id not understand.
His smile was tolerant, even genial, but his face remained like the face
of a sphinx.

"It is for the good of Japan I came," he said, "for her good that I have
stayed here so long. At the same time it has been very pleasant. I have
met with great kindness."

She leaned a little forward so as to look into his face. The impassivity
of his features was like a wall before her.

"After all," she said, "I suppose it is a period of probation. You are
like a schoolboy already who is looking forward to his holidays. You
will be very happy when you return."

"I shall be very happy indeed," he admitted simply. "Why not? I am a
true son of Japan, and, for every true son of his country, absence from
her is as hard a thing to be borne as absence from one's own family."

Somerfield, who was sitting on her other side, insisted at last upon
diverting her attention.

"Penelope," he declared, lowering his voice a little, "it isn't fair.
You never have a word to say to me when the Prince is here."

She smiled.

"You must remember that he is going away very soon, Charlie," she
reminded him.

"Good job, too!" Somerfield muttered, sotto voce.

"And then," Penelope continued, with the air of not having heard her
companion's last remark, "he possesses also a very great attraction. He
is absolutely unlike any other human being I ever met or heard of."

Somerfield glanced across at his rival with lowering brows.

"I've nothing to say against the fellow," he remarked, "except that it
seems queer nowadays to run up against a man of his birth who is not a
sportsman,--in the sense of being fond of sport, I mean," he corrected
himself quickly.

"Sometimes I wonder," Penelope said thoughtfully, "whether such speeches
as the one which you have just made do not indicate something totally
wrong in our modern life. You, for instance, have no profession,
Charlie, and you devote your life to a systematic course of what is
nothing more or less than pleasure-seeking. You hunt or you shoot, you
play polo or golf, you come to town or you live in the country, entirely
according to the seasons. If any one asked you why you had not chosen a
profession, you would as good as tell them that it was because you were
a rich man and had no need to work for your living. That is practically
what it comes to. You Englishmen work only if you need money. If you do
not need money, you play. The Prince is wealthy, but his profession was
ordain