ld not
believe her.

She went on with her story, not wishing to protest against this
impassable wall.

"My father also was of Italian origin but was Austrian because of the
place of his birth.... Furthermore, the Germanic empires always
inspired him with a blind enthusiasm. He was among those who detest
their native land, and see all the virtues in the northern people.

"Inventor of marvelous business schemes, financial promoter of colossal
enterprises, he had passed his existence besieging the directors of the
great banking establishments and having interviews in the lobbies of
the government departments. Eternally on the eve of surprising
combinations that were bound to bring him dozens of millions, he had
always lived in luxurious poverty, going from hotel to hotel--always
the best--with his wife and his only daughter.

"You know nothing about such a life, Ulysses; you come from a tranquil
and well-to-do family. Your people have never known existence in the
Palace Hotels, nor have you known difficulties in meeting the monthly
account, managing to have it included with those of the former months
with an unlimited credit."

As a child she had seen her mother weeping in their extravagant hotel
apartment while the father was talking with the aspect of an inspired
person, announcing that the next week he was going to clear a million
dollars. The wife, convinced by the eloquence of her remarkable
husband, would finally dry her tears, powder her face, and adorn
herself with her pearls and her blonde laces of problematic value. Then
she would descend to the magnificent hall, filled with perfumes, with
the hum of conversation and the discreet wailings of the violins, in
order to take tea with her friends in the hotel,--formidable
millionaires from the two hemispheres who vaguely suspected the
existence of an infirmity known as poverty, but incapable of imagining
that it might attack persons of their own world.

Meanwhile the little girl used to play in the hotel garden of the
Palace Hotel with other children dressed up and adorned like luxurious
and fragile dolls, each one worth many millions.

"From my childhood," continued Freya, "I had been a companion of women
who are now celebrated for their riches in New York, Paris, and in
London. I have been on familiar terms with great heiresses that are
to-day, through their marriages, duchesses and even princesses of the
blood royal. Many of them have since passed by me, w