Chauvenet
was now leading the conversation; it might even have seemed to a critical
listener that he was guiding it with a certain intention.
He laughed as though at the remembrance of something amusing, and held
the little company while he bent over a candle to light a cigar.
"With all due respect to our American host, I must say that a title in
America goes further than anywhere else in the world. I was at Bar Harbor
three years ago when the Baron von Kissel devastated that region. He made
sad havoc among the ladies that summer; the rest of us simply had no
place to stand. You remember, gentlemen,"--and Chauvenet looked slowly
around the listening circle,--"that the unexpected arrival of the
excellent Ambassador of Austria-Hungary caused the Baron to leave Bar
Harbor between dark and daylight. The story was that he got off in a
sail-boat; and the next we heard of him he was masquerading under some
title in San Francisco, where he proved to be a dangerous forger. You all
remember that the papers were full of his performances for a while, but
he was a lucky rascal, and always disappeared at the proper psychological
moment.
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