Keyed up to a high pitch of enthusiasm, I played golf for ten days, and found my friend to be a fine sportsman. Like all Englishmen, he took a beating gracefully, but gave me to understand that he had been having a good deal of trouble with rheumatism or neuritis in his right elbow. On the last day we played he succeeded in bringing me in two down and I've never seen neuritis dispersed so quickly as it was in his case. I remember distinctly that he complained bitterly of the pain in his elbow when we started out, and that he was as fit as a fiddle at the eighteenth hole. He even went so far as to implore me to stay over till the next sailing of the Mauretania. But I took to the high seas. Mr. Poopendyke cabled to the Homestead at Hot Springs for suitable accommodations. I cannot remember when I had been so forehanded as all that, and I wonder what my secretary thought of me. My habit is to procrastinate. I almost forgot to mention a trifling bit of news that came to me the day before sailing. Elsie Hazzard wrote in great perturbation and at almost unfeeling length to tell me that Count Tarnowsy had unearthed the supposedly mythical Rothhoefen treasure chests and was reputed to have found gold and precious jewels worth at least a million dollars. The accumulated products of a century's thievery! The hoard of all the robber barons! Tarnowsy's! Strange to say I did not writhe nor snarl with disappointment and rage. I took the news with a _sang froid_ that almost killed poor Poopendyke. He never quite got over it. Nor was I especially disturbed or irritated by the telegram of condolence I received on board ship from Tarnowsy himself. He could not resist the temptation to gloat. I shall not repeat the message for the simple reason that I do not wish to dignify it by putting it into permanent form. We were two days out when I succeeded in setting my mind at rest in respect to Aline, Countess Tarnowsy. I had not thought of it before, but I remembered all of a sudden that I held decided scruples against marrying a divorced woman. Of course, that simplified matters. When one has preconceived notions about such matters they afford excellent material to fall back upon, even though he may have disregarded them after a fashion while unselfishly thinking of some one else. As I say, the recollection of this well-defined though somewhat remorseless principle of mine had the effect of putting my mind at rest in regard to the Countess. Feeling as strongly as I did about marriage with divorcees, she became an absolutely undesirable person so far as matrimony was concerned. I experienced a rather doubtful feeling of relief. It was not so hard to say to myself that Lord Amberdale was welcome to her, but it was very, very difficult to refrain from adding the unamiable words: "damn him." This rigid, puritanical principle of mine, however, did not declare against the unrighteousness of falling in love with a divorcee. CHAPTER XX I CHANGE GARDEN SPOTS