grunted. His Spanish pride had not abated an inch. He
resented being discussed.

Polk continued: "There were seven or eight men talking over old
times in the Union Club the other night; that is to say, they were
reminiscing over the various enterprises they had been engaged in, and
the piles they had made and lost. Our names naturally came up, and
Brannan said, slowly, as if he were thinking it over hard,
'I--don't--think--I--had--any--dealings--with--Yorba--ever.' Whereupon
Washington replied, quick as a shot, 'You'd remember it if you had.'"

Don Roberto scowled heavily. It was one of his fictions that he
hoodwinked the world. He never snapped his fingers in its face as Polk
did: exteriorly a Yorba must always be a Yorba.

"Some day when the bank have lend Meester Washington one hundred
thousand dollars, I turn on the screw when he no is prepare to pay," he
said. And he did.

X

During the following week all Menlo, which had moved down before Mrs.
Yorba, called on that august leader. She received every afternoon on the
verandah, clad in black or grey lawn, stiff, silent, but sufficiently
gracious. On the day after her arrival, as the first visitor's carriage
appeared at the bend of the avenue, its advent heralded by the furious
barking of two mastiffs, a bloodhound, and an English carriage dog,
Magdalena gathered up her books and prepared to retreat, but her mother
turned to her peremptorily.

"I wish you to stay," she said. "You must begin now to see something of
society. Otherwise you will have no ease when you come out. And try to
talk. Young people must talk."

"But I can't talk," faltered Magdalena.

"You must learn. Say anything, and in time it will be easy."

Magdalena realised that her mother was right. If she was to overcome her
natural lack of facile speech, she could not begin too soon. Although
she was terrified at the prospect of talking to these people who had
alighted and were exchanging platitudes with her mother, she resolved
anew that the time should come when she should be as ready of tongue and
as graceful of speech as her position and her pride demanded.

She sat down by one of the guests and stammered out something about the
violets. The young woman she addressed was of delicate and excessive
beauty: her brunette face, under a hat covered with corn-coloured
plumes, was almost faultless in its outline. She wore an elaborate and
dainty French gown the shade of her feathers, and