speak as if she didn't know what curiosity meant.

"Excellent news, on the contrary," said John, "but a bolt from the
blue." And he offered her the paper.

"Am on my way to Rome," she read aloud. "Could I come to you for a day?
Winthorpe, Hotel Cavour, Milan."--"Winthorpe?" She pursed her lips, as
one tasting something. "I don't know the name. Who is he? What's his
County?" she demanded,--she, who carried the County Families in her
head.

John chuckled. "He hasn't got a County--he's only an American," he said,
pronouncing that genial British formula with intention.

"Oh," sighed Lady Blanchemain, her expectations dashed; and drawing in
her skirts, she sank a little deeper into her corner.

"He hasn't got a County," repeated John. "But he's far and away the
greatest swell I know."

"A swell? An American?" Lady Blanchemain pressed down her lips, and gave
a movement to her shoulders.

"An aristocrat, a patrician," said John.

"Fudge!" said Lady Blanchemain. "Americans and Australians--they're
anything you like, but they're never that."

John laughed. "I adore," he said, "our light and airy British way of
tarring Americans and Australians with the same brush,--the descendants