, and all the while day
+was breaking more fatally clear.
+
+To discourage Miss Gallosh's efforts at conversation,
+yet keep her sitting contentedly upon the floor;
+to appear asleep whenever Miss Maddison turned her
+head and threw a glance inside, and to devise some
+adequate explanation against the inevitable discovery
+at the end of their drive, provided him with employment
+worthy of a diplomatist's steel.  But now, at last,
+they were within sight of railway signals and a long
+embankment; and over a pine wood a stream of smoke
+moved with a swelling roar.  Then into plain view
+broke the engine and carriage after carriage racing
+behind.  Regardless of risk, he leaped from his seat
+and flung up the window, crying--
+
+"Ach, look!  Ve shall be late!"
+
+"That train is going north," said Eleanor.  "Guess
+we've half an hour good before yours comes in."
+
+So little can mortals read the stars that he heaved
+a sigh of relief, and even murmured--
+
+"Ve have timed him very luckily!"
+
+Ten minutes later they descended the hill to Torrydhulish
+Station.  The north-going train had paid its
+brief call and vanished nearly from sight again; no
+one seemed to be moving about the station, and the
+Baron told himself that nothing worse remained than
+the exercise of a little tact in parting with his deliverers.
+
+"Ach! I shall carry it off gaily," he thought, and leaping
+lightly to the ground, exclaimed with a genial
+air, as he gave his hand to Eva.
+
+"Vell!  Now have I a leetle surprise for you,
+ladies!"
+
+Nor did he at all exaggerate their sensation.
+
+"Miss Maddison!"
+
+Alas, that it should be so far beyond the power of
+mere inky words to express all that was implied in
+Eva's accents!
+
+"Miss Gallosh!"
+
+Nor is it less impossible to supply the significance
+of Eleanor's intonation.
+
+"Ladies, ladies!" he implored, "do not, I pray you,
+misunderstand!  I vas not responsible--I could not
+help it.  You both VOULD come mit me!  No, no, do
+not look so at me!  I mean not zat--I mean I could not
+do vizout both of you.  Ach, Himmel!  Vat do I say? 
+I should say zat--zat----"
+
+He broke off with a start of apprehension.
+
+"Look!  Zere comes a man mit a bicycle!  Zis is
+too public!  Come mit me into ze station and I shall
+eggsplain!  He waves his fist!  Come! you vould not
+be seen here?"
+
+He offered one arm to Eva, the other to Eleanor;
+and so alarming were the gesticulations of the
+approaching cyclist, and so beseeching the Baron's tones,
+that without more ado they clung to him and hurried
+on to the platform.
+
+"Come to ze vaiting-room!" he whispered.  "Zere
+shall ve be safe!"
+
+Alack for the luck of the Baron von Blitzenberg! 
+Out of the very door they were approaching stepped
+a solitary lady, sole passenger from the south train,
+and at the sight of those three, linked arm in arm, she
+staggered back and uttered a cry more piercing than
+the engine's distant whistle.
+
+"Rudolph!" cried this lady.
+
+"Alicia!" gasped the Baron.
+
+His rescuers said nothing, but clung to him the more
+tightly, while in the Baroness's startled eyes a harder
+light began to blaze.
+
+"Who are these, Rudolph?"
+
+He cleared his throat, but the process seemed to take
+some time, and in the meanwhile he felt the grip of his
+deliverers relax.
+
+"Who is that lady?" demanded Eleanor.
+
+"His wife," replied the Baroness.
+
+The Baron felt his arms freed now; but still his
+Alicia waited an answer.  It came at last, but not from
+the Baron's lips.
+
+"Well, here you all are!" said a cheerful voice
+behind them.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII
+
+They turned as though they expected to see
+an apparition.  Nor was the appearance of
+the speaker calculated to disappoint such
+expectations.  Their startled eyes beheld
+indeed the most remarkable figure that had ever wheeled
+a bicycle down the platform of Torrydhulish Station. 
+Hatless, in evening clothes with blue lapels upon the
+coat, splashed liberally with mud, his feet equipped
+only with embroidered socks and saturated pumps, his
+shirt-front bestarred with souvenirs of all the soils for
+thirty miles, Count Bunker made a picture that lived
+long in their memories.  Yet no foolish consciousness
+of his plight disturbed him as he addressed the Baron.
+
+"Thank you, Baron, for escorting my fair friends
+so far.  I shall now take them off your hands."
+
+He smiled with pleasant familiarity upon the two
+astonished girls, and then started as though for the
+first time he recognized the Baroness.
+
+"Baroness!" he cried, bowing profoundly, "this is
+a very unexpected pleasure!  You came by the early
+train, I presume?  A tiresome journey, isn't it?"
+
+But bewilderment and suspicion were all that he
+could read in reply.
+
+"What--what are YOU doing here?"
+
+He was not in the least disconcerted.
+
+"Meeting my cousins" (he indicated the Misses
+Gallosh and Maddison with an amiable glance), "whom
+the Baron has been kind enough to look after till my
+arrival."
+
+Audaciously approaching more closely, he added, in
+a voice intended for her ear and the Baron's alone--
+
+"I must throw myself, I see, upon your mercy, and
+ask you not to tell any tales out of school.  Cousins,
+you know, don't always want their meetings advertised--
+do they, Baron?"
+
+Alicia's eyes softened a little.
+
+"Then, they are really your----"
+
+"Call 'em cousins, please!  I have your pledge that
+you won't tell?  Ah, Baron, your charming wife and
+I understand one another."
+
+Then raising his voice for the benefit of the company
+generally--
+
+"Well, you two will want to have a little talk in the
+waiting-room, I've no doubt.  We shall pace the platform. 
+Very fit Rudolph's looking, isn't he, Baroness? 
+You've no idea how his lungs have strengthened."
+
+"His lungs!" exclaimed the Baroness in a changed
+voice.
+
+Giving the Baron a wink to indicate that there lay
+the ace of trumps, he answered reassuringly--
+
+"When you learn how he has improved you'll forgive
+me, I'm sure, for taking him on this little trip. 
+Well, see you somewhere down the line, no doubt--I'm
+going by the same train."
+
+He watched them pass into the waiting-room, and
+then turned an altered face to the two dumbfounded
+girls.  It was expressive now solely of sympathy and
+contrition.
+
+"Let us walk a little this way," he began, and thus
+having removed them safely from earshot of the waiting-
+room door, he addressed himself to the severest
+part of his task.
+
+"My dear girls, I owe you I don't know how many
+apologies for presuming to claim you as my friends. 
+The acuteness of the emergency is my only excuse, and
+I throw myself most contritely upon your mercy!"
+
+This second projection of himself upon a lady's
+mercy proved as successful as the first.
+
+"Well," said Eleanor slowly, "I guess maybe we
+can forgive you for that; but what I want to know
+is--what's happened?--who's who?--and where just
+exactly are we?"
+
+"That's just what I want to know too," added Eva
+sadly.
+
+Indeed, they both had a hint of tears in their eyes,
+and in their voices.
+
+"What has happened," replied the Count, "is that a
+couple of thoughtless masqueraders came up here to
+play a little joke, and succeeded in getting themselves
+into a scrape.  For your share in getting us out of it
+we cannot feel too grateful."
+
+"But, who is----?" the girls began together, and
+then stopped, with a rise of color and a suspicion of
+displeasure in their interchange of eyes.
+
+"Who is who?  Well, my friend is the Baron von
+Blitzenberg; and the lady is, as she stated, his wife."
+
+"Then all this time----" began Eva.
+
+"He was married!" Eleanor finished for her.  "Oh,
+the heartless scoundrel!  To think that I rescued him!"
+
+"I wouldn't have either!" said Eva; "I mean if--
+if I had known he treated you so badly."
+
+"Treated ME!  I was only thinking of YOU, Miss
+Gallosh!"
+
+"Dear ladies!" interposed the Count with his ready
+tact, "remember his excuse."
+
+"His excuse?"
+
+"The beauty, the charm, the wit of the lady who
+took by storm a heart not easily captured!  He himself,
+poor fellow, thought it love-proof; but he had not
+then met HER.  Think mercifully of him!"
+
+He was so careful to give no indication which of the
+rival belles was "her," that each was able to take to
+herself a certain mournful consolation.
+
+"That wasn't MUCH excuse," said Eleanor, yet with
+a less vindictive air.
+
+"Certainly not VERY much," murmured Eva.
+
+"He ought to have thought of the pain he was giving
+HER," added Eleanor.
+
+"Yes," said Eva.  "Indeed he ought!"
+
+"Yes, that is true," allowed the Count; "but
+remember his punishment!  To be married already now
+proves to be less his fault than his misfortune."
+
+By this time he had insidiously led them back to
+their car.
+
+"And must you return at once?" he exclaimed.
+
+"We had better," said Eleanor, with a suspicion of
+a sigh.  "Miss Gallosh, I'll drive you home first."
+
+"You're too kind, Miss Maddison."
+
+"Oh, no!"
+
+The Count assisted them in, greatly pleased to see
+this amicable spirit.  Then shaking hands heartily with
+each, he said--
+
+"I can speak for my friend with conviction, because
+my own regard for the lady in question is as deep
+and as sincere as his.  Believe me, I shall never forget
+her!"
+
+He was rewarded with two of the kindest smiles ever
+bestowed upon him, and as they drove away each secretly
+wondered why she had previously preferred the
+Baron to the Count.  It seemed a singular folly.
+
+"Two deuced nice girls," mused he; "I do believe
+I told 'em the truth in every particular!"
+
+He watched their car dwindle to a scurrying speck,
+and then strolled back thoughtfully to purchase his
+ticket.
+
+He found the signals down, and the far-off clatter
+of the train distinctly audible through the early morning
+air.  A few minutes more and he was stepping into
+a first-class compartment, his remarkable costume earning
+(he could not but observe) the pronounced attention
+of the guard.  The Baron and Alicia, with an air
+of mutual affection, entered another; both the doors
+were closed, everything seemed ready, yet the train
+lingered.
+
+"Start ze train!  Start ze train!  I vill give you a
+pound--two pound--tree pound, to start him!"
+
+The Count leaped up and thrust his head through
+the window.
+
+"What the dickens----!" thought he.
+
+Hanging out of the other window he beheld the
+clamant Baron urging the guard with frenzied entreaty.
+
+"But they're wanting to go by the train, sir," said
+the guard.
+
+"No, no.  Zey do not!  It is a mistake!  Start
+him!"
+
+Following their gaze he saw, racing toward them,
+the cause of their delay.  It was a motor car, yet not
+the same that had so lately departed.  In this were
+seated a young man and an elderly lady, both waving
+to hold back the train; and to his vast amazement he
+recognized in the man Darius Maddison, junior, in the
+lady the Countess of Grillyer.
+
+The car stopped, the occupants alighted, and the
+Countess, supported on the strong arm of Ri, scuttled
+down the platform.
+
+"Bonker, take her in mit you!" groaned the Baron,
+and his head vanished from the Count's sight.
+
+Even this ordeal was not too much for Bunker's
+fidelity.
+
+"Madam, there is room here!" he announced
+politely, as they swept past; but with set faces they
+panted toward the doomed von Blitzenberg.
+
+All of the tragedy that the Count, with strained
+neck, could see or overhear, was a vision of the Countess
+being pushed by the guard and her escort into that
+first-class compartment whence so lately the Baron's
+crimson visage had protruded, and the voice of Ri
+stridently declaring--
+
+"Guess you'll recognize your momma this time,
+Baron!"
+
+A whistle from the guard, another from the engine,
+and they were off, clattering southward in the first
+of the morning sunshine.
+
+Inadequately attired, damp, hungry, and divorced
+from tobacco as the Count was, he yet could say to himself
+with the sincerest honesty
+
+"I wouldn't change carriages with the Baron von
+Blitzenberg--not even for a pair of dry socks and a
+cigar!  Alas, poor Rudolph!  May this teach all young
+men a lesson in sobriety of conduct!"
+
+For which moral reflection the historian feels it
+incumbent upon him, as a philosopher and serious
+psychologist, to express his conscientious admiration.
+
+
+
+EPILOGUE
+
+IT was an evening in early August, luminous and
+warm; the scene, a certain club now emptied of
+all but a sprinkling of its members; the festival,
+dinner; and the persons of the play, that gentleman
+lately known as Count Bunker and his friend the
+Baron von Blitzenberg.  The Count was habited in
+tweeds; the Baron in evening dress.
+
+"It vas good of you to come up to town jost to see
+me," said the Baron.
+
+"I'd have crossed Europe, Baron!"
+
+The Baron smiled faintly.  Evidently he was scarcely
+in his most florid humor.
+
+"I vish I could have asked you to my club, Bonker."
+
+"Are you dissatisfied with mine?"
+
+"Oh, no, no!  But---- vell, ze fact is, it vould be
+reported by some one if I took you to ze Regents. 
+Bonker, she does have me watched!"
+
+"The Baroness?"
+
+"Her mozzer."
+
+"The deuce, Baron!"
+
+The diplomatist gloomily sipped his wine.
+
+"You did hush it all up, eh?" he inquired presently.
+
+"Completely."
+
+"Zank you.  I vas so afraid of some scandal!"
+
+"So were they; that's where I had 'em."
+
+"Did zey write in moch anger?"
+
+"No--not very much; rather nice letters, in fact."
+
+The Baron began to cheer up.
+
+"Ach, so!  Vas zere any news of--ze Galloshes?"
+
+"Yes, they seem very well.  Old Rentoul has caught
+a salmon.  Gallosh hopes to get a fair bag----"
+
+"Bot did zey say nozing about--about Miss Eva?"
+
+"The letter was written by her, you see."
+
+"SHE wrote to YOU!  Strange!"
+
+"Very odd, isn't it?"
+
+The Baron meditated for a minute and then inquired--
+
+"Vat of ze Maddisons?"
+
+"Well, I gather that Mr. Maddison is erecting an
+ibis house in connection with the aviary.  Ri has gone
+to Kamchatka, but hopes to be back by the 12th----"
+
+"And Eleanor--no vord of her?"
+
+"It was she who wrote, don't you know."
+
+"Eleanor--and also to you!  Bot vy should she?"
+
+"Can't imagine; can you?"
+
+The Baron shook his head solemnly.  "No, Bonker,
+I cannot."
+
+For some moments he pondered over the remarkable
+conduct of these ladies; and then--
+
+"Did you also hear of ze Wallingfords?" he
+asked.
+
+"I had a short note from them."
+
+"From him, or----"
+
+"Her."
+
+"So!  Humph, zey all seem fond of writing letters."
+
+"Why--have you had any too?"
+
+"No; and I do not vant zem."
+
+Yet his immunity did not appear to exhilarate the
+diplomatist.
+
+"Another bottle of the same," said Bunker aside to
+the waiter.
+
+ .   .    .    .    .    .
+
+
+It was an hour later; the scene and the personages
+the same, but the atmosphere marvellously altered.
+
+"To ze ladies, Bonker!"
+
+"To HER, Baron!"
+
+"To zem both!"
+
+The genial heart, the magnanimous soul of Rudolph
+von Blitzenberg had asserted their dominion again. 
+Depression, jealousy, repentance, qualms, and all other
+shackles of the spirit whatsoever, had fled discomfited. 
+Now at last he saw his late exploits in their true heroic
+proportions, and realized his marvellous good fortune
+in satisfying his aspirations so gloriously.  Raising
+his glass once more, he cried--
+
+"Dear Bonker, my heart he does go out to you! 
+Ach, you have given me soch a treat.  Vunce more I
+schmell ze mountain dew--I hear ze pipes--I gaze into
+loffly eyes--I am ze noblest part of mineself!  Bonker,
+I vill defy ze mozzer of my wife!  I drink to you, my
+friend, mit hip--hip--hip--hooray!"
+
+"You have more than repaid me," replied the Count,
+"by the spectacle you have provided.  Dear Baron,
+it was a panorama calculated to convert a continent!"
+
+"To vat should it convert him?" inquired the Baron
+with interest.
+
+"To a creed even merrier than Socialism, more
+convivial than Total Abstinence, and more perfectly
+designed for human needs than Esperanto--the gospel
+of 'Cheer up.' "
+
+"Sheerup?" repeated the Baron, whose acquaintance
+with the English words used in commerce and war
+was singularly intimate, but who was occasionally at
+fault with terms of less portentous import.
+
+"A name given to the bridge that crosses the Slough
+of Despond," explained the Count.
+
+The Baron still seemed puzzled.  "I am not any
+wiser," said he.
+
+"Never cease thanking Heaven for that!" cried
+Bunker fervently.  "The man who once dubs himself
+wise is the jest of gods and the plague of mortals."
+
+With this handsome tribute to the character and
+attainments of one of these heroes, and the Baronial
+roar that congratulated the other, our chronicle may
+fittingly leave them; since the mutual admiration of
+two such catholic critics is surely more significant
+than the colder approval of a mere historian.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Etext of Count Bunker by J. Storer Clouston
+
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