hilosophically. "Very glad, senor, very
glad."

Gwynne was not in the humor to repulse anybody, and assured her that she
really made him feel that he had returned to his home. Several of her
tribe were in the kitchen and looked expectant. He informed them that he
had a box of New York sweets in his trunk, and retreated.

On the veranda he sat down facing his mountain, which like the rest of
the world was a mass of delicate color, where it was not merely green,
and seemed to move gently under the pink shimmering haze. Beyond was the
blue crouching mass of the old volcano. "The eternal hills" was a phrase
that never occurred to him when he watched these mountains, always
veiled under a colored and moving haze. They looked far more likely to
pull up their feet and walk off. But Gwynne, although the border
beneath his veranda was full of sweet scents, and the roses on the
pillars hung about him, and the air was a soft caressing tide, was no
longer concerned with nature. He was nervous and full of doubt, of
uneasy anticipation that he would not appear to advantage at three
o'clock that afternoon. He knew that if he were really panic-stricken
and attempted to carry it off in the masterful manner, she would laugh
in his face. If he could work himself up to the attitude, well and good.
At the same time he was vaguely conscious that this period of alternate
hope and fear, of cold fits and hot, would one day be sweet in the
retrospect, and regretted with some sadness; an episode in the lover's
progress gone beyond recall.

There was a sound of wheels on the county road, then on his own
property. He wondered at the unusual dispatch of his Carlos, but
realized in a moment that a buggy was approaching, not a wagon. Then
there was a light slouching step on the veranda, and he rose to greet
Tom Colton.

"By Jove, old chap, I'm glad to see you," he began, and thankful that he
had written his condolences; but he paused abruptly. Colton ignored the
outstretched hand.

"So you've got your passport?" he said. And his ingenuous blue eyes were
full of a hard antagonism.

"Yes," said Gwynne. "I should have told you in a day or two. How did you
find out?" he added, curiously. "I took my oath before the passport
clerk in the innermost recess of the State Department."

"There's not much I don't find out. Only, I got wind of this a little
too late. So did some others, or you might have hung round Washington
for the next four years. Do yo