tiness.

"So I perceive. But he's a human being none the less," said she.

That answer, and its implied rebuke, took him by surprise.

"Your uncle, the Colonel, is of a different opinion," said he, when he
had recovered. "He regards them as vermin to be left to languish and die
of their festering wounds."

She caught the irony now more plainly in his voice. She continued to
stare at him.

"Why do you tell me this?"

"To warn you that you may be incurring the Colonel's displeasure. If
he had had his way, I should never have been allowed to dress their
wounds."

"And you thought, of course, that I must be of my uncle's mind?" There
was a crispness about her voice, an ominous challenging sparkle in her
hazel eyes.

"I'd not willingly be rude to a lady even in my thoughts," said he. "But
that you should bestow gifts on them, considering that if your uncle
came to hear of it...." He paused, leaving the sentence unfinished. "Ah,
well--there it is!" he concluded.

But the lady was not satisfied at all.

"First you impute to me inhumanity, and then cowardice. Faith! For a
man who would not willingly be rude to a lady even in his thoughts, it's
none so bad." Her boyish laugh trilled out, but the note of it jarred
his ears this time.

He saw her now, it seemed to him, for the first time, and saw how he had
misjudged her.

"Sure, now, how was I to guess that... that Colonel Bishop could have
an angel for his niece?" said he recklessly, for he was reckless as men
often are in sudden penitence.

"You wouldn't, of course. I shouldn't think you often guess aright."
Having withered him with that and her glance, she turned to her negro
and the basket that he carried. From this she lifted now the fruits and
delicacies with which it was laden, and piled them in such heaps upon
the beds of the six Spaniards that by the time she had so served the
last of them her basket was empty, and there was nothing left for her
own fellow-countrymen. These, indeed, stood in no need of her bounty--as
she no doubt observed--since they were being plentifully supplied by
others.

Having thus emptied her basket, she called her negro, and without
another word or so much as another glance at Peter Blood, swept out of
the place with her head high and chin thrust forward.

Peter watched her departure. Then he fetched a sigh.

It startled him to discover that the thought that he had incurred her
anger gave him concern. It could not have been