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“I am an American,” he began glibly enough under the combined effects of the whiskey and dinner, “an old soldier. I fought with Grant in the Wilderness, and–“

“Of course,” I interrupted, “and with Sherman in Georgia. I have heard it all by a hundred better talkers than you. Suppose you skip it.”

I did not look up, but I was perfectly familiar with the expression of injured innocence that was mantling his face.

He began again in a few minutes, but his voice had lost some of its engaging frankness.

“I am the son of a kind and indulgent mother,–God bless her. My father died before I knew him–“

I moved uneasily in my chair.

He hurried on:–

“I fell in bad ways in spite of her saintly love, and ran away to sea.”

“Look here, my friend,” I said, “I am sorry to spoil your little tale, but it is an old one. Can’t you give me something new? Now try again.”

He looked at me unsteadily under his thin eyebrows, shuffled restlessly in his seat, and said with something like a sob in his voice:–

“Well, sir, I will. You have been kind to me and taken my little gal in; you saved her life, and, for a change, I’ll tell you the truth.”

He drew himself up a little too ostentatiously, threw his head back, and said proudly:–

“I am a gentleman born.”

“Good,” I laughed. “Now you are on the right track, and besides you look it.”

“Ah! you may sneer,” he retorted, “but I tell you the truth.”

His face flushed and his lip quivered. He brought his fist down on the table.

“I tell you my father,–ah! but never mind my father.” His voice failed him.

“Certainly,” I replied. “Only get on with your story.”

“I came out to India from Boston as a young man,” he continued, “either in ’66 or ’68, I forget which.”

“Try ’67,” I suggested.

“It was not ’67,” he exclaimed angrily, “it was either ’66 or ’68.”

“Or some other date. However, that’s but a detail. Proceed.”

“Sir, you can make sport of me, but what I am telling you is God’s truth. May I be struck dead if one lie passes my lips. I came out to plant coffee; I thought, like many others, that I had only to cut down the jungle and put in coffee plants, and make my everlasting fortune.”

“And didn’t you?” I asked, glancing at his dilapidated old helmet that hung over the corner of the sideboard.

“Look at me!” he burst forth, springing upon his feet, his breast heaving under his blue pajamas.

“Pardon the question,” I answered. “Go on, you are doing bravely.”

He sank back into his chair with a commendable air of dignity.

“I had a little money of my own,” he continued, “and opened up an estate. It promised well, but I soon came to the end of my small capital. I thought I could go to Calcutta and Bombay and Simla, and cultivate my mind by travel and society, while the bushes were growing. Well it ended in the same old way. I got into the chitties’ hands–they are worse than Jews–at two per cent a month on a mortgage on my estate. Then I went back to it with a determination to pay up my debt, make my estate a success, and after that to see the world. I worked, sir, like a nigger, and for a time was able to meet my naked creditor, from month to month, hoping all the time against hope for a bumper crop.”

“I understand,” I said. “Your bumper crop did not come, and your chitty did. Where does she come in?” I nodded in the direction of the little sleeper.

He glanced uneasily in the same direction, and a tear gathered in his eye.

“I married on credit, sir, the daughter of an English army officer. It was infernal. But, sir, you would have done likewise. Live under the burning sun of India for four years, struggle against impossibilities and hope against hope, and then have a pair of great hazel eyes look lovingly into yours and a pair of red lips turned up to yours,–and tell me if you would not have closed your eyes to the future, and accepted this precious gift as though it were sent from above?”