with scores of people staring. What I told you is the simple truth.... Don’t Roman Catholics say that the regular rips make the most thorough-going, out-and-out saints when they do take to religion and good works and all the rest of it? Besides ... good Lord!—it’s Ancient History—happened years and years before our parents saw each other—and the old chap is ninety—or nearly! And—even supposing Dunoisse did what people say he did, only think what Dunoisse has done!”

Curiosity prevailed over injured dignity. The wounded wife emerged from behind a damp wad of cambric to ask: “What has he done?”

“What has he ... why—he has received all sorts of Votes of Thanks from Public Societies, and he has been decorated with heaps of Orders ... the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, and the Orders of the Annunziata of Savoy, and the Black Eagle; and he is a Commander of the Legion of Honor and a Knight of the Papal Order of St. Gregory, and Hereditary Prince of Widinitz if he liked, but he doesn’t like ... goodness me! Haven’t I told you all that already?” The M.P. for the North London borough flapped his hands and lapsed into incoherency.

“But surely you can tell me why these honors were bestowed upon M. Dunoisse?” asked his wife. “I am waiting for the answer to my question—what has he done to deserve them?”

The clear, incisive English voice asking the question cut like a knife through the consonantal, sibilant French,[Pg 9] and the guttural be-voweled German. And a stranger standing near—recognizable as a French priest of the Catholic Church less by the evidence of his well-worn cloth, and Roman collar, and wide-brimmed, round-crowned silk beaver, with the shabby silk band and black enameled buckle, than by a certain distinctive manner and expression—said upon a sudden impulse, courteously raising his hat:

[Pg 9]

“Madame will graciously pardon an old man for presuming to answer a question not addressed to him. She asks, if I comprehend aright, what M. Dunoisse has done to deserve the numberless marks of respect and esteem that have been showered on him?... I will have the honor of explaining to Madame if Monsieur kindly consents?”

“Pleasure, I’m sure!” babbled the dyspeptic victim of the Suffragists and the Budget, yawning as only the liverish can. The priest went on, addressing the little lady:

“Madame, the invalid gentleman whose paralyzed hands rest upon his knees as inertly and immovably as the hands 

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