That evening Howard said, “By the way, you remember an inquiry from Mowlem & Son, New York? The man who made it was in the village today. I saw him, soon after Miss Marten and you strolled on to the beach.”
Power described the stranger, and Howard identified him; but the matter was dismissed as a trivial coincidence. Indeed, Power had affairs of moment to occupy him. Dacre, it appeared, was primed with facts concerning the Principe del Montecastello.
“His people are the famous Lombardy bankers,” he said. “I have an idea, based on ethnological theories, that they belonged originally to one of the ten tribes; but they were ennobled during the seventeenth century, and remained highly orthodox Blacks till the present king came to the throne, when they ’verted to the Whites.[*] I believe that this change came about owing to their association with Marten in an Italian loan. Anyhow, the existing scion of the princely house is rather a bad hat. Why are you interested in him?”
[*] The Papal and Constitutional parties in Italy are often differentiated thus briefly.
“He is a suitor for the hand of a young lady whose welfare I have at heart.”
“Not Nancy?”
“Yes.”
“The devil he is!” and Dacre expressed his sentiments freely. “Why, I’d prefer she married our local road-mender; because then, at least, she would have a decent, clean-minded husband. Marten must be losing grip. Confound it! Why doesn’t he go to Paris or Naples, and find out this fellow’s antecedents? I feel it’s absurd to doubt you, but can you really trust your informant?”
“I have it from Nancy’s own lips.”
“Oh, dash it all! Can nothing be done to stop it?”