sise identity is
to be cultivated. But, as I say, you will have to put your back into
it later on. At present there will be less to do. You will have to play
close and hold your hand, and follow any lead that is given you by de
Gemosac, or by my humble self. You will find that easy enough, I
know. For you have all a Frenchman's quickness to understand. And I
suppose--to put it plainly as between men of the world--now that you
have had time to think it over--you are not afraid, Barebone?"

"Oh no!" laughed Barebone. "I am not afraid."

"One is not a Barebone--or a Bourbon--for nothing," observed Colville,
in an aside to himself. "Gad! I wish I could say that I should not be
afraid myself under similar circumstances. My heart was in my mouth, I
can tell you, in that cabin when de Gemosac blurted it all out. It came
suddenly at the end, and--well!--it rather hit one in the wind. And, as
I say, one is not a Bourbon for nothing. You come into a heritage, eight
hundred years old, of likes and dislikes, of genius and incapacity, of
an astounding cleverness, and a preposterous foolishness without compare
in the history of dynasties. But that doesn't matter nowadays. This is
a progressive age, you know; even the Bourbons cannot hold back the
advance of the times."

"I come into a heritage of friends and of enemies," said Barebone,
gaily--"all ready made. That seems to me more important."

"Gad! you are right," exclaimed Colville. "I said you would do the
moment I saw you step ashore at Farlingford. You have gone right to the
heart of the question at the first bound. It is your friends and your
enemies that will give you trouble."

"More especially my friends," suggested Loo, with a light laugh.

"Right again," answered Colville, glancing at him sideways beneath the
brim of his hat. And there was a little pause before he spoke again.

"You have probably learnt how to deal with your enemies at sea," he said
thoughtfully at length. "Have you ever noticed how an English ship comes
into a foreign harbour and takes her berth at her moorings? There is
nothing more characteristic of the nation. And one captain is like
another. No doubt you have seen Clubbe do it a hundred times. He comes
in, all sail set, and steers straight for the berth he has chosen. And
there are always half a dozen men in half a dozen small boats who go out
to meet him. They stand up and wave their arms, and point this way and
that. They ask a hundred questi