“Where would they be?” asked the lawyer, balancing his pen across his forefinger.

Mr. Twist looked at him very straight.  Vividly he remembered his mother’s peculiar horror when he told her the girls he was throwing away his home life for and breaking her heart over were Germans.  It had acted upon her like the last straw.  And since then he had felt everywhere, with every one he talked to, in every newspaper he read, the same strong hostility to Germans, so much stronger than when he left America the year before.

Mr. Twist began to perceive that he had been impetuous in this matter of the guardianship.  He hadn’t considered it enough.  He suddenly saw innumerable difficulties for the twins and for The Open Arms if it was known it was run by Germans.  Better abandon the guardianship idea than that such difficulties should arise.  He hadn’t thought; he hadn’t had time properly to think; he had been so hustled and busy the last few days....

“They come from England,” he said, looking at the lawyer very straight.

“Ah,” said the lawyer.

Mr. Twist wasn’t going to lie about the twins, but merely, by evading, he hoped to put off the day when their nationality would be known.  Perhaps it never would be known; or if known, known later on when everybody, as everybody must who knew them, loved them for themselves and accordingly wouldn’t care.

“Quite so,” said the lawyer again, nodding.  “I asked because I overheard them talking the other day as they passed through the hall of your hotel.  They were talking about a canary.  The r in the word seemed a little rough.  Not quite English, Mr. Twist?  Not quite American?”

“Not quite,” agreed Mr. Twist.  “They’ve been a good deal abroad.”

“Quite so.  At school, no doubt.”

He was silent a moment, intelligently balancing his pen on his forefinger.

“Then these particulars,” he went on, looking up at Mr. Twist,—­“could you let me have them soon?  I tell you what.  You’re in a hurry to fix this.  I’ll call round to-night at the hotel, and get them direct from your young friends.  Save time.  And make me acquainted with a pair of charming girls.”

“No,” said Mr. Twist.  He got on to his feet and held out his hand.  “Not to-night.  We’re engaged to-night.  To-morrow will be soon enough.  I’ll send round.  I’ll let you know.  I believe I’m going to think it over a bit.  There isn’t any such terrible hurry, anyhow.”

“There isn’t?  I understood—­”

“I mean, a day or two more or less don’t figure out at much in the long run.”

“Quite so, quite so,” said the lawyer, getting up too.  “Well, I’m always at your service, at any time.”  And he shook hands heartily with Mr. Twist and politely opened the door for him.

Then he went back to his writing-table more convinced than ever that there was something very weak somewhere about the entourage.