look with one as full of surprise as his own.

The young man regarded her steadily for a few moments, and then, with a
change of manner, as though he now saw the situation was much more
serious than he had at first supposed, drew up a chair in front of the
two women and seated himself deliberately.

"Has he borrowed any money from you yet?" he asked. Miss Carson's face
flushed crimson and she straightened her shoulders and turned her eyes
away from Gordon with every sign of indignation and disapproval. The
young man gave an exclamation of relief.

"No? That's good. You cannot have known him so very long. I am
greatly relieved."

"Louis of Messina," he began more gently, "is the most unscrupulous
rascal in Europe. Since they turned him out of his kingdom he has
lived by selling his title to men who are promoting new brands of
champagne or floating queer mining shares. The greater part of his
income is dependent on the generosity of the old nobility of Messina,
and when they don't pay him readily enough, he levies blackmail on
them. He owes money to every tailor and horse-dealer and hotel-keeper
in Europe, and no one who can tell one card from another will play with
him. That is his reputation. And to help him live up to it he has
surrounded himself with a parcel of adventurers as rascally as himself:
a Colonel Erhaupt who was dropped from a German regiment, and who is a
Colonel only by the favor of the Queen of Madagascar; a retired
croupier named Barrat; and a fallen angel called Kalonay, a fellow of
the very best blood in Europe and with the very worst morals. They
call him the King's jackal, and he is one of the most delightful
blackguards I ever met. So is the King for that matter, a most
entertaining individual if you keep him in his place, but a man no
woman can know. In fact, Mrs. Carson," Gordon went on, addressing
himself to the mother, "when you have to say that a woman has
absolutely no reputation whatever you can best express it by explaining
that she has a title from Louis of Messina. That is his Majesty's way
of treating his feminine friends when they bore him and he wants to get
rid of them. He gives them a title.

"The only thing the man ever did that was to his credit and that could
be discussed in polite society is what he is doing now at this place,
at this moment. For it seems," Gordon whispered, drawing his chair
closer, "that he is about to show himself something of a man after