cheer over trouble, that he met Clara and Mrs. Stanley with a smile and
a bit of small talk.

"Ladies, can you keep house?" he said. "There are sixteen rooms ready for
you. The people who moved out haven't left any trumpery. Nothing wanted
but a little sweeping and dusting and a stair carpet."

"We will keep house," replied Clara with a laugh, the girlish gayety of
which delighted him.

Assuming a woman's rightful empire over household matters, she began to
direct concerning storage, lodgment, cooking, etc. Sharp as the climbing
was, she went through all the stories and inspected every room, selecting
the chamber in the tower for herself and Mrs. Stanley.

"I never can get up in this world," declared Aunt Maria, staring in dismay
at the rude ladder. "So this is what Mr. Thurstane meant by talking about
a stair carpet! It was just like him to joke on such a matter. I tell you
I never can go up."

"Av coorse ye can get up," broke in little Sweeny impatiently. "All ye've
got to do is to put wan fut above another an' howld on wid yer ten
fingers."

"I should like to see _you_ do it," returned Aunt Maria, looking
indignantly at the interfering Paddy.

Sweeny immediately shinned up the stepped beam, uttered a neigh of
triumphant laughter from the top, and then skylarked down again.

"Well, _you_ are a man," observed the strong-minded lady, somewhat
discomfited. "Av coorse I'm a man," yelped Sweeny. "Who said I wasn't?
He's a lying informer. Ha ha, hoo hoo, ho ho!"

Thus incited, pulled at moreover from above and boosted from below, Aunt
Maria mounted ladder after ladder until she stood on the roof of the Casa
Grande.

"If I ever go down again, I shall have to drop," she gasped. "I never
expected when I came on this journey to be a sailor and climb maintops."

"Lieutenant Thurstane is waving his hand to us," said Clara, with a smile
like sunlight.

"Let him wave," returned Mrs. Stanley, weary, disconsolate, and out of
patience with everything. "I must say it's a poor place to be waving
hands."

Meantime Thurstane had beckoned a couple of muleteers to follow him, and
set off to beat the enclosure for a spring, or for a spot where it would
be possible to sink a well with good result. Although the search seemed
absurd on such an isolated hill, he had some hopes; for in the first
place, the old inhabitants must have had a large supply of water, and they
could not have brought it up a steep slope of two hundred feet