I hadn't seen you staring your eyes out every time we came within a mile
of a penny princess. I haven't forgotten your disgraceful conduct in
collecting photographs of that homely daughter of a certain English duke.
We'll call the incident closed, little brother."

"Our friend Chauvenet, even," continued Captain Claiborne, "is less
persistent--less gloomily present on the horizon. We haven't seen him for
a week or two. But he expects to visit Washington this spring. His
waistcoats are magnificent. The governor shies every time the fellow
unbuttons his coat."

"Mr. Chauvenet is an accomplished man of the world," declared Shirley
with an insincere sparkle in her eyes.

"He lives by his wits--and lives well."

Claiborne dismissed Chauvenet and turned again toward the strange young
man, who was still deep in his newspaper.

"He's reading the _Neue Freie Presse_," remarked Dick, "by which token I
argue that he's some sort of a Dutchman. He's probably a traveling agent
for a Vienna glass-factory, or a drummer for a cheap wine-house, or the
agent for a Munich brewery. That would account for his travels. We simply
fall in with his commercial itinerary."

"You seem to imply, brother, that my charms are not in themselves
sufficient. But a commercial traveler hardly commands that fine repose,
that distinction--that air of having been places and seen things and
known people--"