by to-morrow the papers will be full of your intimations, although you
do not say anything at all. And then the photographers: how will you
escape them? Don't you know that every penny paper will appear with your
picture in front to-morrow, and, wherever you go, it will be thrust
before your eyes? You will hear your name pronounced in all languages,
and in every way, and you will not know how to escape this unsought-for
and unwelcome notoriety. But if you accept my invitation, nobody will be
able to stare at you or interrogate you, and you shall live as quietly
and peacefully as if you were in some herdsman's hovel in Hortobágy at
home."

I stared at him quite stunned. How, in the name of all that was
wonderful, could he have learned of the existence of a herdsman's hovel
in Hortobágy? How could he know that it was my favourite spot? And how
he pronounced that Hortobágy! Just as I myself! He smiled at my
astonishment, but offered no explanation. But now he had caught me in my
weak point--a writer's curiosity--and I gave in, willingly enough.

Mr. Dumany ordered the carriages. In one magnificent landau Mrs. Dumany
was to go with little James, in the other Mr. Dumany and myself. But the
child obstinately refused to leave his father's arms, and clung to him
more tightly than ever. So the lady was obliged to go alone, and we two
men took the boy with us.

I confess that the gentleman puzzled and interested me very much. Not
because people had given him the name of "Silver King." I do not covet,
and I do not admire wealth alone, pure and simple. I know how to
describe a vine-embowered cottage, or even a thatch-roofed hut, with a
garland of gourd blossoms around its small windows, and I can appreciate
the beauties of a picturesque church or castle. But all my descriptive