is manner he has survived an abdication, two dictatorships, and a
restoration with undiminished credit, chiefly by holding his province
easily and asking from Madrid neither reinforcements of soldiers nor of
money.

His wife is not receiving to-day, but in English fashion there are a few
friends who drop in for dinner, _habitues_ of the house, beloved
comrades of Don Rollo's with whom (for the Senora is the old Concha
still) his wife flirts a little, chats a great deal, and gives the best
advice in return for boundless admiration and delight in her beauty and
wit.

"Dolores," she says to a friend who has arrived and sits patiently
folding her little hands on a sofa, "it was pretty of you to come in
such a lovely gown--just to please those poor old bachelors. Here,
Etienne, hold the baby, and be sure not to drop him, sir. There--what
did I tell you? You have made him cry! Monster! Well, he shall be sent
away, sweetest pet, that he shall! He is a buffalo of the _marisma_, a
tiger of the jungle, an ogre out of a story book--that he is, sweetest!
There, La Giralda, take the darling away! Oh, and give him--but stay--I
too will come, else the little villain may howl till midnight."

She continues to talk quickly as she goes toward the door.

"What a voice--just like his father's when he is in the place of arms
and the men do not please him! There--sweetest" (she goes behind the
curtain), "there----!"

And, contented, the young man stills that parade voice of his into
gentle murmurings like those of a bee within the bell of a flower.

Presently a tall young man comes striding in, in a plain uniform with
the starred shoulder-straps of the highest rank. Behind him is a
broad-chested, deep-bearded veteran, his chest blazing with decorations.

The younger man, whose hair gives promise of early threads of grey,
enters with swift impetuosity, dashing a chance servitor out of the way
and opening the inner door as if a gust of wind had come rioting through
the corridors.

"Where is Concha?" he cries as soon as he enters.

"Here!" replies a voice, a little muffled, it is true, from a
neighbouring room; "no, stay where you are! I shall be back in a
moment."

"Ah, Etienne--John, how are you? Have they given you any breakfast?
Etienne, any more loves? There are four pretty girls in the Plaza
Villarasa. I saw them on the balcony as I rode through with the Sagunto
regiment the other day----"

"Trust him for that!" comes the vo