engaged in a noisy though temperate encounter with the roulette wheel at the opposite end of the room. "I've never met any one like him, Mr. King." He mopped his brow, and still looked a trifle dazed.
King laughed. "There isn't any one like him, Count. He is the one and only Blithers."
"He is very rich?"
"Millions and millions," said Mrs. King. "Didn't he tell you how many?"
"I am not quite sure. This daughter of his—is she attractive?"
"Rather. Why?"
"He informed me that her dot would be twenty millions if she married the right man. Moreover, she is his only heir. 'Pon my soul, Mrs. King, he quite took my breath away when he announced that he knew all about our predicament in relation to the Russian loan. It really sounded quite—you might say significant. Does—does he imagine that—good heaven, it's almost stupefying!"
King smoked in silence for many seconds. There was a pucker of annoyance on his wife's fair brow as she stared reflectively through the window at the distant lights of Blitherwood, far up the mountain side.
"Sounds ominous to me," said King drily. "Is Bobby for sale?"
The Count favoured him with a look of horror. "My dear Mr. King!" Then as comprehension came, he smiled. "I see. No, he isn't for sale. He is a Prince, not a pawn. Mr. Blithers may be willing to buy but—" he proudly shook his head.
"He was feeling you out, however," said King, ruminating. "Planting the seed, so to speak."
"There is a rumour that she is to marry Count Lannet," said his wife. "A horrid creature. There was talk in the newspapers last winter of an Italian duke. Poor girl! From what I hear of her, she is rather a good sort, sensible and more genuinely American in her tastes than might be, expected after her bringing-up. And she is pretty."
"How about this young Scoville, Rainie?"
"He's a nice boy but—he'll never get her. She is marked up too high for him. He doesn't
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