he other side."
Angela shuddered. She could hardly bear even to hear this proposal from
the codfish, for a pilgrimage to the Missions of California had been a
dream of Franklin Merriam's. He and she were to have followed the
footsteps of the Franciscan Fathers, stage by stage; and if a Mission here
or there were falling into ruin, Merriam had talked of offering to restore
it at his own expense. Now the money had gone to restore the Palazzo di
Sereno, and to buy motors and aeroplanes and ladies' favours for the
Prince of that name. Yet some day Angela meant to make the pilgrimage,
when she had built her house and given herself a starting-point.
"I've other things to do," she replied coldly. "I shall see only the
Missions I may happen to pass on this tour."
"Well, some folks'd ruther save this trip for a weddin' journey," Sealman
suggested. "I suppose widows have weddin' trips, don't they?" He gazed
thoughtfully at the gray coat and gray-veiled motor hat which Angela wore
to protect her from the dust. She sat in front beside the chauffeur for
the motion of the car was less there, but she decided that, if she were
ever hypnotized into associating with the Model again, she would take the
back seat.
"The Missions for mine," he went on, when his passenger made no reply.
"There's some prefers the Yosemite, but there's no motorin' there. And if
I was a girl I wouldn't feel married without a motor. In the Yosemite
there's; so much honeymoonin', the minute you see a lady with a man you
put 'em down for bride and groom."
Angela had cause to remember this remark later.
"Speakin' of honeymoons, looks as if there'd been some around here," the
codfish continued chattily.
They were running about through the suburbs of Los Angeles, and if
Sealman's passenger had deigned to answer she would have been compelled
to agree. It was ideal honeymoon-land; a moving picture, painted in
colours, seemingly by rival artists of different nations, for the mingling
of effects was mysterious as the scenery of dreams.
Just as Angela told herself that it was like Holland in the jewel-box
neatness of little streets and little houses--behold the Riviera, with
groups of palms among tropical flowers, and feathery pepper-trees,
graceful and large as giant willows! Then, when she had decided on Italy
or Southern France as a simile, far-off, sharp mountain peaks, a dark,
grotesquely branching pine in filmy distance, and a doll's house with a
red
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