? Zat
is vat I ask myself."

"And what answer do you generally return?"

"Ze answer I make is," said the Baron gravely and with the deliberation
the point deserved--"Ze answer is zat I shall vait and gonsider vich
lady is ze best for him."

"The means you employ will no doubt include a further short personal
interview with each of them?"

"Vun short! Ach, Bonker, I most investigate mit carefulness. No, no; I
most see zem more zan zat."

"How long do you expect the process will take you?"

For the first time the Baron noticed with surprise a shade of impatience
in his friend's voice.

"Are you in a horry, Bonker?"

"My dear Baron, I grudge no man his sport--particularly if he is careful
to label it his duty. But, to tell the truth, I have never played
gamekeeper for so long before, and I begin to find that picking up your
victims and carrying them after you in a bag is less exhilarating to-day
than it was a week ago. I wouldn't curtail your pleasure for the world,
my dear fellow! But I do ask you to remember the poor keeper."

"My dear friend," said the Baron cordially, "I shall remember! It shall
take bot two or tree days to do my duty. I shall not be long."

"A day or two of sober duty,
Then, Hoch! for London, home, and beauty!"

trolled the Count pleasantly.

The Baron did not echo the "Hoch"; but after retaining his thoughtful
expression for a few moments, a smile stole over his face, and he
remarked in an absent voice--

"Vun does not alvays need to go home to find beauty."

"Yes," said the Count, "I have always held it to be one of the
advantages of travel that one learns to tolerate the inhabitants of
other lands."

CHAPTER XXIII

"Ach, you are onfair," exclaimed the Baron. "Really?" said Eva, with a
sarcastic intonation he had not believed possible in so sweet a voice.

It was the day following the luncheon at Lincoln Lodge, and they were
once more seated in the shady arbor: this time the Count had guaranteed
not only to leave them uninterrupted by his own presence, but to protect
the garden from all other intruders. Everything, in fact, had presaged
the pleasantest of tete-a-tetes. But, alas! the Baron was learning that
if Amaryllis pouts, the shadiest corner may prove too warm. Why, he was
asking himself, should she exhibit this incomprehensible annoyance? What
had he done? How to awake her smiles again?

"I do not forget my old friends so quickly," he protested