repeat imperfectly--"what a beautiful name!"

"Dthen Blanca vill call me 'Guillermo.' I like not 'de Baron de Bach'
from her lips. Besides ve use not titles in Peru."

Mrs. Steele and Senor Noma call us from the corner of the Plaza as we
approach.

"We've been round four times hunting for you; where in the world have
you been?" says Mrs. Steele, looking disapproving and a little out of
breath.

"Walking about here looking for you! I couldn't imagine where you
were," I say.

The others come up and we turn our faces towards the harbour. The
dusky oarsmen are waiting for us, and we are soon skimming over the
dark water--I with my hoard of flowers in my lap and my eyes fixed on
the great dim hulk of the _San Miguel_ anchored out in the bay.

CHAPTER III

[Illustration: Chapter Three]

I AM LECTURED

"Blanche," says Mrs. Steele the next morning as she brushes out the
lovely waves of prematurely grey hair, "what are you going to do about
t h e Baron?"

"Do?" I repeat innocently. "What's the matter with him?"

"Now, Blanche, you said if I would promise not to interfere you would
be frank. I'm not sure I am wise to adhere to my side of the bargain
under any circumstances. I never thought you the kind of a girl to go
on letting a man fall more and more in love knowing all the while you
would never be able to give him more than a passing interest."

"How do you know that? Perhaps I'm disguising all sorts of fierce and
fiery feelings under my cool exterior?"

"No, my dear, you can't impose on an old friend so far as that. You
are a queer girl and not always easy to understand, but you care less
for the Baron de Bach than I do, and you know it. Now, what makes you
act so?" and she arraigns me with uplifted brush.

"Dear Mrs. Steele, I'm a student of human nature in a small way. If I
know anything about our Peruvian friend he will fall out of 'love,' as
you are pleased to call his chronic state of sentiment, as readily as
he fell in, and no bones broke, either. He would have forgotten all
about me before this and gone over to pretty Miss Rogers and the study
of photography except that I've been a bit obdurate--unusually so, he
is naive enough to assure me, and his vanity is piqued."

Mrs. Steele lays down her brush and begins to coil up the long, soft
hair.

"My dear, you are very old for your years. When I was twenty I would
have made a hero out of that man instead of calmly picking out his
foibles--gi