Ching will bring up the peppers
and I will tell Mrs. Steele what you say." I glance back at the
Peruvian. He is sitting by the table just as I left him, his chin in
one hand, while with the other he strokes the wavy moustache and
regards me with lowering looks. "He's a handsome creature," I think,
as I go upstairs; "but he's been told it too often, and he has
abominably mediaeval ideas about women."

All that hot afternoon I sit in the stuffy stateroom with Mrs. Steele.
The wind has veered to the other side and not a breath stirs the
curtains at our little window. About four o'clock the "Church of
England" knocks at the door. She is profuse in proffers of assistance,
and kindly tells me I am looking very badly. "You'd better go out for
a little air," she says; "you'll find my daughter and Baron de Bach
sitting in the breeze on the other side. He has teased Nellie to get
out her guitar; we've had quite a concert. What a charming, bright
companion he is!" she says, appealing to me.

"Very, very!" I assent, with a slight yawn.

"Do go out, Blanche, I don't need you here." Mrs. Steele looks a
little self-reproached.

"No, dear, I know you don't care about my staying," I answer, "but I'm
a little tired of the deck."

The "Church of England" drones on about Nellie, who is "such a child,
only seventeen; so unsophisticated and so unworldly."

"Just imagine, she quite snubs that handsome Peruvian nobleman, and he
is really _delightful_, you know."

We draw a simultaneous sigh of relief when the "Church of England"
leaves us to ourselves.

"Blanche," says Mrs. Steele, "you've been fighting again with the
Baron. Those Rogers people would be only too glad to attach him to
their party. I wouldn't let them do it if I were you. It would be too
much of a feather in their cap to have distracted him from us after
his very palpable devotion and our unusual friendliness."

"No, dear, I won't let our interpreter be wiled away from us. Leave
him to me. He's very exasperating at times, but I'll bear with him in
future; there's no denying it would be comparatively stupid without
him."

Mrs. Steele raises the bandage from her eyes and looks at me.

"It strikes me you are about to experience a change of heart. If it
were almost any other girl, I'd say beware!"

I laugh with confident unconcern.

"Oh, I don't deny I find him more interesting than I did at first. He
enrages me with his imperious self-confidence, and then charms me