“My father! He was a coachman in the employ of old David Soulett, who was the son of Walter and the father of Richard and David the third, and of Madge, who married the Duke of Peterborough. Old David Soulett--the second, he was--was my father's employer. My father was English. He came to New York when he was eighteen. He went straight into the Souletts' stable, became head coachman, and lived with the family for fifty years. They pensioned him off. I grew up with the boys--called one another by our first names. Do you get that?--by our first names!” Jemingham compressed his lips tightly and nodded. His eyes filled with reminiscence--sweet, yet sad. “You did, eh?” said the reporter. If J. Willoughby had been addicted to slang he would have used the same wondering tone of voice and would have exclaimed, “What do you know about that!” “And that is why I went to the Klondike!” There are times when a man's voice and attitude show that he is speaking in italics. This was one of the times. Having said all there was to be said, he turned to the tea with a gesture of such determination that Parkhurst leaned over, half expecting to see a dozen starving grizzly-bears jump out of the cup. Then the thought came to the watchful reporter that the grim-shut lips merely expressed that some memory was bitter. He asked, very sympathetically, “Did they send you away?” “They did not send me away. They did nothing! They were! That's all. It was enough.” “Yes, of course!” The reporter agreed with Jerningham absolutely. “But I don't quite see the exact reason, as you might say.” “They were!” explained Jerningham as one might talk to a child. “They were Souletts, rich by inheritance, in the best society. They had everything I did not have. So I went to the Klondike.” “Yes?” “Is it not clear?” “No!” said the reporter, grateful for the chance to use the plain negative. “They were in the Four Hundred. They were gentlemen. They were good-looking, pleasant-mannered, kindly-hearted fellow-Christians. But if they had not been the sons of David Soulett, and if David had not been the son of Walter, and Walter the son of the first David, they wouldn't have been in the Four Hundred, or in the Four Thousand even. Policemen at the corners used to touch their hats to them as they drove by and seemed really glad to get a pleasant smile in return. You felt the cops would never have dreamt of taking a Soulett to the station-house--always to the Soulett mansion. New-Yorkers used to point to it--the Soulett mansion--with an air of pride, as though they owned it! Clerks in shops would send for the proprietor if one of the Souletts walked in, and later they would brag how they said to David Soulett, they said; and he said, said he--and so on. And why? Why, I ask you?” “Why?” repeated the reporter, hypnotically.