"Deuced fine girl, Miss Heath, ain't she?" he began; "Got the stamps, too--richest heiress in the market. Old man took his death through immoderate use of cold water--fell in the drink over in Jersey, where he owned a whole town; and to think now that this sallow-faced bandit seems to have the inside track. It's a burning shame, I say, that such a smoky-head lazzaroni should be tolerated, when good-looking chaps like you and I, colonel, are around and unprovided for, ain't it?"
The stockbroker's flippant way of treating a subject so near to the colonel's heart grated harshly on his feelings, but curiosity overcame his repugnance, and he inquired, "Who is this Italian--this Count?"
"I'll tell you all I know about him in a few words," continued Jobson. "Throw away that segar first, and take a fresh one--they're Partagas. You see I'm a broker--by the bye, here's my card, and happy to see you down town at my office any time you're that way, or at the club in the evening, whichever is most convenient. Well, as I was saying, I'm a broker, and last year after I closed out the Rock Island pool, out of which I cleared two hundred and forty-five thousand dollars, in less than ninety days, I went to Europe and fell in with the Mumbies. I'm a second cousin of old man Mumbie, you must know, although he never discovered it until I was worth half a million. Anyway Bob Mumbie and I went about together some, and had a good time. Miss Heath, who, I suppose you know, is a ward of Mumbie's, was with the family, and this feller, this Italian, was their courier. After a while it came out that he was a count, and then they all kow-towed to him as if he were the Grand Mogul. When they got to Italy he showed them his ancestral halls, and all that sort o' thing, and sold Mumbie pictures and marbles enough at five prices to stock a museum, so that the commissions and profits he made on them enabled him to set up for a gentleman, and give up the courier business. But he still froze to the Mumbies, and accompanied them over here. First he made love to Ada, but when he found out that Miss Heath was an heiress, and ever so much richer, he dropped Ada and turned his batteries on the other. Bob Mumbie was also sweet on Miss Heath, but when the Count appeared, poor Bob's pipe was out at once. Mrs. Mumbie is as much magnetized as any of them. She thinks a wonderful sight of high birth, blood, families, and all that sort o' thing, and wants to secure the Count for Ada, though I don't think there's much show for her now. So you see the feller's in clover and, begad, I think he can take his pick of the girls any day he wants to. Can't imagine what possesses our girls to take up with foreign beggars, with handles to their names, when there's lots of their good-looking sensible countrymen to be had, with the rocks to back 'em." Here Jobson threw back the lappels of his coat and displayed his chest. "So it goes," he continued with a sigh. "Some time ago French marquises and barons were all the rage, and now they're running on Italian counts and princes. That Count Borgia hasn't got a red cent. He's passing chips half the time 'round to Morrissey's. Hang me, if I don't think he's a capper, and that's the way he manages to live."