The logic here seemed a little close; but Lord Lambeth, made conscious
of a compliment, found his natural modesty just at hand.
"I am sure you know a great deal more than I do."

"I really think I know a great deal--for a person who has never been there."

"Have you really never been there?" cried Lord Lambeth. "Fancy!"

"Never--except in imagination," said the young girl.

"Fancy!" repeated her companion. "But I daresay you'll go soon, won't you?"

"It's the dream of my life!" declared Bessie Alden, smiling.

"But your sister seems to know a tremendous lot about London,"
Lord Lambeth went on.

The young girl was silent a moment. "My sister and I are two
very different persons," she presently said. "She has been
a great deal in Europe. She has been in England several times.
She has known a great many English people."

"But you must have known some, too," said Lord Lambeth.

"I don't think that I have ever spoken to one before.
You are the first Englishman that--to my knowledge--
I have ever talked with."

Bessie Alden made this statement with a certain gravity--