The Man from Home. Booth Tarkington

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      [lifting her hand gayly as she enters, and striking a little attitude before she descends the steps]

      Me voici!

      HAWCASTLE

      [half rising and bowing]

      My esteemed relative is still asleep?

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [speaking gayly, with a very slight accent, as she crosses to a chair at the table]

      I trust your beautiful son has found much better employment—as our hearts would wish him to.

      HAWCASTLE

      He has. He's off on a canter with the little American, thank God!

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [interjecting the word]

      Bravo!

      [She turns the hands of her gloves back and sips coffee, MARIANO serving.]

      HAWCASTLE

      [continuing]

      But I didn't mean Almeric. I meant my august sister-in-law.

      [He reads the paper.]

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [smiling]

      The amiable Lady Victoria Hermione Trevelyan Creech has déjeuner in her apartment. What you find to read?

      HAWCASTLE

      I'm such a duffer at Italian, but [pg 022] apparently the people along the coast are having a scare over an escaped convict—a Russian.

      MARIANO

      [starting slightly, drops a spoon noisily upon a plate on the table]

      Pardon, Milor'!

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [setting down her coffee abruptly]

      A Russian?

      HAWCASTLE

      [translating with difficulty]

      "An escaped Russian bandit has been traced to Castellamare—"

      [Pauses.]

      MARIANO

      [awe-struck]

      Castellamare—not twelve kilometres from here!

      HAWCASTLE

      [continuing]

      "—and a confidential agent"—

      [looking up]

      —secret-service man, I dare say—"has requested his arrest. But the brigand tore himself"—

      [repeating slowly]

      —"tore himself"—What the deuce does that mean?

      MARIANO

      [bowing]

      Pardon, Milor'—if I might—

      HAWCASTLE

      Quite right, Mariano!

      [Handing him the paper.]

      Translate for us.

      MARIANO

      [reading rapidly, but with growing agitation which he tries to conceal]

      "The brigan' tore himself from the hands of the carabiniere and without the doubts he conceal himself in some of those grotto near Sorrento and searchment is being execute'. [pg 023] The agent of the Russian embassy have inform' the bureau that this escaped one is a mos' in-fay-mose robber and danger brigand."

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [quickly]

      What name does the journal say he has?

      MARIANO

      [hurriedly]

      It has not to say. That is all. Will Milor' and Madame la Comtesse excuse me? And may I take the journal? There is one who should see it.

      HAWCASTLE

      [indifferently]

      Very well.

      MARIANO

      Thank you, Milor'!

      [Bows hastily and hurries out up left.]

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [gravely, drawing back from the table.]

      I should like much to know his name.

      HAWCASTLE

      [smiling, and eating composedly]

      You may be sure it isn't Ivanoff.

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [not changing her attitude]

      How can one know it is not

      [pauses and speaks the name very gravely]

      Ivanoff?

      HAWCASTLE

      [laughing]

      He wouldn't be called an infamous brigand.

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [very gravely]

      That, my friend, may be only Italian journalism.

      HAWCASTLE

      Pooh! This means a highwayman—

      [finishes [pg 024] his coffee coolly]

      —not—not an embezzler, Hélène.

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

      [taking a deep breath and sinking back in her chair with a fixed gaze]

      I am glad to believe it, but I care for no more to eat. I have some foolish feeling of unsafety. It is now two nights that I dream of him—of Ivanoff—bad dreams for us both, my friend.

      HAWCASTLE

      [laughing]

      What rot! It takes more than a dream to bring a man back from Siberia.

      MADAME DE CHAMPIGNY

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