'woman!' Well, why not?
She's just the kind of thing you want--to fetch wood, draw water, cook
food, and--bear children! And when the children come they'll run about
the hill like savages themselves, and yell and dance and be greedy and
dirty--and you'll presently wonder whether you are a civilised man or a
species of unthinking baboon! You will be living the baboon life,--and
your brain will grow thicker and harder as you grow older,--and your
great scientific discovery will be buried in the thickness and hardness
and never see the light of day! All this, IF she is 'your woman!' It's
a great 'if' of course!--but she's big and handsome, with a beautiful
body and splendid strength, and I never heard of a man who could resist
beauty and strength together. As for ME and my 'vulgar wealth' as you
call it, I'm a little wisp of straw not worth your thought!--or so you
assume--no, good Bear!--not till we come to a tussle--if we ever do!"

She took up her gloves and hand-bag and went downstairs, entering the
broad, airy flower-bordered lounge of the Plaza with a friendly nod and
smile to the book-keeper in the office where she paid her bill. Her
chauffeur, a smart Frenchman in quiet livery, was awaiting her with an
assistant groom or page beside him.

"We go on to-day, Madame?" he enquired.

"Yes,--we go on"--she replied--"as quickly and as far as possible. Just
fetch my valise--it's ready packed in my room."

The groom hurried away to obey this order, and Morgana glancing around
her saw that she was an object of intense curiosity to some of the
hotel inmates who were in the lounge--men and women both. Her grey-blue
eyes flashed over them all carelessly and lighted on Manella who stood
shrinking aside in a corner. To her she beckoned smilingly.

"Come and see me off!" she said--"Take a look at my car and see how
you'd like to travel in it!"

Manella pursed her lips and shook her head.

"I'd rather not!" she murmured--"It's no use looking at what one can
never have!"

Morgana laughed.

"As you please!" she said--"You are an odd girl, but you are quite
beautiful! Don't forget that! Tell the man on the mountain that I said
so!--quite beautiful! Good-bye!"

She passed through the lounge with a swift grace of movement and
entered her sumptuous limousine, lined richly in corded rose silk and
fitted with every imaginable luxury like a queen's boudoir on wheels,
while Manella craned her neck forward to see the last of her.