arms. Never had she looked so beautiful. Her great green eyes
were as radiant as spring. Her lips were redder than blood. A pink flame
burned in her oval cheeks. Her head moved like a Californian lily on its
stalk. No Montereno would ever forget her.

"El Son!" cried the young men, with one accord. Her magnificent beauty
extinguished every other woman in the room. She must not hide her light
in the contradanza. She must madden all eyes at once.

Ysabel bent her head and glided to the middle of the room. The other
women moved back, their white gowns like a snowbank against the garish
walls. The thin sweet music of the instruments rose above the boom of
the tide. Ysabel lifted her dress with curving arms, displaying arched
feet clad in flesh-coloured stockings and white slippers, and danced El
Son.

Her little feet tapped time to the music; she whirled her body with
utmost grace, holding her head so motionless that she could have
balanced a glass of water upon it. She was inspired that night; and
when, in the midst of the dance, De la Vega entered the room, a sort of
madness possessed her. She invented new figures. She glided back and
forth, bending and swaying and doubling until to the eyes of her
bewildered admirers the outlines of her lovely body were gone. Even the
women shouted their approval, and the men went wild. They pulled their
pockets inside out and flung handfuls of gold at her feet. Those who
had only silver cursed their fate, but snatched the watches from their
pockets, the rings from their fingers, and hurled them at her with
shouts and cheers. They tore the lace ruffles from their shirts; they
rushed to the next room and ripped the silver eagles from their hats.
Even Pio Pico flung one of his golden ropes at her feet, a hot blaze in
his old ugly face, as he cried:--

"Brava! brava! thou Star of Monterey!"

Guido Cabanares, desperate at having nothing more to sacrifice to his
idol, sprang upon a chair, and was about to tear down the Mexican flag,
when the music stopped with a crash, as if musicians and instruments had
been overturned, and a figure leaped into the room.

The women uttered a loud cry and crossed themselves. Even the men fell
back. Ysabel's swaying body trembled and became rigid. De la Vega, who
had watched her with folded arms, too entranced to offer her anything
but the love that shook him, turned livid to his throat. A friar, his
hood fallen back from his stubbled head, his brown ha