but it's not that. He got it from his blood. You know, his father
was one of those West India, sea-captains that one used to find
strewn thick through Halifax society, who made fortunes in rum and
lost them pretty much the same way. Well, the old captain married a
Spanish girl. I have seen her portrait, and she was a beauty, a
`high-bred Spanish lady,' sure enough. Lived somewhere in the
islands. Came home with the Captain, and died in Halifax, leaving
her seven year old boy in charge of an aunt. Father died soon
afterwards. Grief, I believe, and drink. Even then his people called
the 'the little Don.' He had a little money left him to start with,
but that has long since vanished. At any rate, for the last five or
six years he has had to fend for himself."

"Quite a romance," said Lloyd.

"Isn't it?" exclaimed Betty. "And he never told a word."

"Well, The Don's not a publisher."

"But then he told you."

"Yes, he told me and Shock one night. He likes us, you see."

"'De gustibus non disputandum,'" murmured Lloyd, and in answer to
Betty's inquiring look added, "as the old woman said when she kissed
her cow."

"Now then, what about Shock's name?" continued Betty.

"Hair," said Brown laconically. "You have seen him come out of a