Mrs. Carew seated herself beside her dearest Katrina, and Dr. Kirby bore
them company; the Rev. Mr. Moore and Mrs. Thorne gave their attention to
Mrs. Harold. Evert Winthrop took a seat which had the air of being near
enough to the first group for conversational purposes, but which was in
reality a little apart. Garda and Manuel were on the opposite side of
the room, with Torres standing near them; Manuel was talking, but Garda
gave him a divided attention, she was looking at Evert Winthrop. At
length she rose and went across to his chair.

"Did you have a pleasant ride to-day?" she asked, standing with the
simplicity of a child before him, her hands clasped and hanging.

"Yes; I went down the King's Road," he answered, rising. "I like a
'King's Road;' we have no King's Roads at the North."

"Why not?" said Garda.

"We abolished kings more completely than you did perhaps; in 1776."

"What happened then? Something at the North?"

"Oh, a small matter, quite unimportant; it didn't include
Gracias-a-Dios."

"It might have, I don't pretend to know the history of Gracias-a-Dios,"
replied Garda, rather loftily; "all I know is the history of my own
family. In 1776 my grandmother Beatriz was five years old, and even
then, they say, water could run under her insteps."

"Why did they keep the poor child in such wet places? It must have been
very unhealthy. Won't you have this chair?"

"I'm so tired of chairs."

"Have you been asleep in the hammock all the afternoon?"

"Yes," she confessed. "But I hope I don't show it so plainly? It isn't
polite to look sleepy at a party."

"Let us walk up and down for a while: that will waken you," he said,
offering his arm.

"Do people walk up and down when the party is such a small one? Is that
a northern custom?"

"I am a northerner certainly; and it's my custom," he answered. As they
entered the back drawing-room, "I did not mean that you looked sleepy,"
he added, "but the contrary; the walking will be of use as a sedative."

"You need not be afraid, I shall not do anything out of the way; don't
you see that I have on white gloves?" And she extended her hands for his
inspection. "They are not mine, as you may well imagine, I never had a
pair of white gloves in my life; they are mamma's, and ever so many
years old, she wore them when she was married."

"I wish I could have seen her; she must have looked like a little
blossom of the May."

"Yes," answered Garda, "I am sur