ccountable fancy to this
strange Northman, with his quiet ways and his unaffected courtesy, and
at the present moment they would have quarrelled with their best friends
rather than hear a word against him. "My guest, too, and on my yacht,"
he went on; and it did his sister good to see him angry--"it's true he
brought him, and introduced him to me." Then a bright idea struck him.
"And if Claudius were not a gentleman, what the deuce right had Barker
to bring him to me at all, eh? Wasn't it his business to find out? My
word! I would like to ask him that, and if I find him I will." Lady
Victoria had no intention of making mischief between her brother and Mr.
Barker. But she did not like the American, and she thought Barker was
turning the Duke into a miner, or a farmer, or a greengrocer, or
something--it was not quite clear. But she wished him out of the way,
and fate had given her a powerful weapon. It was just that sort of
double-handedness that the Duke most hated of all things in the earth.
Moreover, he knew his sister never exaggerated, and that what she had
told him was of necessity perfectly true.

Woe to Mr. Silas B. Barker junior if he came in the Duke's way that
evening!

"I suppose he is coming to dinner?" said the Duke after a pause, during
which his anger had settled into a comfortable ferocity.

"No," said Lady Victoria; "he sent some flowers and a note of regret."

"Well--I am glad of that. Would you like to go for a drive, Vick?"

"Yes, of all things. I have not been here since I was married"--which
was about eighteen months, but she had already caught that matronly
phrase--"and I want to see what they have been doing to the Park."

"All right. We'll take Claudius, if he is anywhere about the place."

"Of course," said Lady Victoria. And so the brother and sister prepared
to soothe their ruffled feelings by making much of the man who was "a
gentleman." But they were right, for Claudius was all they thought him,
and a great deal more too, as they discovered in the sequel.

Having driven in the Park, the Duke insisting that Claudius should sit
in the place of honour with Lady Victoria, and having criticised to
their satisfaction the few equipages they met--for it was too early for
New York--they went back to their hotel, and dispersed to dress for
dinner. The Duke, as he had told his sister, had invited his friend to
dine. They all sat together waiting his arrival. Punctual to the moment,
the door ope