"I know it not, pairhaps you can inform. I haf gom, as I say, to-day."
"With pleasure," said the stranger, readily. "In fact, if you are ever disengaged I may possibly be able to act as showman."
"Showman!" roared the Baron, thinking he had discovered a jest. "Ha, ha, ha! Goot, zehr goot!"
The other looked a trifle astonished for an instant, and then as he sipped his champagne an expression of intense satisfaction came over his face.
"I can put away my lantern," he said to himself,--"I have found him."
"May I have the boldness to ask your name, sir?" he asked aloud.
"Ze Baron Rudolph von Blitzenberg," that nobleman replied. "Yours, sare--may I dare?"
"Francis Bunker, at your service, Baron."
"You are noble?" queried the Baron a little anxiously, for his prejudices on this point were strong.
"According to your standard I believe I may say so. That's to say, my family have borne arms for two hundred odd generations; twenty-five per cent of them have died of good living; and the most malicious have never accused us of brains. I myself may not be very typical, but I assure you it isn't my ancestors' fault."
The latter part of this explanation entirely puzzled the Baron. The first statement, though eminently satisfactory, was also a little bewildering.
"Two hondred generations?" he asked, courteously. "Zat is a vary old family. All bore arms you say, Mistair Bonker?"
"All," replied Mr Bunker, gravely. "The first few bore tails as well."
"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the Baron. "You are a fonny man I pairceive, vat you call clown, yes?"
"What my friends call clown, and I call wit," Mr Bunker corrected.
"Vit! Ha, ha, ha!" roared the Baron, whose mind was now in an El Dorado of humour when jokes grew like daisies. His loneliness had disappeared as if by magic; as course succeeded course his contentment showed itself in a perpetually beaming smile: he ceased to worry even about his friend's pedigree, convinced in his mind that manners so delightful and distinguished could only result from repeated quarterings and unoccupied forefathers. Yet by the time dessert arrived and he had again returned to his port, he began to feel an extreme curiosity to know more concerning Mr Bunker. He himself had volunteered a large quantity of miscellaneous information: about Bavaria, its customs and its people, more especially the habits and history of the Blitzenberg family; about himself, his parentage and education; all about his family ghost, his official position as hereditary carpet-beater to the Bavarian Court, and many other things equally entertaining and instructive. Mr Bunker, for his part, had so far confined his confidences to his name.