"There," he said, rising, and encountering her glance. As she did not
speak, he continued: "You are thinking, Miss Saltonstall, that you have
seen me before, are you not? Well--you HAVE; I asked you the road to
San Jose one morning when I was tramping by your hedge."

"And as you probably were looking for something better--which you seem
to have found--you didn't care to listen to MY directions," said
Maruja, quickly.

"I found a man--almost the only one who ever offered me a gratuitous
kindness--at whose grave I afterwards met you. I found another man who
befriended me here--where I meet you again."

She was beginning to be hysterically nervous lest any one should return
and find them together. She was conscious of a tingling of vague
shame. Yet she lingered. The strange fascination of his half-savage
melancholy, and a reproachfulness that seemed to arraign her, with the
rest of the world, at the bar of his vague resentment, held the
delicate fibres of her sensitive being as cruelly and relentlessly as
the thorns of the cactus had gripped her silken lace. Without knowing
what she was saying, she stammered that she "was glad he connected her
with his better fortune," and began to move away. He noticed it with
his sidelong lids, and added, with a slight bitterness:--

"I don't think I should have intruded here again, but I thought you had
gone. But I--I--am afraid you have not seen the last of me. It was the
intention of my employer, Mr. Prince, to introduce me to you and your
mother. I suppose he considers it part of my duties here. I must warn
you that, if you are here when he returns, he will insist upon it, and
upon your meeting me with these ladies at dinner."

"Perhaps so--he is my mother's friend," said Maruja; "but you have the
advantage of us--you can always take to the road, you know."

The smile with which she had intended to accompany this speech did not
come as readily in execution as it had in conception, and she would
have given worlds to have recalled her words. But he said, "That's
so," quietly, and turned away, as if to give her an opportunity to
escape. She moved hesitatingly towards the passage and stopped. The
sound of the returning voices gave her a sudden courage.

"Mr.--"

"Guest," said the young man.

"If we do conclude to stay to dinner as Mr. Prince has said nothing of
introducing you to my sister, you must let ME have that pleasure."

He lifted his eyes to hers with