mpty handed, and Father with pockets cleaned out. It was
then that Di seriously set her thoughts upon the new world--new worlds,
it is said, being easier to conquer than old ones.

Father had two or three acquaintances in the diplomatic service at
Washington. He hoped to squeeze invitations out of them; for in a
country entirely populated by monotonous Misters and Mrs-es, with
nothing more decorative than a colonel or a general or a judge, even a
poor Irish earl isn't to be sneezed at. Di needn't be handicapped by
every one remembering that her mother would have described herself as a
"music 'all h'artist"; and several Americans living in New York had
asked us to their houses.

At first it wasn't proposed to take me if the family went, and the
thought of going through again what I had endured when seeing Di and
Eagle March together, kept me from raising my voice in persuasion. It
would be heartwearing to be left behind, never to know what was
happening except from an occasional letter; but to be on the spot and
see for myself would be heartbreaking. I wasn't quite sure which would
be worse, so I left the decision to Fate; and as I said before, it was
my Frenchified genius for doing hair which settled the matter. Di
discussed it with Father frankly before me, and argued that not only was
I cleverer than the average maid, but actually cheaper. "Besides," she
finished, "Peggy dear would like to go, and she's not a bad little
thing. Who knows but she might pick up something over there for
herself?"

"A picker up of unconsidered trifles!" the scotched, not killed minx in
me couldn't resist quoting, at the suggestion that I was welcome to Di's
leavings if I could bag them. But neither Father nor Di was paying the
slightest attention.

By superhuman efforts in borrowing, and perhaps begging (I wouldn't "put
it past him"), and selling the portrait of our best-looking,
worst-behaved ancestor, Father scraped up enough money to take us to
America and have a little over for travelling expenses there. Further
than that he did not look, for we should be living board free most of
the time; and besides, something was almost sure to turn up. In December
we sailed on a slow, cheap ship; and once on the other side, lived for
six weeks, like the lord and ladies we were, upon friends Di had
carefully collected, as if they were rare foreign stamps or postcards,
in London during the past season. Most of these she had met through
Eagle. S