"Who is Pauline?" he asked.
"She was a skater from the Winter Palace in Berlin. She is beautiful or she would not be at Castle Radna; she is clever or she could not control Count Michæl who has broken many women's hearts. She is bad or she would not have driven the countess from her home. For myself I hate her and the men and women with whom she fills the place."
"So they keep a lot of company up there?"
"Company!" Hentzi replied, "there is no such castle in Europe. I have seen life in Buda and Vienna but up there! You may be sure when the master drinks champagne the servants will drink shlivovitza. But do not think they are all Pauline's friends. No. No. The great of the world come there too and Pauline's friends are banished. You will drive great personages up from Fiume and you will not know who they are or what their errand."
"Is the count a politician?"
Hentzi laughed with good natured contempt at such a naïve query. Not to know Michæl, Count Temesvar's reputation in the field of world politics was to admit ignorance of all the troubled currents which worried kings and presidents.
He was rudely brought back from his lofty attitude by the sudden stopping of the car. He was almost thrown from his seat.
"Look!" Trent cried, pointing to a piece of close cropped turf, "a golf green as I live."
"What of it?" Hentzi snapped, "what do you know of golf?"