eir little charge. Concha, with a black riding skirt over her
flounces, was now mounted on a handsome pinto mustang glittering with
silver trappings, accompanied by a vaquero in a velvet jacket, Mr.
Hoover bringing up the rear. He, as he informed the master, had
merely come to show the way to the vaquero, who hereafter would always
accompany the child to and from school. Whether or not he had been
induced to this display by the excitement did not transpire. Enough that
the effect was a success. The riding skirt and her mustang's fripperies
had added to Concha's piquancy, and if her origin was still doubted by
some, the child herself was accepted with enthusiasm. The parents who
were spectators were proud of this distinguished accession to their
children's playmates, and when she dismounted amid the acclaim of her
little companions, it was with the aplomb of a queen.

The master alone foresaw trouble in this encouragement of her precocious
manner. He received her quietly, and when she had removed her riding
skirt, glancing at her feet, said approvingly, "I am glad to see you
have changed your slippers; I hope they fit you more firmly than the
others."

The child shrugged her shoulders. "Quien sabe. But Pedro (the vaquero)
will help me now on my horse when he comes for me."

The master understood the characteristic non sequitur as an allusion
to his want of gallantry on the previous day, but took no notice of it.
Nevertheless, he was pleased to see during the day that she was paying
more attention to her studies, although they were generally rehearsed
with the languid indifference to all mental accomplishment which
belonged to her race. Once he thought to stimulate her activity through
her personal vanity.

"Why can you not learn as quickly as Matilda Bromly? She is only two
years older than you," he suggested.

"Ah! Mother of God!--why does she then try to wear roses like me? And
with that hair. It becomes her not."

The master became thus aware for the first time that the elder Bromly
girl, in "the sincerest form of flattery" to her idol, was wearing a
yellow rose in her tawny locks, and, further, that Master Bromly with
exquisite humor had burlesqued his sister's imitation with a very small
carrot stuck above his left ear. This the master promptly removed,
adding an additional sum to the humorist's already overflowing slate by
way of penance, and returned to Concha. "But wouldn't you like to be as
clever as she?