is
high-born and most admirable countess had died soon after the birth
of her second child, the present Marchioness of Scarland. Such a man
would naturally be the most jealous scrutineer of the pretensions of
his son's chosen wife. Qualities of heart and mind would weigh light
in the scale against genealogy. To his thinking, blue blood differed
from the common red stream as the claret of some noted vintage differs
from the _vin ordinaire_ of the same year. Perhaps he had blundered on
a well-founded theory, but he certainly lacked discrimination as to
the _cru_.

Medenham did some shopping, lunched at a club, surprised his tailor by
a prolonged visit and close inspection of tweeds and broadcloths, and
successfully repressed a strong desire to write a letter. It was some
consolation to peruse for the twentieth time the four closely-written
pages on which Cynthia had set out the tour's timetable for the
benefit of Simmonds. He had not returned it, since she possessed a
copy, and in his mind's eye he followed the Mercury in its flight
up the map from end to end of industrial Lancashire, through smoky
Preston to trim Lancaster and quiet Kendal, and finally, after a long
day, to the brooding peace and serene beauty of Windermere.

At last, rousing himself from his dreaming--for he was now back in his
club again, sipping a cup of tea--he glanced at his watch. Five
o'clock--a likely hour to find Mr. Vanrenen in the hotel, if, as was
most probable, Devar's telegram to his mother was altogether mistaken
in its report of the millionaire's movements.

He meant, of course, to make himself known to Vanrenen, and go through
the whole adventure from A to Z. It should provide an interesting
story, he thought--lively as a novel in some of its chapters, and
calculated to appeal strongly to the bright intelligence of an
American. On his way to the Savoy, he tried to picture to himself just
what Cynthia's father would look like. It was a futile endeavor,
because he had never yet been able to construct a mental portrait of
any man wholly unknown to him. One day in Madras he had telephoned
to an official for leave to shoot an elephant in a Government
reservation, and a deep voice boomed back an answer. Apparently
it belonged to a man whose stature warranted his appointment as
controller of monsters, but when Medenham called in person for the
permit he found that the voice came from a lean and wizened scrap of
humanity about five feet high