which, if he were to live in comfort, it was necessary he should
sell, he could find no purchaser; and, moreover, having quarrelled
with his father-in-law, he had cut off his former supply of money.
The need of it pinched him cruelly.

The advertised cause of this quarrel was sufficiently characteristic
to be the real one. Moved by the attack of Great Britain upon his
principality, Harden-Hickey decided upon reprisals. It must be
remembered that always he was more Irish than French. On paper
he organized an invasion of England from Ireland, the home of his
ancestors. It was because Flagler refused to give him money for
this adventure that he broke with him. His friends say this was the
real reason of the quarrel, which was a quarrel on the side of
Harden-Hickey alone.

And there were other, more intimate troubles. While not separated
from his wife, he now was seldom in her company. When the
Baroness was in Paris, Harden-Hickey was in San Francisco; when
she returned to San Francisco, he was in Mexico. The fault seems
to have been his. He was greatly admired by pretty women. His
daughter by his first wife, now a very beautiful girl of sixteen,
spent much time with her stepmother; and when not on his father's
ranch in Mexico, his son also, for months together, was at her side.
The husband approved of this, but he himself saw his wife
infrequently. Nevertheless, early in the spring of 1898, the
Baroness leased a house in Brockton Square, in Riverside, Cal.,
where it was understood by herself and by her friends her husband
would join her. At that time in Mexico he was trying to dispose of
a large tract of land. Had he been able to sell it, the money for a
time would have kept one even of his extravagances contentedly