“Father,” she cried, “father, are you ill? What is it? Shall I ring?” As she spoke Gwendoline reached for the heavy bell-rope that hung beside the wall, but the earl, fearful that her frenzied efforts might actually make it ring, checked her hand. “I am, indeed, deeply troubled,” said Lord Oxhead, “but of that anon. Tell me first what is this news you bring. I hope, Gwendoline, that your choice has been worthy of an Oxhead, and that he to whom you have plighted your troth will be worthy to bear our motto with his own.” And, raising his eyes to the escutcheon before him, the earl murmured half unconsciously, “Hic, haec, hoc, hujus, hujus, hujus,” breathing perhaps a prayer as many of his ancestors had done before him that he might never forget it.

“Father,” continued Gwendoline, half timidly, “Edwin is an American.”

“You surprise me indeed,” answered Lord Oxhead; “and yet,” he continued, turning to his daughter with the courtly grace that marked the nobleman of the old school, “why should we not respect and admire the Americans? Surely there have been great names among them. Indeed, our ancestor Sir Amyas Oxhead was, I think, married to Pocahontas–at least if not actually married”–the earl hesitated a moment.

“At least they loved one another,” said Gwendoline simply.

“Precisely,”’ said the earl, with relief, “they loved one another, yes, exactly.” Then, as if musing to himself, “Yes, there have been great Americans. Bolivar was an American. The two Washingtons–George and Booker–are both Americans. There have been others, too, though for the moment I do not recall their names. But tell me, Gwendoline, this Edwin of yours–where is his family seat?”

“It is at Oshkosh, Wisconsin, father.”

“Ah! Say you so?” rejoined the earl, with rising interest. “Oshkosh is, indeed, a grand old name. The Oshkosh are a Russian family. An Ivan Oshkosh came to England with Peter the Great and married my ancestress. Their descendant in the second degree once removed, Mixtup Oshkosh, fought at the burning of Moscow and later at the sack of Salamanca and the treaty of Adrianople. And Wisconsin, too,” the old nobleman went on, his features kindling with animation, for he had a passion for heraldry, genealogy, chronology, and commercial geography; “the Wisconsins, or better, I think, the Guisconsins, are of old blood. A Guisconsin followed Henry I to Jerusalem and rescued my ancestor Hardup Oxhead from the Saracens. Another Guisconsin…”

“Nay, father,” said Gwendoline, gently interrupting, “Wisconsin is not Edwin’s own name: that is, I believe, the name of his estate. My lover’s name is Edwin Einstein.”

“Einstein,” repeated the earl dubiously– “an Indian name perhaps; yet the Indians are many of them of excellent family. An ancestor of mine…”

“Father,” said Gwendoline, again interrupting, “here is a portrait of Edwin. Judge for yourself if he be noble.” With this she placed in her father’s hand an American tin-type, tinted in pink and brown. The picture represented a typical specimen of American manhood of that Anglo-Semitic type so often seen in persons of mixed English and Jewish extraction. The figure was well over five feet two inches in height and broad in proportion. The graceful sloping shoulders harmonised with the slender and well-poised waist, and with a hand pliant and yet prehensile. The pallor of the features was relieved by a drooping black moustache.

Such was Edwin Einstein, to whom Gwendoline’s heart, if not her hand, was already affianced. Their love had been so simple and yet so strange. It seemed to Gwendoline that it was but a thing of yesterday, and yet in reality they had met three weeks ago. Love had drawn them irresistibly together. To Edwin, the fair English girl with her old name and wide estates possessed a charm that he scarcely dared to confess to himself. He determined to woo her. To Gwendoline there was that in Edwin’s bearing, the rich jewels that he wore, the vast fortune that rumour ascribed to him, that appealed to something romantic and chivalrous in her nature. She loved to hear him speak of stocks and bonds, corners and margins, and his father’s colossal business.