"So far as I am aware he referred to it but once, and then to no more than one person, a French military officer, now dead. 'I am heir to a peerage and could take my rank to-morrow, if I chose,' were his words."
"And that's all the evidence you have?"
"All the evidence I have, Ivar."
"Marville was boasting, beyond a doubt. Does that fellow," he continued, glancing at Idris' distant figure, "know of his father's claim to a peerage?"
"He has not the least inkling of it."
"You'll act wisely by keeping the notion out of his pate."
"Why so?"
"It's one thing to claim a peerage, but quite another thing to prove one's claim. Why fill the fellow with false hopes? Be guided by me, and refrain from telling him of his father's pretensions."
"Very well, Ivar," responded Lorelie, quietly, "I will be guided by you. As your wife it is my duty to do nothing to the detriment of your future interests."