I refuse to apologize. Pearl smiles. Mrs. Radigan is abject. Realizing that this modern knight carries the Duke in his waistcoat pocket, she fears to offend him and so agrees with everything he says. "Ah, Sir Wigge," she said to him the other afternoon, "it must be a great hardship for you to have to give up your beloved London for the discomforts of New York." "It is not a hardship," Sir Charles replied with a courtly grace. "You know that as a youngster I served in the campaign against the Zulus. An Englishman, Mrs. Radigan, adapts himself to his circumstances. He is as much at home in a Zulu kraal or in America as he is in Piccadilly." Now when Sir Charles speaks like this, it comes as if from Zeus. He looks like Zeus shaved. I suggested this to Mrs. Radigan, but she replied that she would not say, until she had seen the two together, and I decided that it was not worth while for me to explain; I could cherish for myself the conceit that this was some barbaric god, dressed up by a Piccadilly tailor, and surveying the world through a monocle. When I saw him first, I was standing in the Radigan library, gazing disconsolately over the park, watching the endless stream of carriages rolling along the drive-way, for the town was out enjoying the breath of early spring. I was thinking of him, wondering when he would arrive, when he would present himself to Pearl Veal to claim her hand and her fortune for his noble master, the Duke of Nocastle. Then a smart brougham bowled up to the curb, and by the Frenchmen on the box I recognized a Bumpschus carriage, and I was not surprised when his Grace climbed out. A great man followed, a very large man, with gray hair and gray side-whiskers, clad in the conventional attire, so he might have been taken for either a statesman or an undertaker. The two paused a moment while the stranger gazed over the Radigan house. Then he turned and, looking down at his companion, said something. The Duke laughed so heartily that he dropped his monocle, and it took several moments of beating around the air before his hands discovered it, dangling at the end of its string. "The Duke and Sir Charles Wigge have just come in," said I to Mrs. Radigan. "At last," said she, laying down her picture-paper and gliding over to me. "My poor boy, I fear this is the end of your romance. It is splendid of you to stand ready to give up Pearl to the Duke, and no doubt you will find your reward in the consciousness of a duty done. To a certain extent, it is hard for my little sister, for I think she is fond of you, but while she says nothing, I am sure that she believes as I do, that it would be wrong, absolutely wrong, for her to refuse an offer from so great a man, a man any girl would deem it a privilege to marry." An appeal to Pearl brought me not even a smile.