sh that it should alter matters, Your Highness!" retorted
Vernon, proudly. "When I have offered you the greatest reparation in my
power, it is ungenerous that you should--"

Again a knock interrupted him.

"Come in!" he called, recklessly.

The door opened and Archibald Rushford entered. He closed the door
carefully behind him and advanced to the middle of the room.

Vernon started forward.

"Why, how are you, Mr. Rushford?" he began, with outstretched hand. "I'm
very glad to see you."

"Oh, you are?" inquired the American, keeping his own hands firmly
behind his back. "I suppose _you're_ glad to see me, too?" he added,
turning to the Prince.

"I know of no reason why I should avoid you," returned the Prince,
proudly.

"Perhaps not," assented Rushford, drily. "The standards of gentlemanly
conduct seem to be different in the Old World and in the New. I'm glad,
however, that I've caught you two together. I suppose that little farce
of pretended illness was played only for the benefit of outsiders!"

"I assure you, Mr. Rushford," began Vernon quickly, but the American
stopped him with a gesture.

"I don't care to hear," he said. "I care nothing for your two-by-four
conspiracies and intrigues. But, I repeat, I'm glad I caught both of you
together. It enables me to tell, in the same breath, what I think of
both of you, and I am very anxious to tell you, fully and completely,
for I suppose you have been surrounded all your lives by toadies who
were afraid to tell you the truth about yourselves, or who were so like
you that they couldn't see the truth--products of the same code of
morals--a code truly European! In a word, then, I think you are both
blackguards--blackguards of the most nasty and contemptible kind--the
kind that preys upon women! I may add that you have deeply shaken my
faith in human nature, for, to look at you, one would mistake you for
gentlemen!"

The words were uttered quietly, evenly, deliberately; each one given its
full value. There was a certain dignity in Rushford's aspect which made
interruption impossible; but neither man offered to interrupt. The
Prince was biting his lips desperately; Vernon turned red and white and
red again in evident amazement.

"And having said this," concluded the American, "as emphatically as
possible, I will very gladly leave you to yourselves."

"Oh, no, you won't!" cried Vernon, fiercely, in a voice hoarse with
emotion. "I, at least, demand an explanation.