eamy complexion, yet not without colour of a rose
tint; dimples in the cheeks, which were ravishing when she smiled,--and
she was very fond of smiling, ay, and laughing too, and showing the
most perfect set of white teeth,--black hair, and very dark blue eyes;
and there you have her. United to this beauty of person was a most
fascinating natural manner; not the manner of a flirt, but that of a
light-hearted, pure-minded girl, as gay as a lark released from
captivity, and not unlike it in its new freedom, for she had not
escaped from a first-rate finishing school in Paris more than six
months.

She had spent the intervening period under the care of a sister of her
father who had married an Englishman and who lived in good society.

She had had a season in London and had spent the autumn in a round of
country visits which accounted for her wonderful _savoir faire_; she
was only eighteen. Now she was going home to her dear father, a
widower, under the care of her aunt. Hearing her always referred to in
conversation as "Dolores," her surname was a revelation when I heard it
properly pronounced. St. Nivel's idea of foreign names was exceedingly
hazy and misleading. As soon as she told me she was going home to
Aquazilia, I became very alert and began to ask her questions.

"Yes," she replied to my query concerning her parent's name, "my father
is the Senor Don Juan d'Alta; in the old time of our monarchy he was
for many years the Prime Minister. He is a very old man is my father,"
she further explained; "he is nearly seventy!"

Looking at her I could understand the old man simply making an idol of
this his only child. It appeared to me very marvellous that I should
have met her.

Some of the other passengers told me that he was a member of one of the
oldest and most aristocratic families in the country.

It was very lovely as we steamed farther and farther away from our own
cold fogs and got into the warmth of the south; very fascinating to
walk on deck with Dolores and talk, under the brilliant stars, of
Aquazilia and the extraordinary chance which had made us meet on board
both with the same destination in view--the house of her father.

"I don't think, though, it is so strange," she confided to me one
lovely moonlight night when we were walking the promenade deck side by
side; "it is not an unreasonable thing that we should have taken the
same boat, considering that they only run once a fortnight."

"It is