He tossed his cloak over the saddle and walked toward the inn.  The size of the place and the great number of people going and coming surprised him, but in the numbers he saw his own security, and he walked boldly up the steps of the main hotel entrance.  He stepped into the long corridor of the inn, where many people lounged about, and heard with keen satisfaction and relief the click of a telegraph instrument that seemed at once to bring him into contact with the remote world.  He filed his telegrams and walked the length of the broad hall, his riding-crop under his arm.  The gay banter and laughter of a group of young men and women just returned from a drive gave him a touch of heartache, for there was a girl somewhere in the valley whom he had followed across the sea, and these people were of her own world—­they undoubtedly knew her; very likely she came often to this huge caravansary and mingled with them.

At the entrance he passed Baron von Marhof, who, by reason of the death of his royal chief, had taken a cottage at the Springs to emphasize his abstention from the life of the capital.  The Ambassador lifted his eyes and bowed to Armitage, as he bowed to a great many young men whose names he never remembered; but, oddly enough, the Baron paused, stared after Armitage for a moment, then shook his head and walked on with knit brows.  Armitage had lifted his hat and passed out, tapping his leg with his crop.

He walked toward the private houses that lay scattered over the valley and along the gradual slope of the hills as though carelessly flung from a dice box.  Many of the places were handsome estates, with imposing houses set amid beautiful gardens.  Half a mile from the hotel he stopped a passing negro to ask who owned a large house that stood well back from the road.  The man answered; he seemed anxious to impart further information, and Armitage availed himself of the opportunity.

“How near is Judge Claiborne’s place?” he asked.

The man pointed.  It was the next house, on the right-hand side; and Armitage smiled to himself and strolled on.

He looked down in a moment upon a pretty estate, distinguished by its formal garden, but with the broad acres of a practical farm stretching far out into the valley.  The lawn terraces were green, broken only by plots of spring flowers; the walks were walled in box and privet; the house, of the pillared colonial type, crowned a series of terraces.  A long pergola, with pillars topped by red urns, curved gradually through the garden toward the mansion.  Armitage followed a side road along the brick partition wall and contemplated the inner landscape.  The sharp snap of a gardener’s shears far up the slope was the only sound that reached him.  It was a charming place, and he yielded to a temptation to explore it.  He dropped over the wall and strolled away through the garden, the smell of warm earth, moist from the day’s light showers, and the faint odor of green things growing, sweet in his nostrils.  He walked to the far end of the pergola, sat down on a wooden bench, and gave himself up to reverie.  He had been denounced as an impostor; he was on Claiborne soil; and the situation required thought.