He
was clad in white of no remembered fashion, with the green gem
burning on his breast, but his manner was that of one perfectly
tailored and about the most cosmopolitan offices of modernity. One
might have told him one's most subtly humourous story and rested
certain of his smile.
"I wonder," he asked with engaging hesitation when he was seated,
"whether I may have a--cigarette? That is the name? Yes, a
cigarette. Tobacco is unknown in Yaque. We have invented no colonies
useful for the luxury. How can it be--forgive me--that your people,
who seem remote from poetry, should be the devisers and popularizers
of this so poetic pastime? To breathe in the green of earth and the
light of the dead sun! The poetry of your American smoke delights
me."
St. George smiled as he offered the prince his case.
"In America," he said, "we devised it as a vice, your Highness. We
are obliged to do the same with poetry, if we popularize it."
And St. George was thinking:
"Miss Holland. He has seen Miss Holland--perhaps yesterday.
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