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The slow, distinct voice came floating across the little table, and ladies who that day had been reading the last French novel and could interpret every word and tone smiled slyly at each other or held themselves still to hear the sequel; the ill-bred turned round and stared; the parvenu sitting at the head of the table, who had been a foreign buyer of some London firm, chuckled coarsely and winked at the waiter, and Baron, the Afrikander trader, who sat next to Telford, ordered champagne on the strength of it. The bronzed, weather worn face of Telford showed imperturbable, but his eyes were struggling with a strong kind of humor. The officer flushed to the hair, accepted the grapes, smiled foolishly, and acknowledged–swallowing the reflection on his accent–that he had been in Paris. Then he engaged in close conversation with the young lady beside him, who, however, seemed occupied with Telford. This quiet, keen young lady, Miss Mildred Margrave, had received an impression, not of the kind which her sex confide to each other, but of a graver quality. She was a girl of sympathies and parts.

The event increased the interest and respect felt in the hotel for this stranger. That he knew French was not strange. He had been well educated as a boy and had had his hour with the classics. His godmother, who had been in the household of Prince Joseph Bonaparte, taught him French from the time he could lisp, and, what was dangerous in his father’s eyes, filled him with bits of poetry and fine language, so that he knew Heine, Racine and Beranger and many another. But this was made endurable to the father by the fact that, by nature, the boy was a warrior and a scapegrace, could use his fists as well as his tongue, and posed as a Napoleon with the negro children in the plantation. He was leader of the revels when the slaves gathered at night in front of the huts and made a joy of captivity and sang hymns which sounded like profane music hall songs, and songs with an unction now lost to the world, even as Shakespeare’s fools are lost–that gallant company who ran a thread of tragedy through all their jesting.

Great things had been prophesied for this youth in the days when he sat upon an empty treacle barrel with a long willow rod in his hand, a cocked hat on his head, a sword at his side–a real sword once belonging to a little Bonaparte–and fiddlers and banjoists beneath him. His father on such occasions called him Young King Cole.

All had changed, and many things had happened, as we shall see. But one thing was clear–this was no wild man from the west. He had claims to be considered, and he was considered. People watched him as he went down over the esplanade and into quiet streets. The little occurrence at the dinner table had set him upon a train of thoughts which he had tried to avoid for many years. On principle he would not dwell on the past. There was no corrosion, he said to himself, like the memory of an ugly deed. But the experiences of the last few days had tended to throw him into the past, and for once he gave himself up to it.

Presently there came to him the sound of a banjo–not an unusual thing at Herridon. It had its mock negro minstrels, whom, hearing, Telford was anxious to offend. This banjo, he knew at once, was touched by fingers which felt them as if born on them, and the chords were such as are only brought forth by those who have learned them to melodies of the south. He stopped before the house and leaned upon the fence. He heard the voice go shivering through a negro hymn, which was among the first he had ever known. He felt himself suddenly shiver–a thrill of nervous sympathy. His face went hot and his hands closed on the palings tightly. He stole into the garden quietly, came near the window and stood still. He held his mouth in his palm. He had an inclination to cry out.