and significances of
things not readily to be seen upon the surface of events.

"If there were dollars to be made out of it, of course America would
rush in," was Feather's decision. "Americans never do anything unless
they can make dollars. I never saw a dollar myself, but I believe they
are made of green paper. It would be very exciting if they did rush in.
They would bring so much money and they spend it as if it were water. Of
course they haven't any proper army, so they'd have to build one up out
of all sorts of people."

"Which was what we were obliged to do ourselves, by the way," Coombe
threw in as a contribution.

"But they will probably have stockbrokers and Wall Street men for
officers. Then some of them might give one 'tips' about how to make
millions in 'corners.' I don't know what corners are but they make
enormities out of them. Starling!" with a hilarious tinkle of a laugh,
"you know that appallingly gorgeous house of Cherry Cheston's in Palace
Garden--did she ever tell you that it was the result of a 'tip' a queer
Chicago man managed for her? He liked her. He used to call her 'Cherry
Ripe' when they were alone. He was big and red and half
boyish--sentimental and half blustering. Cherry _was_ ripe, you know,
and he liked the ripe style. I should like to have a Chicago stockbroker
of my own. I wish the Americans _would_ come in!"

The Dowager Duchess of Darte and Lord Coombe had been of those who had
begun their talk of this in the early days.

"Personally I believe they will come in," Coombe had always said. And on
different occasions he had added reasons which, combined, formulated
themselves into the following arguments. "We don't really know much of
the Americans though they have been buying and selling and marrying us
for some time. Our insular trick of feeling superior has held us
mentally aloof from half the globe. But presumably the United States was
from the first, in itself, an ideal, pure and simple. It was. It is
asinine to pooh-pooh it. A good deal is said about that sort of thing in
their histories and speeches. They keep it before each other and it has
had the effect of suggesting ideals on all sides. Which has resulted in
laying a sort of foundation of men who believe in the ideals and would
fight for them. They are good fighters and, when the sincere ones begin,
they will plant their flag where the insincere and mere politicians will
be forced to stand by it to save their faces. A f