d him honorary member
to their clubs; they patted him on the back and called him captain; but
it was all in a negligent toleration that turned every pleasure into
rust.

Arthur Carmichael was Irish. He was born in America, educated there and
elsewhere, a little while in Paris, a little while at Bonn, and, like
all Irishmen, he was baned with the wandering foot; for the man who is
homeless by choice has a subtle poison in his blood. He was at Bonn when
the Civil War came. He went back to America and threw himself into the
fight with all the ardor that had made his forebears famous in the
service of the worthless Stuarts. It wasn't a question with him of the
mere love of fighting, of tossing the penny; he knew with which side he
wished to fight. He joined the cavalry of the North, and hammered and
fought his way to a captaincy. He was wounded five times and imprisoned
twice. His right eye was still weak from the effects of a powder
explosion; and whenever it bothered him he wore a single glass,
abominating, as all soldiers do, the burden of spectacles. At the end of
the conflict he returned to Washington.

And then the inherent curse put a hand on his shoulder; he must be
moving. His parents were dead; there was no anchor, nor had lying
ambition enmeshed him. There was a little property, the income from
which was enough for his wants. Without any influence whatever, save his
pleasing address and his wide education, he blarneyed the State
Department out of a consulate. They sent him to Ehrenstein, at a salary
not worth mentioning, with the diplomatic halo of dignity as a tail to
the kite. He had been in the service some two years by now, and those
who knew him well rather wondered at his sedative turn of mind. Two
years in any one place was not in reckoning as regarded Carmichael; yet,
here he was, caring neither for promotion nor exchange. So, then, all
logical deductions simmered down to one: _Cherchez la femme_.

He knew that his case would never be tried in court nor settled out of
it; and he realized that it would be far better to weigh anchor and set
his course for other parts. But no man ever quite forsakes his
dream-woman; and he had endued a princess with all the shining
attributes of an angel, when, had he known it, she was only angelic.

The dreamer is invariably tripping over his illusions; and Carmichael
was rather boyish in his dreams. What absurd romances he was always
weaving round her! What exploits on