though their fragrance had been wafted full in his
face by a breeze, and yet there was no breeze, nor were there any roses
close at hand; the season of roses had passed.

No man could have resisted for long the fascinations of a woman like
Blanch Lennox if she chose to make love to him. It was the sound of
those wings and the fragrance of the roses that upheld Captain Forest's
resolution; especially the fragrance of the roses. Whence it came or how
it originated, who could say? For it came and passed like a mere breath.
Perhaps the invisible angel who, it is said, presides over the destiny
of the individual, caused it; for with it flashed the vision of Chiquita
before his eyes as he had seen her on that day in the garden among the
roses and had silently watched her from the back of his horse and
breathed deep drafts of the flowery fragrance. The same subtle,
invisible something that has changed the destiny of individuals and of
nations through all the ages, caused him to remember, recalled him to
himself. The manhood surged up within him, asserting its supremacy, and
he drew himself up with a sudden impulse. She noted the change, and in a
fierce, passionate voice, almost of terror, cried: "Jack, you are mine,
you have always been mine! I will not give you up--I claim my own!" and
she flung her arms passionately about his neck in an endeavor to draw
his lips down to her own.

"I can't--I can't do it, Blanch!" he said, and shook himself free. With
a cry, terrible in its intensity and despair, she sank across the
table.

XXVIII

Pale and trembling and humiliated, Blanch pulled herself together with
an effort and stood for some time as one dazed where the Captain had
left her. Then, she remembered, she had smiled and bowed absently to the
men and women in the _patio_ on the way back to her room, where she
flung herself down upon the couch in a frenzy, burying her face in the
cushions; her frame shaking with passionate, convulsive sobs as she
writhed in paroxysms of untold grief and pain.

He had refused her, dared to refuse her--her! She had failed! Was this,
then, the end, the reward for righteous ambition, conscientious
endeavor? For years she had worked and schemed for the realization of
her ideal, and this was the end. How proud she always had been of him,
and how perfectly her beauty and brilliancy would have crowned his
career--their lives! And now, when ambition's goal was attained, that
rare cup of ea