"Constance," said Alice, turning with a little shrug to her friend, "we have been caught! Our story is being spoiled for us. Please go on, Mr. Raynor. Just what does the American State Department have to say about us?"
"That you are endowed with a very unusual personality," continued Raynor, his eyes twinkling. "You are not at all content to remain in that station of life to which you were born; you like playing at being all sorts of other persons. Once, so your friend the ambassador confided to me, you ran away and followed a band of gypsies, which must have been when you were a very little girl."
"I was seven," said Alice, "and the gypsies were nice to me."
"And then you showed talent for the stage——"
"A dreadful revelation!" she exclaimed.
"But you don't know that it was really your father who managed to have Mrs. Farnsworth, one of the most distinguished actresses in England, take charge of you."
"No! Alice never knew that!" said Mrs. Farnsworth, laughing. "I was her chaperon as well as her preceptress; but Alice's father knew that if Alice found it out it would spoil the adventure for her. Alice must do things in her own way."
"You are a fraud," said Alice, "but I always suspected you a little."
"Speaking of the stage," resumed Raynor, "it is also a part of my instructions that the Honorable Miss Seabring shall be discouraged from any further adventures in that direction; she's far too talented; there's danger of her becoming a great luminary. In other words, she is not to grace the boards again as Violet Dewing."
Alice's brow clouded, and she turned to me. "That was settled when you mailed that letter for me. It was to make an appointment with an American playwright who wants me to appear in a most adorable comedy."