"Well, I be dem!" gasped the colonel.
"It's the truth. Take the American: he thinks there is nothing in the
world but money. Take the Britisher: to him caste is everything. Take the
money out of one man's mind and the importance of being well-born out of
the other...." He turned from the window and smiled at the artist and the
empurpling Anglo-Indian.
"Abbott," growled the soldier, "that man will some day drive me amuck.
What do you think? One night, on a tiger hunt, he got me into an argument
like this. A brute of a beast jumped into the middle of it. Courtlandt
shot him on the second bound, and turned to me with--'Well, as I was
saying!' I don't know to this day whether it was nerve or what you
Americans call gall."
"Divided by two," grinned Abbott.
"Ha, I see; half nerve and half gall. I'll remember that. But we were
talking of airships."
"I was," retorted Courtlandt. "You were the man who started the powwow."
He looked down into the street with sudden interest. "Who is that?"
The colonel and Abbott hurried across the room.
"What did I say, Abbott? I told you I saw him. He's crazy; fact. Thinks he
can travel around incognito when there isn't a magazine on earth that
hasn't printed his picture."
"Well, why shouldn't he travel around if he wants to?" asked Courtlandt
coolly.
The colonel nudged the artist.
"There happens to be an attraction in Bellaggio," said Abbott irritably.
"The moth and the candle," supplemented the colonel, peering over
Courtlandt's shoulder. "He's well set up," grudgingly admitted the old
fellow.
"The moth and the candle," mused Courtlandt. "That will be Nora Harrigan.
How long has this infatuation been going on?"
"Year and a half."
"And the other side?"
"There isn't any other side," exploded the artist. "She's worried to
death. Not a day passes but some scurrilous penny-a-liner springs some
yarn, some beastly innuendo. She's been dodging the fellow for months. In
Paris last year she couldn't move without running into him. This year she
changed her apartment, and gave orders at the Opera to refuse her address
to all who asked for it. Consequently she had some peace. I don't know why
it is, but a woman in public life seems to be a target."
"The penalty of beauty, Abby. Homely women seldom are annoyed, unless they
become suffragists." The colonel poured forth a dense cloud of smoke.
"What brand is that, Colonel?" asked Courtlandt, choking.
The colonel generously produced his pouch.
"No, no! I was about to observe that it isn't ambrosia."
"Rotter!" The soldier dug the offender in the ribs. "I am going to have
the Harrigans over for tea this afternoon. Come over! You'll like the
family. The girl is charming; and the father is a sportsman to the
backbone. Some silly fools laugh behind his back, but never before his
face. And my word, I know rafts of gentlemen who are not fit to stand in
his shoes."