“I am only sorry you should find our little cottage in such disorder,” said Mr. Maddison.  “The contractor for the conservatory undertook to erect it in a week, and my only satisfaction is that he is now paying me a forfeit of 500 dollars a day.  As for the electricians in this country, sir, they are not incompetent men, but they must be taught to hustle if they are to work under American orders; and I don’t quite see how they are to find a job anyways else.”

He turned to the window with a more satisfied air.

“Here, however, you will perceive a tolerably satisfactory piece of work.  I guess those trees will be ready pretty near as soon as the capercailzies are ready for them.”

Count Bunker opened his eyes.

“Do I understand that you are erecting a pine wood?”

“You do.  That fir forest is my daughter’s notion.  She thought ordinary plane-trees looked kind of unsuitable for our mountain home.  The land of Burns and of the ill-fated Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, should have more appropriate foliage than that!  Well, sir, it took four hundred men just three days to remove the last traces of the last root of the last of those plane-trees.”

“And the pines, I suppose, you brought from a neighboring wood?” said the Count, patriotically endeavoring not to look too dumbfoundered.

“No, sir.  Lord Tulliwuddle’s factor was too slow for me—­said he must consult his lordship before removing the timber on the estate.  I cabled to Norway:  the trees arrived yesterday in Aberdeen, and I guess half of them are as near perpendicular by now as a theodolite can make them.  They are being erected, sir, on scientific principles.”

Restraining his emotion with a severe effort, Bunker quietly observed

“Very good idea.  I don’t know that it would have occurred to me to land them at Aberdeen.”

From the corner of his eye he saw that his composure had produced a distinct impression, but he found it hard to retain it through the Silver King’s next statement.

“You have taken a long lease of Lincoln Lodge, I presume?” he inquired.

“One year,” said Mr. Maddison.  “But I reckon to be comfortable if I’m spending twenty minutes at a railroad junction.”

“Ah!” responded the Count, “in that case shifting a forest must be child’s-play.”

The millionaire smiled affably at this pleasantry and invited his guest to be seated.

“You will try something American, I hope, Count Bunker?” he asked, touching the bell.

Count Bunker, rightly conceiving this to indicate a cock-tail, replied that he would, and in as nearly seven and a half seconds as he could calculate, a tray appeared with two of these remarkable compounds.  Following his host’s example, the Count threw his down at a gulp.

“The same,” said Mr. Maddison simply.  And in an almost equally brief space the same arrived.