As he coolly studied the good looks of the young
caballeros and the plain intellectual face and slight
little figure of the Bostonian, noted the utter in-
difference with which they were treated by the
Favorita of Presidio and Mission, he felt a sudden
rush of arrogance, a youthful tingling of nerves,
the same prophetic sense of imminent happiness and
power that his first contact with the light electrical
air and the beauty of the country had induced.
After all, he was but forty-two. Life on the whole
had been very kind to him. And, although he did
not realize it as yet, his frame, blighted by the rigors
of the past three years, was already sensible to a
renewal of juice and sap. He admitted that he was
more interested than he had been for many years,
and that if he was not in love, he tingled with a
very natural masculine desire for an adventure with
a pretty girl.

But he was by no means a weak man, and his
mind counted the cost even while his imagination
hummed. He had almost decided to bid Dona
Ignacia an abrupt good-night, pleading fatigue,
which his pallor indorsed, when the door of the din-
ing-room was thrown open to the liveliest of
fiddling, and a white hand with a singular sugges-
tion of tenacity both in appearance and clasp took
possession of his arm.

"My mother has gone to Gertrudis Rudisinda,