I don't know who you are. I only suppose--but no doubt
correctly--that you are the gentleman whose title is on the doorplate."
"Right, quite right--sit down, pray sit down." The earl was rattled,
thrown off his bearings, his head was in a whirl. Then he noticed
Hawkins standing apart and staring idiotically at what to him was the
apparition of a defunct man, and a new idea was born to him. He said to
Tracy briskly:
"But a thousand pardons, dear sir, I am forgetting courtesies due to a
guest and stranger. Let me introduce my friend General Hawkins--General
Hawkins, our new Senator--Senator from the latest and grandest addition to
the radiant galaxy of sovereign States, Cherokee Strip"--(to himself,
"that name will shrivel him up!"--but it didn't, in the least, and the
Colonel resumed the introduction piteously disheartened and amazed),--
"Senator Hawkins, Mr. Howard Tracy, of--er--"
"England."
"England!--Why that's im--"
"England, yes, native of England."
"Recently from there?"
"Yes, quite recently."
Said the Colonel to himself, "This phantom lies like an expert.
Purifying this kind by fire don't work. I'll sound him a little further,
give him another chance or two to work his gift.
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