en he opened to her the glories of Guatemala,
not contenting himself with describing the certainty of the 20 per
cent., but enlarging on the luxurious happiness of life in a country
so golden, so green, so gorgeous, and so grand. It had been the
very apple of the eye of the old Spaniards. In Guatemala, he said,
Cortez and Pizarro had met and embraced. They might have done so for
anything Lizzie Eustace knew to the contrary. And here our hero took
advantage of his name. Don Diego di Lopez had been the first to raise
the banner of freedom in Guatemala when the kings of Spain became
tyrants to their American subjects. All is fair in love and war, and
Lizzie amidst the hard business of her life still loved a dash of
romance. Yes, he was about to change the scene and try his fortune in
that golden, green, and gorgeous country. "You will take your wife of
course," Lady Eustace had said. Then Lopez had smiled, and shrugging
his shoulders had left the room.

It was certainly the fact that she could not eat him. Other men
before Lopez have had to pick up what courage they could in their
attacks upon women by remembering that fact. She had flirted with him
in a very pleasant way, mixing up her prettiness and her percentages
in a manner that was peculiar to herself. He did not know her, and he
knew that he did not know her;--but still there was the chance. She
had thrown his wife more than once in his face, after the fashion of
women when they are wooed by married men since the days of Cleopatra
downwards. But he had taken that simply as encouragement. He had
already let her know that his wife was a vixen who troubled his life.
Lizzie had given him her sympathy, and had almost given him a tear.
"But I am not a man to be broken-hearted because I have made a
mistake," said Lopez. "Marriage vows are very well, but they shall
never bind me to misery." "Marriage vows are not very well. They may
be very ill," Lizzie had replied, remembering certain passages in her
own life.

There was no doubt about her money, and certainly she could not eat
him. The fortnight allowed him by the San Juan Company had nearly
gone by when he called at the little house in the little street,
resolved to push his fortune in that direction without fear and
without hesitation. Mrs. Leslie again took her departure, leaving
them together, and Lizzie allowed her friend to go, although the last
words that Lopez had spoken had been, as he thought, a fair prelude