"The truth is, you've been long enough away from America to begin to idealize it. By the way, I thought you were of the _élite_ asked to the Château d'Avranchéville this autumn."
"This is better than Normandy," he said, shortly.
"Ah, but think of the dear creatures gathered there?"
"That you don't love _that_ kind shows you're getting _blasé_."
Gano sat up, and fixed his dark eyes on his friend's face.
"You know you're talking nonsense. You'll allow I met her under peculiar circumstances."
"After helping you to fish her out of an Italian lake, I will allow the circumstances were romantic."
"Of course, love at first sight. Just the thing to fetch you."
"I thought she liked me as a girl at home might have liked me, who hadn't heard that my grandfather--"
He thumped out an oath as he thrust his hands deep down in his yachtman's jacket.
"She's so young," Gano went on--"probably less sophisticated, I thought, than our American girls."
"And here she was, ready to throw over poor Parthenay like that"--he tossed his cigarette overboard--"caring for him all the time, as Parthenay showed me. Then this _ingénue_, after turning the Tallmadge dollars into francs in her pretty baby head, was calmly arranging to help me to spend them here in France. How the devil they knew on such short acquaintance--before the settlement question came up--"
"Oh, her brother asked me that first day."
"And when I thought they didn't so much as know that I was American!" He laughed with that excessive bitterness of youth perturbed, and pretended to speak apologetically. "You see, I've plumed myself on my French since I was seven, and my name tells nothing."
"Your French is all right, but you don't imagine people like that would put themselves out for the _premier venu_ as they did for you from the start."
"My mistake was that, even without my banker's reference, I didn't look upon myself as the _premier venu_."
"I must say I admired the charming way they conveyed the idea to you that Mademoiselle Lucie--"
"My dear fellow, you would never have dreamed of Mademoiselle Lucie, enchanting as she is, if it hadn't been for their tact in pointing out that--"
"To be sure, and envied you your damned good luck. She's an adorable creature, and would spend your money with distinction."