"To return to our subject," she at length said; "Were I required to say, I should not be able to decide on the country of Mr. Blunt; nor have I ever met with any one who appeared to know. I saw him first in Germany, where he circulated in the best company; though no one seemed acquainted with his history, even there. He made a good figure; was quite at his ease; speaks several languages almost as well as the natives of the different countries themselves; and, altogether, was a subject of curiosity with those who had leisure to think of any thing but their own dissipation and folly."
Mr. Sharp listened with obvious gravity to the fair speaker, and had not her own eyes been fastened on the deck, she might have detected the lively interest betrayed in his. Perhaps the feeling which was at the bottom of all this, to a slight degree, influenced his answer.
"Quite an Admirable Crichton!"
"I do not say that, though certainly expert in tongues. My own rambling life has made me acquainted with a few languages, and I do assure you, this gentleman speaks three or four with almost equal readiness, and with no perceptible accent. I remember, at Vienna, many even believed him to be a German."
"What! with the name of Blunt?"
Eve smiled, and her companion, who silently watched every expression of her varying countenance, as if to read her thoughts, noted it.
"Names signify little in these migratory times," returned the young lady. "You have but to imagine a von before it, and it would pass at Dresden, or at Berlin. Von Blunt, der Edelgeborne Graf Von Blunt, Hofrath--or if you like it better, Geheimer Rath mit Excellenz und eure Gnaden"
"Or, Baw-Berg-Veg-Inspector-Substitut!" added Mr. Sharp, laughing. "No, no! this will hardly pass. Blunt is a good old English name; but it has not finesse enough for Italian, German, Spanish, or anything else but John Bull and his family."
"I see no necessity, for my part, for all this Bluntishness; the gentleman may think frankness a good travelling quality."
"Surely, he has not concealed his real name!"