white moon in the far east. And
presently she spoke, still playing softly.

"My father was an American, my mother Italian. But I have lived in
Europe nearly all my life. There! You have more of my history than I
intended telling you." The music went dreamily.

"I knew it. Who but an American woman would have the courage to do what
you are doing to-night? Who but one of mine own countrywomen would trust
me so wholly and accept me so frankly for what I am, an American
gentleman?"

"Softly!" she warned. "You will dig a pit for your vanity."

"No. I am an American gentleman, and I am proud of it; though this
statement in your ears may have a school-boy ring."

"A nobility in this country? Impossible!"

"Not the kind you find in the _Almanach de Gotha_. I speak of the
nobility of the heart and the mind." He was very much in earnest now.

"Indeed!" The music stopped, and she turned. She regarded his
earnestness with favor.

"I have traveled much; I have found noblemen everywhere, in all climes,
and also I have found beasts. Oh, I confess that my country is not
wholly free from the beast. But the beast here is a beast; shunned,
discredited, outcast. On the other side, if he be mentioned in the
_Almanach_, they give him sashes and decorations. And they credit us
with being money-mad! It is not true. It is proved every day in the
foreign cables that our love for money is not one-tenth so strong as
that which our continental cousins evince."

"But if you are not money-mad, why these great fortunes?" dubiously.

"At a certain age a fortune in this country doubles itself without any
effort on the part of the owner. Few of us marry for money; and when we
do, we at least have the manhood to keep the letter of our bargain. We
do not beat the wife, nor impoverish her, nor thrust opera-singers into
the house she shares with us."

"And when you marry?"

"Well, it is generally the woman we love. Dowries are not considered.
There is no social law which forbids a dowerless girl to marry a
dowerless man," laughing. "But over there it is always and eternally a
business contract simply. You know that."

"Yes, a business contract," listlessly.

"And yet these foreigners call us a business nation! Well, we are,
outside our homes. But in the home we are husbands and fathers; most of
us live cleanly and honestly; we make our homes our havens and our
heavens. But of course there is always the beast. But they talk of
nobility on th