turn aside a fellow who was so big of frame and apparently so sane and so
steady of purpose as this Armitage. And there was, too, the further
consideration that while Armitage was volunteering gratuitous
information, and assuming an interest in his affairs by the Claibornes
that was wholly unjustified, there was also the other side of the matter:
that his explanations proceeded from motives of delicacy that were
praiseworthy. Dick was puzzled, and piqued besides, to find that his
resources as a big protecting brother were so soon exhausted. What
Armitage was asking was the right to seek his sister Shirley's hand in
marriage, and the thing was absurd. Moreover, who was John Armitage?

The question startled Claiborne into a realization of the fact that
Armitage had volunteered considerable information without at all
answering this question. Dick Claiborne was a human being, and curious.

"Pardon me," he asked, "but are you an Englishman?"

"I am not," answered Armitage. "I have been so long in America that I
feel as much at home there as anywhere--but I am neither English nor
American by birth; I am, on the other hand--"

He hesitated for the barest second, and Claiborne was sensible of an
intensification of interest; now at last there was to be a revelation
that amounted to something.

"On the other hand," Armitage repeated, "I was born at Fontainebleau,
where my parents lived for only a few months; but I do not consider that
that fact makes me a Frenchman. My mother is dead. My father died--very
recently. I have been in America enough to know that a foreigner is often
under suspicion--particularly if he have a title! My distinction is that