E-text prepared by D Alexander and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 32185-h.htm or 32185-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/32185/pg32185-images.html) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32185/32185-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See http://www.archive.org/details/lordstranleighab00barruoft LORD STRANLEIGH ABROAD by ROBERT BARR Author of "Young Lord Stranleigh," "Lord Stranleigh, Philanthropist," "The Mutable Many," etc. Ward, Locke & Co., Limited London, Melbourne, and Toronto 1913 [Illustration: "'Why did you wish to murder me?'" (Page 189.) _Frontispiece_] CONTENTS. PAGE I.--LORD STRANLEIGH ALL AT SEA 7 II.--AN AUTOMOBILE RIDE 49 III.--THE GOD IN THE CAR 87 IV.--THE MAD MISS MATURIN 125 V.--IN SEARCH OF GAME 164 VI.--THE BUNK HOUSE PRISONER 209 VII.--THE END OF THE CONTEST 259 LORD STRANLEIGH ABROAD. I.--LORD STRANLEIGH ALL AT SEA. A few minutes before noon on a hot summer day, Edmund Trevelyan walked up the gang-plank of the steamship, at that moment the largest Atlantic liner afloat. Exactly at the stroke of twelve she would leave Southampton for Cherbourg, then proceed across to Queenstown, and finally would make a bee-line west for New York. Trevelyan was costumed in rough tweed of subdued hue, set off by a cut so well-fitting and distinguished that it seemed likely the young man would be looked upon by connoisseurs of tailoring as the best-dressed passenger aboard. He was followed by Ponderby, his valet, whose usually expressionless face bore a look of dissatisfaction with his lot, as though he had been accustomed to wait upon the nobility, and was now doomed to service with a mere commoner. His lack of content, however, was caused by a dislike to ocean travel in the first place, and his general disapproval of America in the second. A country where all men are free and equal possessed no charms for Ponderby, who knew he had no equal, and was not going to demean himself by acknowledging the possibility of such. Once on deck, his master turned to him and said-- "You will go, Ponderby, to my suite of rooms, and see that my luggage is placed where it should be, and also kindly satisfy yourself that none of it is missing."