talk comfortably while the kettle is boiling. Are you new to the West,
Mr. Blount, or is this only a return to your own? The senator is always
talking about you, you know; but he is so inordinately proud of you that
he forgets to tell us all the really interesting things that we want to
know."

The serving-man took his own time about coming back; so long a time that
Blount forgot that it was past midnight, that he was a guest in a
strange house, and that he still had not learned the name of his
entertainer. For all this forgetfulness the little lady with the
dark-brown eyes was directly responsible. Almost before he realized it,
Blount found himself chatting with her as if he had always known her,
making rapid strides on the way to confidence and finding her alertly
responsive in whatever field the talk happened to fall. Apparently she
knew the world--his world--better than he knew it himself: she had
summered on the North Shore and wintered in Washington. She knew Paris,
and when the conversation touched upon the Italian art-galleries he was
led to wonder if he had gone through Italy with his eyes shut. At the
next turn of the talk he was forced to admit that not even Patricia
herself could speak more intelligently of the English social problem;
and when it came to the vital questions of the American moment he gasped
again and wondered if he were awake--if it could be possible that this
out-of-place Georgian mansion and its charming mistress could be part
and parcel of the West which had so far outgrown the boyhood memories.

Since all things mundane must have an end, the old butler with the
white-fringed head came at last to show him the way to his luxurious
lodgings on the second floor of the mansion. With a touch of hospitality
which carried Blount back to his one winter in the South, the hostess
went with him as far as the stair-foot, and her "Good-night" was still
ringing musically in his ears when the old negro lighted the candles in
the guest-room, put another stick of wood on the small fire that was
crackling and snapping cheerfully on the hearth, and bobbed and bowed
his way to the door. Blount saw his last chance for better information
vanishing for the night, and once more broke with the traditions.

"Uncle Barnabas, before you go, suppose you tell me where I am," he
suggested. "Whose house is this?"

The old man stopped on the threshold, chuckling gleefully. "A-ain't you
know dat, sah?--a-ain't de mistis