"Would you like to meet the most beautiful woman in America?" asked
Edward Trenton of his guest.

Lord Stranleigh drew a whiff or two from the favourite pipe he was
smoking, and the faint suggestion of a smile played about his lips.

"The question seems to hint that I have not already met her," he said at
last.

"Have you?"

"Of course."

"Where?"

"In every town of any size I ever visited."

"Oh, I daresay you have met many pretty girls, but only one of them is
the most beautiful in America."

Again Stranleigh smiled, but this time removed his pipe, which had gone
out, and gently tapped it on the ash tray.

"My dear Ned," he said at last, "on almost any other subject I should
hesitate to venture an opinion that ran counter to your own experience,
yet in this instance I think you wrong the great Republic. I am not
very good at statistics, but if you will tell me how many of your
fellow-countrymen are this moment in love, I'll make a very accurate
estimate regarding the number of most beautiful women there are in the
United States."

"Like yourself, Stranleigh, I always defer to the man of experience, and
am glad to have hit on one subject in which you are qualified to be my
teacher."

"I like that! Ned Trenton depreciating his own conquests is a popular
actor in a new _role_. But you are evading the point. I was merely trying
in my awkward way to show that every woman is the most beautiful in the
world to the man in love with her."

"Very well; I'll frame my question differently. Would you like to meet
one of the most cultured of her sex?"

"Bless you, my boy, of course not! Why, I'm afraid of her already. It is
embarrassing enough to meet a bright, alert man, but in the presence of
a clever woman, I become so painfully stupid that she thinks I'm putting
it on."

"Then let me place the case before you in still another form. Would your
highness like to meet the richest woman in Pennsylvania?"

"Certainly I should," cried Stranleigh, eagerly.

Trenton looked at him with a shade of disapproval on his brow.

"I thought wealth was the very last qualification a man in your position
would care for in a woman, yet hardly have I finished the sentence, than
you jump at the chance I offer."

"And why not? A lady beautiful and talented would likely strike me dumb,
but if she is hideously rich, I may be certain of one thing, that I
shall not be asked to invest money in some hare-brained scheme or
other."