sent on by train to San Francisco.

Nick enjoyed hearing Angela exclaim, "This is like Algeciras!" "That's
like the Italian Riviera!" as the car ran on. It seemed wonderful that she
should have seen all the most beautiful places in Europe, that she should
hold their pictures in her mind now, comparing them with these new ones,
yet that her heart should be in the New World--_his_ world.

Near Santa Barbara the mountains came crowding down to the sea, as at
Mentone; and on the horizon floated islands, mysterious as the mirage of
Corsica seen from the Italian shore at sunrise. Over there, Nick told her,
was a grotto, painted in many lovely colours; and boats dived into it on
the crest of a wave. He had not heard of the Blue Grotto at Capri, but she
described it; and so they went on, each with something to tell that the
other did not know.

Two new battleships were trying their speed in the channel between Santa
Barbara and the islands, and as the car turned into the park of the hotel
the rivals raced into sight. Angela's eyes were dazzled with the brilliant
sunshine, the blue of the sea, and the flaming colour of the geranium
borders that burned like running fire the length of the mile-long drive.
The veranda was crowded with people, but thinking only of the great ships
in the bay she was conscious of seeing no one until a voice exclaimed,
"Why, Princess, what a surprise to meet you here!"

It was a voice she knew, and if she could have stepped back into the car,
pulled her motor-veil over her eyes, and asked Nick Hilliard to drive
away, she would have been glad. But one does not do these things. One
faces emergencies, and makes the best of them. Angela had been foolish,
she told herself, not to think of running across somebody she knew. If she