AN ERRANT WOOING
 
 , __ 
 
 jyyi 
 
 I f i if I 
 
 n 
 
 THE TOWEE OF COMARES, ALHAMBRA. 
 
 (See last page.)
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 BY MRS. BURTON HARRISON 
 
 AUTHOR OF "SWEET BELLS OUT OF TUNE," "A BACHELOR MAID," 
 "CROW'S NEST AND BELHAVEN TALES," ETC. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 NEW YORK : THE CENTURY CO. 
 1895
 
 Copyright, 1894, 1895, by 
 THE CENTURY Co.
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 THE TOWER OP COMARES, ALHAMBRA Frontispiece 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 TRAFALGAR SQUARE 4 
 
 PICCADILLY 12 
 
 WESTMINSTER ABBEY, FROM PALACE YARD 20 
 
 AT SHOTTERY 32 
 
 ON THE AVON 40 
 
 A BIT OF RURAL ENGLAND 72 
 
 THE ROCK OF GIBRALTAR 112 
 
 TANGIER, FROM THE KASBAH 120 
 
 A CORNER OF THE SOKO, TANGIER 124 
 
 THE MAIN STREET OF TANGIER 144 
 
 INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE AT CORDOVA 184 
 
 THE CATHEDRAL, SEVILLE 188 
 
 THE TOWER OF GOLD, SEVILLE 196 
 
 THE BANDERILLERO'S CHARGE 208 
 
 THE BULL-RING, SEVILLE 212 
 
 THE ALHAMBRA, FROM THE GENERALIFE 224 
 
 THE GARDENS OF THE ALHAMBRA, GRANADA BELOW 232 
 
 THE GALLERY OF THE COURT OF LIONS, ALHAMBRA 256 
 
 2034542
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING
 
 AN EKKANT WOOING 
 
 NE day of jocund spring in London, 
 the family of Mrs. Arden Standish of 
 "West Thirty-third street, New York, 
 found themselves dolefully groping 
 about their lodgings in Mayfair, in 
 the yellow darkness of a morning fog. 
 Having recently arrived from the Italian lakes, the 
 Standishes had wasted some little time as units of the 
 gilded splendor of the Hotel Metropole before they 
 unwittingly acted upon the injunction laid upon them 
 some months before by Lady Watson-Jones, a baro- 
 net's widow with whom they had achieved friendship 
 at a table d'hote in Rome. 
 
 " In London the big hotels are nasty, and the little 
 ones are dear," this lady had observed, that day in 
 Rome, while pocketing an orange to carry to her 
 room. 
 
 She was a large, red-faced woman of a serious 
 cast of countenance, who habitually wore tailor-made 
 tweeds, with a neck-chain and bracelets of Irish bog- 
 oak, and had no scruple in supplementing her gray- 
 flaxen hair with a frankly brown chignon.
 
 2 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "Take my advice," she added impressively, "go 
 into lodgings somewhere off Piccadilly. Then you 
 won't have to pay for what you don't eat, and it ; s 
 really the only way I know to avoid the Americans." 
 
 " Mother dear, you are so chicken-spirited ! " Pau- 
 lina had let fly, when they regained their sitting-room. 
 " When she said that, you looked almost apologetic. 
 Why in the world did n't you answer back, and have 
 it out with the rude old thing ? " 
 
 " What would have been the use ? I could never 
 have made her understand. And I really think they 
 have an idea they 're complimenting one when they 
 abuse one's countrymen." 
 
 " Oh, I am so tired of being a shining exception ! " 
 Polly then called out. " I hate to be set apart as a 
 person who has escaped contamination by a miracle." 
 
 "If we could only introduce them into our homes!" 
 sighed Mrs. Standish. 
 
 " Oh, mother darling, don't!" Paulina had responded 
 with genuine emotion. 
 
 "There was that earl's daughter, I forget her 
 name; Mrs. M'Cantle brought her," mused Mrs. 
 Standish, retrospectively ; " you remember they came 
 to one of my teas the one when Paderewski played ; 
 she wore an old astrakhan jacket with a white silk 
 muffler. She told me nobody in England will believe 
 how well we know how to do such things until they 
 come to New York and see for themselves." 
 
 "She told you! And you smiled, and did n't re- 
 buke her?" 
 
 " In one's own house, Polly ? " 
 
 "Well, you let her go away and say the same thing,
 
 or worse, to her next entertainer. No, mummy dear ; 
 you have the most angelic temper, and the most 
 optimistic spirit, in the world, or you 7 d see how 
 these dear English of yours lie in wait to be horrid 
 to us Americans. The best of them we meet travel- 
 ing are hardly above a little stab or sneer. They 
 ask questions about our homes and habits that are 
 as ill-bred as they are prof oundly ignorant." 
 
 "Not so loud, Polly dear. These hotel walls " 
 
 " Oh, I don't mind the walls. I could stand it from 
 people who are my equals in culture and opportunity. 
 But when it comes to the little provincial nobodies ! 
 Why, just think of our houses, for instance, and the 
 way we live, and the pictures, and books, and music, 
 and travel we have, or can have for the seeking ; and 
 compare it with what most of them have in their 
 narrow lives. It makes me want to laugh," and 
 Polly smiled away her wrath. 
 
 "I can't think why you are so " 
 
 "So what, dear?" 
 
 " I hardly know the word for it. It 's just like your 
 grandpapa, and a little bit like Roger." 
 
 " You don't mean patriotic ? Or is it pugnacious ? 
 Have n't I an Irish ancestor, mother ? I do so long, 
 on these occasions, to step out and invite somebody 
 to tread on the tail of my coat. And then I catch 
 a glimpse of your mild, distressed countenance, and 
 pull myself together, and try to be like the statu- 
 esque English girls who sit at table beside their 
 mamas, and never speak except to ask for the olives, 
 or to admit they have visited a certain catacomb, or 
 church, or picture. Never mind. My education is
 
 4: AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 progressing. You noticed how meek I was to Lady 
 Watson-Jones." 
 
 "When you see English people in their own homes, 
 they are quite different." 
 
 " I hope so, I 'm sure." 
 
 "When your papa and I visited England last, we 
 met with the utmost kindness. I have never been 
 able to think of going back there without him, until 
 now." 
 
 " Well, mother dear, for your sake, in future I will 
 submit to be snubbed and then patted on the head by 
 all the English we meet. But it 7 s an awfully de- 
 pressing prospect, and you must not expect anything 
 from me but resignation. If I am outwardly polite, 
 I shall be a hollow mockery within." 
 
 " Polly, how can. you go on so ? I mean to ask 
 Lady Watson-Jones, to-morrow, if she can give us 
 any good addresses in London of places where we 
 can lodge. There is one in Curzon street where the 
 Manhattans always go, but that is likely to be full ; 
 and Clarges street is where your dear papa and I 
 went I could n't go back there. Paulina, I wish 
 you would put down that Baedeker and show some 
 interest." 
 
 " Put down my Baedeker? And yet you wish me 
 to be like an English girl abroad ! " 
 
 At luncheon, on the day following this conversa- 
 tion, Lady Watson- Jones had voluntarily resumed her 
 patronage. 
 
 " I 've been thinking over places for you to stop in 
 London, and there 's one in Half Moon street, where 
 they don't generally take in Americans ; but I 'in sure
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 5 
 
 there will be no objection if you mention my name 
 or Lady Jenkins's. Sir Thomas and Lady Jenkins 
 have been going there for the season, for I don't know 
 how many years. This year Lady Jenkins's leg is so 
 bad she 's quite fearful they may n't get up to town 
 at all. I could really recommend Lady Jenkins's floor. 
 The number of the house has popped out of my head, 
 but no wonder, after the fright I 've just had about 
 leaving my binocular in the cab coming back from 
 the Appian Way ; but I '11 look it up for you, and you 
 need have no fear but what the landlady will be quite 
 civil when she knows you come through me from 
 Lady Jenkins. " 
 
 Some time later, Lady Watson-Jones, on her way to 
 Florence in a second-class compartment, with a rack 
 full of anomalous bags and bundles over her head, 
 had steamed out of the Roman station and Paulina's 
 thoughts. 
 
 The Standishes, taking Venice and Verona on the 
 way, had been translated into a world of bloom at 
 Cadenabbia, thence through the St. Gotthard to Lu- 
 cerne and Paris, and thus to British shores. 
 
 In addition to her sentimental desire to revisit the 
 scene of a connubial pilgrimage, Mrs. Standish had 
 a wish to return to England in the hope of providing 
 entertainment for her younger child a boy of four- 
 teen, whose unqualified rebellion against the customs 
 and tongues of the Latin races had begun to make 
 her life burdensome. Master William Woodbury 
 so named for an important maternal grandfather, still 
 living was known to his intimates as Toodles. A 
 sturdy, manly boy, he had been taken from his school
 
 6 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 and occupations in New York, and carried from point 
 to point in the Riviera and southern Italy, on the 
 theory that it would benefit his throat. A Swiss 
 tutor who for a time had looked after Toodles's edu- 
 cation resigned his post, and was gathered, discour- 
 aged, to his fatherland. Masters engaged at Nice and 
 Rome had also melted into space. " Toodles is some- 
 how not in sympathy with his teachers, over here," 
 it was his mother's plaintive custom to assert. In 
 plain truth, Toodles's American soul revolted against 
 the divers nationalities with which his wandering lot 
 was cast. He wanted to be back in New York with 
 "the fellows," to hear nothing spoken but his own 
 vernacular, and to share in the athletic contests of the 
 schools. In his eyes the system of life carried on 
 through the medium of what he called " foreign jab- 
 ber" was unreal, theatrical, and open to adverse crit- 
 icism in minutest detail. Of much scenery he was 
 aweary, against the small parceling of food at for- 
 eign tables d'hote he protested, and to visiting more 
 churches and cathedrals he had taken almost violent 
 exception. 
 
 It was in the nature of a compromise with Toodles, 
 therefore, that Mrs. Standish regarded her present 
 English venture, and, so far, her experience of sight- 
 seeing with her son from the Hotel Metropole had 
 not proved a success. Toodles had ceased to smile, 
 and his distracted mother was about returning to New 
 York, when she recalled a saying of her late husband : 
 " In good London lodgings where they know how to 
 cook whitebait, may be found as fair a substitute for
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 7 
 
 the comfort of home as a man who has been dragged 
 up by the roots can ask." 
 
 The quest for lodgings had lasted several days, the 
 pilgrims coming away disconsolate from many houses 
 where the exterior, fresh with paint, white curtains, 
 brass bells and knockers, geraniums and myosotis in 
 window-boxes, was belied by gloom and stuffiness 
 within. 
 
 How often had they followed the waiter or land- 
 lady up dark stairways, past the pots of palms on the 
 landing that could not hide the smoke-blackened 
 leads and backs of houses beyond ! How often had 
 they stumbled into dull sitting-rooms from which 
 newly washed chintz failed to banish the smell of by- 
 gone dinners, and stood listening to the lists of Lords 
 Adolphus and Ladies Gwendolyn whose former oc- 
 cupancy might have made illustrious, but could not 
 deodorize, the quarters ! How many bedrooms had 
 they looked into, where the brass bedstead, under 
 which the bath-tub lurked, and a dressing-table shut- 
 ting out half the light of a window into which rained 
 smuts from adjoining chimneys, offered the only 
 promise of comfort ! Let us not blame our wander- 
 ers if sometimes their thoughts went back to the 
 roomy, cheerful house, light in every part, temptingly 
 clean and cozy, they had wilfully abandoned in 
 Thirty-third street, West. 
 
 When at length they had decided to take posses- 
 sion of Mrs. Cryder's first floor and two upper bed- 
 rooms, in Half Moon street, Mrs. Standish made the 
 gratifying discovery that she was in the stronghold
 
 8 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 of Lady Jenkins, to which she had been warned she 
 could not obtain entrance without the indorsement of 
 Lady Watson-Jones. 
 
 The day after their removal thither had dawned 
 through the turbid atmosphere in which Polly de- 
 clared their breakfast by candlelight reminded her of 
 the burial of Sir John Moore : 
 
 The sods with our bayonets turning ; 
 By the struggling moonbeams' misty light, 
 And the lanterns dimly burning. 
 
 After the man-servant had disappeared with the tea- 
 pot and muffineer, the ladies tried to find diversion in 
 scattering about the room the bits of embroidery, 
 books, curios, silverware, and Alinari photographs 
 indispensable to feminine installation of the tempo- 
 rary sort. 
 
 " It is no use," exclaimed Paulina ; " it is darkness 
 visible. When I can't tell Botticelli's 'Madonna' from 
 the ' Vision of Ezekiel/ it 's about time to give up the 
 struggle, and ring for lamps." 
 
 "Italy was bad enough, but London is just rot- 
 ten," came in a muffled voice from the vicinity of the 
 fender. 
 
 " Woodbury, my love," observed Mrs. Standish, ad- 
 dressing a dim image of her offspring in the act of 
 poking the fire. " I can't have you using such expres- 
 sions." 
 
 " Hamlet made that remark about the state of Den- 
 mark, mother," said Paulina ; " and he 's been a good 
 deal quoted." 
 
 "Yes; but Shakspere, you know, is so Woodbury,
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 9 
 
 is there nothing you can think of that it would amuse 
 you to do this morning ? n 
 
 " Not a thing," was the uncompromising answer. 
 
 "I think the fog is lightening a little the man 
 said it would not last you could go in a hansom to 
 Madame Tussaud's; the Tower is rather far. You 
 would n't care for Westminster Abbey, Woodbury ? " 
 This, faintly, prayerfully. 
 
 " If I can have a hansom to myself, without you or 
 Paulina wanting to shop," replied Master Standish, 
 ignoring the other propositions, "there is a fellow 
 at the Grand Hotel I know, that 's got a cold, and 
 can't go out. He 7 s a chump we kicked off our foot- 
 ball team last year; but he 's better than nobody 
 over here." 
 
 "Don't go without your overcoat, Toodles," cried 
 his mother, fruitlessly, as, with a renewed animation, 
 the victim of travel sprang to his feet, seized his hat, 
 upset a china shepherdess and a vase of spills, fell 
 over the tray-holder, and dashed down to the front 
 door, where, possessing himself of the butler's whis- 
 tle, he made a shrill appeal to the outer world for 
 the species of vehicle he desired. 
 
 " It is decidedly lighter. What a great responsibil- 
 ity a boy is, Paulina! I wish, my dear, I had the 
 courage to send Woodbury, as I should like to do, to 
 a school here. There 's one at Cranmorton where 
 Mrs. Stanley Weston has her boy, and she 's charmed 
 with it charmed. The boys play cricket with the 
 under-masters so nicely; and, when their mothers go 
 there for a visit, they come in to the head-master's 
 drawing-room for such pretty little teas. But, if I
 
 10 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 mention that to Too Woodbury, he simply won't 
 hear of it." 
 
 "I am afraid you '11 have to own yourself con- 
 quered, dear, and take Toodles home, and get him 
 prepared for college like all the rest of the fellows 
 who are going to grow up with him to be average 
 American citizens." 
 
 "Paulina, is n't there something a little exag- 
 gerated in your way of talking ? It is n't as if Wood- 
 bury were to be dependent on his own exertions, 
 exactly. Although your dear grandpapa has peculiar 
 notions about not giving young people too much 
 money to start life on, Toodles will one day have his 
 portion and he will be very well off. Not, of 
 course, as much so as you, when you and Roger, 
 if you and Roger " The lady paused. 
 
 "Mother," interrupted Miss Standish, with imme- 
 diate darkening of a very pretty countenance, "re- 
 member our bargain. I will not have Roger thrown 
 into my face." 
 
 " But, Polly, he ought to be coming soon." 
 
 Miss Standish straightened her straight back, in- 
 flated her nostrils, and looked mutinous. 
 
 "Roger, according to his own showing, ought, at 
 this season, to stay upon his ranch, and not come 
 prowling across the Atlantic, to be an eternal burden 
 upon other people's minds." 
 
 "Paulina, I have been meaning to speak of this 
 quite seriously. I am alarmed at your growing in- 
 difference. Not only is Roger such an excellent 
 young man, my own brother's son; though as a 
 general thing I don't approve of cousins marrying, 
 but your grandpapa has set his heart upon the Wood-
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 11 
 
 bury property being kept together by you two. I 
 really could n't answer for the consequences to papa 
 if he were to be disappointed in the matter ; though 
 it is unfortunate his having that hasty way of an- 
 nouncing his ideas and not letting anybody answer 
 back. And poor Roger. You ought to consider the 
 strain of uncertainty upon his mind." 
 
 "Roger! He imposes on you, mother," the girl 
 said, laughing. " Roger and I understand each other 
 perfectly. I should n't be a bit surprised if pink-eye 
 were to break out among his cattle, or a railway were 
 to run over his land, or anything, to keep him in 
 "Wyoming this spring." 
 
 " This kind of jesting can't go on forever, my dear." 
 
 " Oh, mother, let us drift, or let grandpapa give all 
 of it, and welcome, to Toodles ! " 
 
 "Toodles has n't the name, as Roger has. The 
 great "Woodbury estate, as the newspapers call it, 
 must go in the direct male line." 
 
 " Oh, dear ! how sick I am of the great "Woodbury 
 estate ! And I wonder where grandpapa, who is fero- 
 cious about adopting anything from England, should 
 have got such an idea of handing down property 
 undivided. It does n't seem fair to you, mummy, or 
 to Aunt Sophy and her girls." 
 
 " Sophy and I were brought up to understand that 
 what we might get when we should be married was 
 to be the chief thing we were to expect. And, equally 
 so, my brother always looked to inherit the bulk of 
 the property. After poor William died, your grand- 
 papa called me into his library, and informed me he 
 had been making an entirely new will." 
 
 " Oh ! Oh ! What possessed grandpapa f "
 
 12 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "He said he had this new idea of Roger marry- 
 ing one of his cousins, and inheriting on that con- 
 dition. You were your grandpapa's first choice, and 
 after you, Fanny Low." 
 
 " Don't remind me of it. I feel as if I had been 
 put in a barrow, and rolled into the market-place, 
 my name and virtues hawked in a loud voice over 
 my head." 
 
 " Roger, when consulted by your grandpapa, imme- 
 diately said he did n't want Fanny Low on any terms, 
 and did want you. When you were children, Roger 
 called you his little wife. Your grandpapa was ex- 
 tremely pleased at this ; so much so that he did not 
 object to our engaging our passage to spend the 
 whole of this last winter abroad." 
 
 " If he had, I should have gone out as a governess 
 in New York." 
 
 " I will not revert to your behavior at this time. I 
 must say, Paulina, you were exceedingly trying to 
 everybody near. When you at last consented not to 
 interpose any objection to the scheme, provided you 
 were left entirely free for two years, matters quieted 
 down a little, and your grandpapa gave me some 
 peace." 
 
 "Poor mother! It was hard lines for you, to be 
 everybody's buffer. But please do me the favor to 
 remember that my first year is n't up until Septem- 
 ber. And Roger agreed that if he came abroad to 
 join us in the spring, there should be absolutely no 
 allusion to the blight that has fallen on our two lives." 
 
 " I never know whether you are in jest or earnest, 
 my dear."
 
 PICCADILLY.
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 13 
 
 "Nor do I, quite, dearest. But here comes the 
 landlady for orders; and I do believe, since we 've 
 been talking, the fog has taken itself off." 
 
 While Mrs. Standish lent ear to the usual proposi- 
 tion for a " clear soup, bit o' fish, sweetbread rissoles, 
 baked shoulder o' lamb, with peas and potatoes, and 
 a tart to follow," Paulina ran to the window and 
 opened it, leaning out with American disregard of 
 Mayfair convenances. 
 
 Now that the yellow curtain was withdrawn from 
 nature's face, what smiles radiated from its broad 
 expanse! At the first glimmer of watery sunlight, 
 the suspended animation of the staid old street re- 
 turned. Hansoms and four-wheelers, tradesmen's 
 carts, barrows of flowers, and a Punch-and-Judy 
 show on wheels, made up the sum of vehicles at that 
 early hour in the lie-abed quarter of London human- 
 ity. Pedestrians, gentlemen mostly, attired with the 
 scrupulous nicety of their class, each carrying his 
 umbrella ferrule uppermost, strode by, Piccadilly- 
 ward. The facades of the quaintly dignified houses, 
 and the clean paving-stones of the narrow street, 
 exhaled respectability with moisture. A tatterde- 
 malion boy, catching sight of the girl at the win- 
 dow, thrust upward the tossing plumes of a potted 
 white lilac, crying out in a voice pathetically sweet, 
 "Oh, please do, lydy! Buy this 'ere 'an'some lay- 
 lock; only two en six!" 
 
 " Lily o' the valley, pansies, lydy, penny er bunch," 
 chimed in another with the first vender's appeal. In 
 a trice the street seemed to upheave and break into 
 blossoms, in basket, pot, and pottle.
 
 14 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " Oh, why can't I buy all ! " said well-pleased Pau- 
 lina to herself, as she beckoned the white lilac to 
 the door below, and singled out a tray of wet violets 
 and daffodils to succeed it. "What is that lovely 
 verse about one's spirit dancing with the daffodils ? 
 No, little boy; go away, and don't tease. I really 
 believe I 'm beginning to cheer up." 
 
 These flowery transactions, a whiff of fresh air, and 
 the droll persistence of Mr. Punch's impresario in 
 preparing to set up his theater for her sole benefit, 
 brought back to Polly's face its customary look of 
 healthy good humor ; and, when fairly driven inside 
 by a gathering crowd of Punch's satellites, she was 
 prepared to admit that the situation of Mrs. Cryder's 
 lodgers had its mitigating points. 
 
 "This house all these houses are so old-timey 
 and demure, mother. Everything about them is so 
 low-toned, neutral-tinted, restful. Nothing happens, 
 nobody invades us, no sound comes from the other 
 people in the house. We might as well be in a little 
 planet of our own. I feel like one of Miss Austen's 
 or Miss Edgeworth's young persons come up to town 
 for the season, and wondering whether the captain 
 will write first, or call." 
 
 " Mr. Roger Woodbury," observed the butler in an 
 impartial manner, throwing open the door, and effac- 
 ing himself behind a very tall young man.
 
 n 
 
 JOGER!" exclaimed Mrs. Standish, 
 putting down her " Morning Post," 
 which she had been holding open 
 in a half-hearted way, trying to 
 think she enjoyed it. 
 
 " Roger ! " cried Paulina, letting 
 fall the lapful of moist violets she was arranging in 
 sundry china cups, as she sprang to her feet. "Where 
 on earth did you come from ? " 
 
 " The city, just now, Proserpina, where those stupid 
 people at the hotel sent me to find your address at 
 your banker's. The fog is responsible for my delay 
 in getting here." 
 
 " We had no idea you were even on the ocean, yet," 
 began Mrs. Standish, looking rather timidly from his 
 brown and manly face to Polly's slightly clouded one. 
 " It is such a delightful surprise to us." 
 
 " Hum ! " said Roger, after a scrutiny, on his own 
 account, of Paulina's countenance. " You were ask- 
 ing about my voyage, Aunt Rose. Why, we steamed 
 along most of the time in pouring rain, under a gray 
 sky, over a gray sea, through warmish weather that 
 made one think of things a-blowin' and a-growin' on 
 land. Never saw the sun once; and got into Liv- 
 
 15
 
 16 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 erpool yesterday, in an atmosphere that looked like 
 pea-soup and smelt of kerosene. Add to that, London 
 in a fog, and you may suppose I 'm glad to see sun- 
 shine and violets and Polly all at once, again." 
 
 "When you come to making proper speeches " 
 said Paulina, curling her lip. 
 
 "Paulina I beg I insist," began Mrs. Standish, 
 distressed ; but Roger only laughed. 
 
 " Now I know I 've got my tart cousin back, un- 
 changed," he said. 
 
 "Your coming will be the greatest thing in the 
 world for Woodbury," averred that young gentle- 
 man's mama. 
 
 " Poor old Toodles ! I can fancy him in these little 
 china-shops," said Koger, looking about the room. 
 " You ought to have taken my offer, Aunt Rose, and 
 left him with me on the ranch. How Toodles would 
 have rejoiced in the immediate cause of my journey 
 east ! " 
 
 "What was it?" asked Paulina, who had been a 
 trifle suspicious of lurking sentiment. 
 
 " The fact and the way that I lost my cook." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Polly, relieved. 
 
 " He was a beautiful, soft- voiced, soft-handed native 
 I got about six weeks ago, and life under his kitchen 
 management had begun to be a blissful dream 
 when, one day, having been just paid off, he quietly 
 disappeared. The same day the little town of Para- 
 chute, about twenty miles from me, was thrown into 
 a fever of excitement by the proceedings of a couple 
 of strangers on horseback, who rode up to the bank, 
 tied their steeds to the hitching-post, went inside, cov-
 
 AN EKE ANT WOOING 17 
 
 ered the paying teller with their pistols, and de- 
 manded twenty thousand dollars on the spot." 
 
 " Which they got ? " asked Paulina. 
 
 " Which they got, and rode out of the town at a 
 dead run before the inhabitants had time to do more 
 than spring to arms and set out in a vain pursuit. 
 This story did not reach me till the day following, 
 when I had, simultaneously, the satisfaction of hear- 
 ing from one of my ' boys ' that he had been roused 
 up in the night to give food and drink and a fresh 
 horse my horse, and all this at the muzzle of a pistol, 
 understand to our late chef, who had then vanished 
 we suppose in the direction of New Mexico, but he 
 has never been, heard from since." 
 
 " And you have been living under the same roof 
 with that desperate character ! Oh, Roger ! I tremble 
 to think of what you are erposed to in that rough 
 Western life," said Aunt Rose, in her placid voice. 
 
 " Peace to his memory ! He made such a jam ome- 
 let as I never ate before. When he left us, to enjoy 
 a green and virtuous old age as a bloated millionaire, 
 my partner and I did the cooking, turn about, for a 
 while. This culminated in a plum-pudding made by 
 Lansing, which, after various attacks, we voted to 
 bury in the yard; and there Lansing's collie dug it 
 up next day, and ate it, dying in convulsions directly 
 after." 
 
 "This decided you to give up republican house- 
 keeping, and try the effete monarchies for a while ? " 
 said Polly. 
 
 "Exactly." And seeing by the friendly gleam in 
 his lady's eye that he was restored to favor, Mr.
 
 18 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 Woodbury drew his chair by hers, and, under cover 
 of Mrs. Standish's discreet approbation, the two went 
 into a long and all-cousinly talk over what had oc- 
 curred to them since their parting on the pier at New 
 York eight months before. 
 
 " But you have n't told me, Roger," interposed his 
 aunt, "whether papa was well how he looked 
 how he seemed whether he needs us at home." 
 
 " My grandfather was in his usual vigorous health 
 a week ago yesterday, when I bade him good-by. I 
 stopped overnight at his house, and had a long talk 
 with him over I was going to say the wine, but 
 will substitute, for him, the last new table-water, 
 which he now declares is the only infallible remedy 
 for that complaint of his which nobody has yet been 
 able to find out. In the morning, on my way to the 
 steamer, I knocked at his door, and was told to come 
 in. It was a raw spring day the window open; a 
 searching breeze played through the room, and the 
 old gentleman was nowhere to be seen. I heard a 
 tremendous douche of water in the old shower-bath 
 with a curtain that stands in one corner of the desert 
 he calls his bedroom. ' Good-by. My love to Rose 
 and the children. Tell 'em when they get tired over 
 there, I '11 expect to see 'em home,' he roared out 
 from under this. My teeth chattered sympathetically 
 as I said good-by and took my leave." 
 
 "Papa is certainly wonderful," cooed Mrs. Stan- 
 dish, her talk then ramifying into a catechism about 
 relatives left behind, until Roger was fairly put 
 through his paces in family affairs.
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 19 
 
 "And you did n't tell us did you cross with 
 anybody in particular, Roger?" asked the lady in 
 summing up. 
 
 " What mama means," said Paulina, " is the people 
 of her own acquaintance. She 's like the woman who 
 asked her husband, at breakfast, if he found any ' nice 
 deaths' in his newspaper, please to read them aloud 
 to her." 
 
 " We had the usual thing at this season of the year 
 in those big liners," answered the young man "a 
 lot of what you call your smart set." 
 
 " Oh, my dear boy ! as if you could renounce your 
 birthright ! " interrupted Mrs. Standish, comfortably. 
 
 " Considering I pulled up stakes in New York, and 
 went to Wyoming to get rid of their rubbish of pre- 
 tense ! I don't mean your kind, my kind, if you will, 
 but the strainers and strugglers who have made us 
 so ridiculous. On this trip there were the H-ums and 
 the H-aws, eager for the telegrams and notes invit- 
 ing them to dinners and house-parties, which, they 
 averred, were awaiting them at Queenstown." 
 
 "For shame, my dear! You are really too sarcas- 
 tic at their expense. It is not fair." 
 
 " I don't say those families are not the darlings of 
 English aristocracy, auntie." 
 
 "But remember, mummy dear," put in Paulina, 
 with shining eyes of fun, "how Lady Watson-Jones 
 spoke about your dear friends who are of our fine 
 fleur in the American ' Siege of London/ as 'those 
 pushing Yankees that keep everybody wondering 
 what they will do next.' "
 
 20 AN EBRANT WOOING 
 
 " Paulina, when you insist upon bringing up dis- 
 agreeables" said her mother, compressing her lips 
 and looking martyrized. 
 
 " Mother, why should you mind ! I don't, one fig, 
 so long as they and we pay our way honestly, and 
 know that we don't push. Why should n't we, for 
 instance, like numbers of our countrymen who have 
 a straight descent from English emigrants of the 
 best stock dating more than two centuries back, have 
 the right to come here and enjoy the land our fathers 
 left, without sneers from our kinspeople who have 
 remained ? " 
 
 " Family feuds are always the hottest," said Roger. 
 " But here am I keeping back an important item of 
 fashionable news. One of my fellow-passengers was 
 that star of New York society, the beautiful Miss 
 Amaranth Clyde." 
 
 " Those people ! " began Mrs. Standish, inflating her 
 fine nostrils promptly. 
 
 " Now, mother, I know what you are going to say. 
 You say it regularly every time Amaranth is brought 
 up for discussion. Granted the Clydes are nobodies, 
 what matters it? They have now won they 're in; 
 and Amaranth was their ' open-sesame.' " 
 
 " But I have had it from undoubted authority that 
 the extraordinary woman, her mother, once walked 
 around in a Western shop trying on cloaks for cus- 
 tomers to see." 
 
 "That 's a vocation I reserve for myself in case 
 you and I and Toodles and grandpapa get caught 
 in a Wall-street panic some time, and lose all our 
 money. You know everybody's clothes seem to fit
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 21 
 
 me, and the dressmakers always compliment my 
 back. Mrs. Clyde must have been a beauty. You 
 can see it in her likeness to Amaranth, can't you, 
 Roger?" 
 
 "I suppose so. They are like two sketches from 
 the same model by draftsmen of unequal merit. I 
 should think there is certainly enough resemblance 
 to depress intending sons-in-law." 
 
 " Roger, don't ignore the fact that last summer at 
 Newport, looking on you as the heir of all the Wood- 
 burys, Mrs. Clyde made the most barefaced exhibi- 
 tion of her willingness to call you hers." 
 
 " Really, Paulina" 
 
 "No use being shocked, mother; it was town-talk, 
 for all Roger looks so innocent. I 'd venture to 
 assert that, if there was nobody more desirable on 
 board, Mrs. C. made Amaranth keep her hand in by 
 allowing her to walk most of the way over with 
 Roger. There! he is blushing; he is found out. 
 But, oh, my dear Roger, unless the coming campaign 
 fails to bring down their long-expected duke, or earl, 
 or baron, what hope have you H " 
 
 " She 's a stunningly handsome girl, and has a way 
 with her, when she likes, no fellow can resist," per- 
 sisted Roger, in spite of his aunt's perturbation. Poor 
 Mrs. Standish could not resign herself to the touch- 
 and-go levity of this fin de sibcle generation upon 
 sacred themes. " She had a jolly little red cloak with 
 a hood, like those Irish boatwomen ; and of an evening 
 she would lean over the rail with you, and tell your 
 fortune by your palm." 
 
 " I know," cried Paulina, joyously ; " several men 
 
 2*
 
 22 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 have told me about her palmistry and I know the 
 red cloak with the hood. When it 's no longer abso- 
 lutely fresh, she gets Redfern to make her another just 
 like it. Now, mother, I see in your face that you are 
 dying to say, ' Of course those people know all about 
 cloaks!' but you won't, because you are too Chris- 
 tian. And, Roger, tell me the plain truth. When you 
 drew near England, was Amaranth quite quite the 
 same f " 
 
 "She was a little distracted by her Queenstown 
 mail. And she opened, here and there, such dazzling 
 vistas of important households that were in conten- 
 tion for her, I felt rather depressed and roughly re- 
 publican. But, like all the truly great, she was 
 gracious in her time of triumph. And she even con- 
 descended to hope I am invited to a 'very little' 
 house-party to be given by our compatriot, Lady 
 Edmund Blount, at Whitsuntide." 
 
 " Lucy Blount's ? Why, we 're asked there, and of 
 course you will be, Roger. Lucy's devoted to you. 
 She says she never can forget that canoeing you used 
 to give her at Bar Harbor, and that another waltz 
 with you, after those whirling English dervishes, 
 would set her up for life. Let me see, where is her 
 letter? Mama, is it in your blotter? We got it yes- 
 terday. No ; here it is. Let me read you what dear 
 old Lucy says. You '11 see she 's not changed a bit 
 by having a handle to her name. 
 
 "Ted has taken a three years' lease of poor Sir Piers Gil- 
 christ's place, Wooton Magna, up here in the East Country, 
 where the winds blow over us straight from the German Ocean. 
 We are ' seven miles from a lemon,' a telegraph-station, railway,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 23 
 
 or neighbor. I 'm in love with the old house, and, though Ted 
 had expected to use it chiefly for men in the shooting-season, 
 I've persuaded him to let me freshen things up indoors, and 
 stay on here till baby has brought out his new tooth, after 
 which event we go back to the house in Pont street for the rest 
 of the season. Ted's own place in Leicestershire is like a re- 
 formatory for juvenile delinquents, and even baby and I can't 
 make it lively. Of course you must come to me, you and dear 
 Mrs. Standish, and that adorable Toodles. How good it will be 
 to see you, and to talk American as much as I please, and hear 
 all your gossip and tell you mine ! I 'm to have a few people at 
 Whitsuntide, so do come before that, and stay on none of 
 your beggarly three days will suit me ; ten at the least, or two 
 weeks, you darling things ! How I wish Roger could be with 
 us, and my brother Billy ; but they 're like two buckets in a well 
 only one comes up at a time. 
 
 "Then follows what I told you, and a lot more 
 there 's no need to read," interpolated Miss Standish, 
 growing roseate during the scanning of certain lines. 
 " But here I will go on : 
 
 "You will be interested, as I was, in hearing about Sir Piers, 
 the owner of this rather gone-to-seed paradise, which he has not 
 lived in since Lady Gilchrist left him and their small daughter 
 (it was years ago, a famous London scandal, he not a bit in 
 fault, she dying abroad, and almost forgotten by society I 
 hate to resurrect old gossip). Sir Piers, my husband says, is 
 one of the best fellows in the world, and, though a young man 
 still, not much over forty, and tremendously good-looking (as 
 you '11 see by his portrait in the hall here), chooses to live out 
 of England, traveling or painting in Spain, I think, and only 
 once in a long time turns up at his clubs in town. Now and 
 then, they say, he puts in an appearance at Wooton Magna vil- 
 lage, but has never set foot across this threshold since the 
 trouble with his wife, preferring to inhabit rooms always ready 
 for him in a little thatched dower-house buried in rhododen- 
 drons on the border of a wood where I '11 take you to listen to
 
 24 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 the nightingales, and chat with the old dame who keeps it and 
 swears by her absent master. 
 
 "Naturally, the estate is a good deal down, and but for the 
 income Sir Piers gets from the shooting (Ted hires his, and two 
 others, making five thousand acres, as good as any hereabout), 
 I don't know what the poor dear man would do, since he is very 
 hard up, and has to educate his girl, who lives with an old great- 
 aunt somewhere, and has never been here since she left her 
 home in babyhood. The villagers and all the cottage people 
 adore Sir Piers, and make me feel like a base usurper when I 
 drive about in my victoria and receive their bobs. But my Ted 
 is winning them, too. (That darling Ted, of course he would, 
 as you will say when you know him, Anglophobe though you 
 be, my Polly ! ) And this reminds me that Ted charges me to 
 say he is prepared to fall in love with you at once, as the most 
 charming of all my American swans. Now that he has got one 
 of us, he can't be satisfied without cultivating the acquaintance 
 of the rest\ wants me to invite the prettiest American girls I 
 know, and says my bunch of bridesmaids was a dream he can- 
 not forget." 
 
 "Lucy Lansing was always a chatterbox," said 
 Mrs. Standish. 
 
 "But such a jolly one so frank, so generous!" 
 said Roger. 
 
 " I always thought it strange Lord Edmund should 
 have picked out the sister whose nose turned up/' 
 pursued the lady, pensively. 
 
 "Lucy's nose, like herself, is tip-tilted, character- 
 istic, quaint," cried Paulina. "I 'm glad we are to 
 go to her so soon. I shall write at once, Roger, and 
 tell her you 're here. Of course she will want to 
 hear about her brother Billy's pudding." 
 
 " Would n't it be nice to start earlier, and get in 
 a ^ay or two at Leamington ? It 's a little early
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 25 
 
 for town, and I am almost sure the air would benefit 
 Woodbury's throat/' suggested Mrs. Standish. 
 
 " Then, while you put in at that amiable, jog-trot 
 spa," said Roger, " Polly and I will take a jaunt over 
 to Warwick and Kenilworth and Stratford. There 's 
 a path to Shottery, Paulina, where, once having put 
 your feet into lush greenery, you enter straightway 
 into the Shaksperian spirit, and evermore rejoice in 
 his singing phrases about nature out of doors, as you 
 could not have done before." 
 
 "Too I mean Woodbury should certainly see 
 Stratford, if we can possibly induce him to consent," 
 murmured Woodbury's mama. 
 
 " I '11 undertake Toodles," said Roger, with a mas- 
 terful certainty that compelled the mother's awe; and, 
 the door just then opening, the object of her solici- 
 tude effected a bursting entrance, to spring upon his 
 new-found male supporter with the abandonment of 
 a happy dog. 
 
 " You 'd better look out there 's somebody com- 
 ing up the stairs after me," remarked Toodles, simul- 
 taneously. "Got out of a four-wheeler, and was 
 jawing the cabby about his fare the old witch 
 from Rome." 
 
 " Lady Watson-Jones," announced the butler, and 
 at once a dread silence fell upon the little group. 
 
 "How do you do? You see, I was quite right 
 about there being no objections to Mrs. Cryder's tak- 
 ing you, if you mentioned me," observed her ladyship. 
 
 " Oh, but it was really by accident we came quite 
 a coincidence," Mrs. Standish strove vainly to ex- 
 plain; but her suavity was overborne.
 
 26 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 " Odd, was n't it, my hearing you were here through 
 Lady Jenkins, who had it from Mrs. Cryder when she 
 sent down Lady Jenkins's new maid. Excellent peo- 
 ple, the Cryders, so faithful to their old patrons, and 
 so obliging. It must quite cut her up to see any 
 one else in Lady Jenkins's rooms. No ; not near the 
 fire, please. I am astonished to see fire on a warm 
 day like this." 
 
 Then Lady Watson- Jones plumped into an arm- 
 chair against the wall opposite the fire, and, to shade 
 her face, held her closed umbrella rigidly before her 
 in an attitude suggestive of war upon the company. 
 During these preliminaries to sociable conversation, 
 she had not assumed to mention or introduce the 
 very tall, blonde young girl, so simply attired that 
 she might have been either a princess or a lady's- 
 maid, who followed in her wake, and for whom 
 Roger advanced a chair, into which she dropped, 
 blushing a vivid red. 
 
 " My niece," said Lady Watson-Jones, meeting the 
 glance of inquiry from Mrs. Standish. " Of course, 
 seeing that I had got you into this place, I had to 
 come to be sure that all was right. I live a goodish 
 bit from here, in Bryanstone Square, a part I dessay 
 you Americans don't know. But you '11 come to 
 luncheon with me some day, and I '11 show you my 
 cats. One of them is ailing to-day, and I 'm half 
 afraid he 's got the influenza. I had a touch of it 
 myself, and kept abed two days for safety's sake; 
 but, thank God ! I 'm better, and I hope Tom will be 
 soon. When I 'm sure Tom is better, I '11 set a day 
 for vou to lunch."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 27 
 
 " And does this young lady help you to take care 
 of Tom!" asked Mrs. Standish, vaguely hoping to 
 elicit some allusion that might throw light on the 
 unknown visitor. 
 
 "She? Oh, no. I never let her touch them. She 's 
 to be presented at the next drawing-room, and we 've 
 been seeing after her frock." 
 
 " Presented 1 What fun ! " cried Polly Standish. 
 
 " Humph ! Not funny in the least," resumed Lady 
 Watson-Jones. " And a pretty penny Aline asks for 
 a plain white silk train, with mousseline de soie puf- 
 fings and lilies of the valley bunched around the 
 edge." 
 
 "Are n't you excited?" asked Polly of the nameless 
 one, while Roger and Toodles conversed together in 
 the window-seat. 
 
 " No," ventured the maiden j " I think not." 
 
 " So many of my friends have told me about their 
 presentations," pursued the American girl, anxious 
 to put her guest in some sort at her ease, "I feel 
 as if I know the whole affair, and could do it with 
 my eyes shut." 
 
 Polly was not prepared for the startled look turned 
 on her at this. 
 
 " I don't mean really with my eyes shut. I mean 
 that I could go through the ceremony without being 
 told. But I have no great curiosity to try the experi- 
 ment. It seems to me pointless for a republican girl 
 to have to bend and bow and kotow like that, just 
 to kiss an old lady's hand." 
 
 "Oh!" exclaimed the visitor, her surprise now 
 evident alarm.
 
 28 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " If I 've said anything impolite, you must excuse 
 me," said Polly, laughing, and hastening to discourse 
 of everything, grave or gay, that she could imagine, 
 to coax the stranger from her shell. Monosyllables 
 only, uttered in a beautiful and perfectly educated 
 voice, rewarded Polly's pains ; and when Lady Wat- 
 son-Jones arose to go, and marshaled her charge 
 away, the door closed upon a smiling ring of faces. 
 
 " What a piece of still-life that girl is ! " said Mrs. 
 Staiidish. 
 
 "She has been abstracted from Madame Tus- 
 saud's," said Paulina. 
 
 " I hope, if we go there to lunch, they '11 put the 
 cat next to me," observed Toodles. 
 
 "She looks intelligent," said Roger, "and when 
 she did speak, I never heard a sweeter voice. Who 
 could suppose a grown girl to be so painfully shy ! " 
 
 " She has an exquisite complexion," remarked Mrs. 
 Standish, looking with an involuntary sigh at her 
 daughter's clear pale cheeks. 
 
 "But to think we don't even know what to call 
 her ! " 
 
 "Anyhow, here 's their card," announced Wood- 
 bury, who had been foraging in a biscuit- jar upon 
 the side-table. 
 
 "Dear me! 'Miss Gilchrist,'" read out Paulina. 
 "Where have we heard that name?"
 
 Ill 
 
 AULINA has always declared that 
 the immediate cause of their run- 
 away from London just after being 
 settled in the Half Moon street 
 lodgings was the dread they all 
 shared of having to take luncheon 
 with Lady "Watson-Jones. Paulina's mother, on hear- 
 ing this sally, has invariably said: "Nonsense! It 
 was because of the risk from influenza, and on ac- 
 count of Toodles's throat." Paulina's cousin Roger, 
 a dear lover of pastoral England, kept his own coun- 
 sel, and never let the ladies know how subtly he had 
 schemed to hold them to the point of giving him a 
 week of Paulina's company in blossom-time in the 
 country. As to Paulina's brother, Toodles was in 
 the robust juvenility of a young dog, to whom any 
 move with anybody, anywhere, is acceptable. 
 
 They had a week to spend before repairing to 
 Lady Edmund Blount's, to whose Whitsuntide party 
 an urgent invitation for Roger had arrived. A vaga- 
 bond week in England what more delightful? A 
 week without too much luggage, without any respon- 
 sibility, without previous plan of travel. A week of 
 loitering in daisy-sprinkled meads, under ivied min-
 
 30 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 ster walls, upon rivers shining clear only, whither, 
 whither should they go? 
 
 So much time was lost in discussing this, they bid 
 fair to go nowhere at all, and at last settled down 
 to what Roger had called u amiable, jog-trot " Leam- 
 ington. 
 
 From the Manor Inn of that staid, many-gardened 
 old spa there were pleasant excursions to be made to 
 Kenilworth, Stratford, Guy's Cliff, Warwick Castle, 
 Charlcote, Stoueleigh Abbey excursions afoot or 
 by rail, or in a carriage rolling over the smoothest 
 roads, in which Mrs. Standish could easily join, while 
 to Toodles the facility of hiring a bicycle and speed- 
 ing whither he would, offered an outlet for his zeal. 
 
 In those early days of May so few trippers were 
 abroad that they had hotels and railway compart- 
 ments practically to themselves; and the fine, dry 
 weather was a marvel to be spoken of under the 
 breath, lest it should disappear. 
 
 " I did not know the world contains so many green 
 checkerboards of fields, with blackthorn hedges, and 
 shaggy sheep, and weak-kneed lambs," said Paulina ; 
 " so many cottage doors with fruit-trees trained above 
 them, and old women knitting, and cats purring at 
 the old women's knees." 
 
 "The peace and rest and rich verdure of it al- 
 most pass American understanding," observed Roger. 
 " No wonder our country-people are accused of ap- 
 propriating Warwickshire. 7 ' 
 
 They had gone over to Stratford for the afternoon, 
 and, Paulina having made the rounds of the town in 
 a rather perfunctory fashion, the young people re-
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 31 
 
 turned from Shottery by the field path, carrying 
 nosegays of pansies and bleeding-heart presented by 
 a descendant of the Hathaways, who sat drinking her 
 tea in the corner of the wide-mouthed chimney 
 where sun and moon had looked in upon Shak- 
 spere's courtship. 
 
 "Have you heard," Roger added, "what an old 
 crippled woman in Leamington said recently to a 
 visitor, about Shakspere ? ' Law ! who was he ? 
 On'y a plowboy. An' he was never thought nothin' 
 of till the Americans came over and took him up.' 
 Now, Polly, what did I tell you ! Is n't this the per- 
 fection of rural landscape ? " 
 
 "Oh, yes," she said wilfully; "it 's all pretty, 
 placid, well-fed. But my heart pants for an open, 
 rolling hill-country such as we have in our own 
 Berkshire, in Massachusetts, with miles of wild, rock- 
 strewn pasture on the slopes, and green tors, and 
 wild roses, and life-everlasting, and sweet-fern crop- 
 ping up around the boulders; and the Housatonic 
 winding like a silver ribbon in the valley; and old 
 Greylock and the Dome looking down on the lower 
 mountains ! " 
 
 " I did not suppose our Polly would join the noble 
 army of trippers who make comparisons with what 
 they have left at home," he said, smiling. " The ob- 
 vious answer to which is, Why did n't you stay where 
 you were so well satisfied ? " 
 
 " Good one on Polly ! " cried Toodles, who believed 
 in fair play. 
 
 "Oh, well, one must see things," the girl said. 
 "And you know, Roger, I never professed to be a
 
 32 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 creature of sentiment." Then, drawing her brother's 
 arm through hers, she started ahead of Roger to walk 
 to the train that was to restore the excursionists to 
 Leamington and Mrs. Standish in time for dinner. 
 
 They were sitting in the train, presently, waiting 
 for it to start, and breathing the moist air surcharged 
 with odors of lilac and hawthorn, that made of their 
 compartment 
 
 a box where sweets compacted lie, 
 
 while looking on at a game of cricket among the boys 
 of the King Edward school in a field close to the sta- 
 tion. Suddenly, without premonition, a shower fell 
 from an apparently clear sky, breaking up the sport, 
 and sending the merry, manly fellows scampering in 
 search of jackets, sweaters, and bicycles. Looking 
 back at Stratford, through the pearly mist of summer 
 rain, all that our travelers saw not softest gray, was 
 exquisitely green. 
 
 " Roger, I suppose I am unreasonable," vouchsafed 
 Paulina, as, in a gentler mood, she turned toward 
 him. " I am trying to see with your eyes ; but for 
 the life of me I 've never been able to enjoy cut-and- 
 dried privileges." 
 
 " What sort of privileges, for instance ? " he asked 
 good-humoredly. 
 
 " Well, Kenilworth and Stratford and what grand- 
 papa wants us to be to one another now, don't be 
 angry ! If I can't speak out what I feel when I feel 
 it, I become a horrible repressed object, like a bomb 
 of dynamite."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 33 
 
 "Then you have had no real pleasure in these 
 beautiful days we Ve spent together?" he asked, 
 Toodles buried in a penny newspaper opposite them. 
 
 " Pleasure ! Every day is full of pleasure. How 
 can any one who is only twenty years old, who has n't 
 an ache, and who sleeps like a top, help being happy 
 when a new day comes around ? " And the elusive 
 look in her eyes warned him not to pursue his in- 
 quiries. 
 
 In her room that night, Polly reproached herself 
 fiercely. Who was there, after all, better in her world 
 than Roger ; who more patient with her whims, who 
 stronger, truer, more good to look at? Every day, 
 every hour they spent together but confirmed her in 
 this opinion. So long as the question of the great 
 Woodbury estate did not loom up on her horizon, 
 Roger was entirely to her taste. And yet there was 
 that goading spirit within her, ever driving her to 
 defy, rebuff, wound him. But then, who that is born 
 of woman can answer for the vagaries of a young 
 girl's heart ? Polly gave it up. 
 
 Full of good resolution for the future, she walked 
 with her cousin next day to Warwick, and went over 
 that most satisfying of all English castles, in the 
 wake of a stupid little party of sightseers, who hud- 
 dled like sheep, and looked almost as intelligent, while 
 listening to the remarks of their smart soldier-guide. 
 
 " Roger," said Paulina, sweetly, stopping behind to 
 lean with her cousin from the boudoir- window, look- 
 ing down, through the dusky boughs of cedars planted 
 by the Crusaders, into the placid sheen of Avon, far
 
 34 AN ERBANT WOOING 
 
 below, "if I have been a little horrid to you lately, 
 forgive me. I am going to turn over a new leaf. 
 Don't ask for particulars, but await results." 
 
 "Are n't you feeling quite well, my daughter?" 
 Mrs. Standish inquired that afternoon, as they were 
 driving, Roger and Toodles facing them in the landau. 
 
 " Perfectly well, mother. I have only experienced 
 a change of heart, and the first day of such goodness 
 is depressing," she said, with a glance at Roger. 
 
 " Roger, what does she mean ? " asked the mother, 
 with knitted brows. 
 
 But then, Mrs. Standish had been puzzling over 
 Paulina from her cradle. 
 
 " I mean that I now love fat sheep and green mea- 
 dows and things settled, as much as Roger does. 
 Though, to tell you the truth, I think Roger is incon- 
 sistent. He left New York to go and be a cow-boy 
 and with the cow-boys stand ; but, when over here, he 
 falls down and worships what he calls the perfected 
 civilization of English society. He 's tremendously 
 up in English politics; in London, at the galleries, 
 and so on, he 's quite a greenery-yallery young man ; 
 and in the country he is ready to weep at the note of 
 a cuckoo." 
 
 " I am afraid your reformation is short-lived," said 
 Roger, with the smile her nonsense always won from 
 him. "But please let me beg you to remember, 
 Polly, that "Wyoming is my place, this is my play- 
 ground. And, if I do believe in the ' government of 
 the people, by the people, and for the people' " 
 
 "Eh?" said Polly, with raised eyebrows. 
 
 " Oh, I 'm not going to talk politics to you. If I do
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 35 
 
 believe in that with all my heart, I say, may n't I feast 
 my gaze upon the afternoon of England's monarchy ? 
 If I delight in the finished structure of England's 
 social life, the peace, security, exclusiveness of her 
 homes, her settled views upon the social questions 
 that are still disrupting us, and that make such jack- 
 asses of us in foreign eyes " 
 
 " Hear ! Hear ! " cried Polly. 
 
 " All this does n't blind me to make me in the least 
 disloyal to the real glory of an exhaustless land like 
 ours a buoyant atmosphere, a vivid, original, pic- 
 turesque nature, that fill my moral lungs with fresher 
 air only to speak of them." 
 
 " My dears," said Mrs. Standish, turning to look at 
 a carriage just then passing, "there is the rather 
 nice old lady who is so civil to us at the hotel. She 
 told me last night she has been always interested 
 in America, since a gentleman she knew once had 
 gone there and brought home to his wife some such 
 excellent porous plasters." 
 
 " Now has our nation achieved its destiny ! " cried 
 Paulina. "Look, Roger, at this wagonette full of 
 women that 's coming toward us. They are all alike, 
 big, blooming, buxom. And the rosiest one of them 
 has got on a respirator a thing like a black stere- 
 opticon over her mouth. Perhaps she 's the young- 
 est and prettiest sister, and that 's their way of 
 keeping her under till the older ones are married off." 
 
 11 Let me see the stereopticon," said Toodles, twist- 
 ing around in his seat. " I say, Polly, what a jolly 
 guy she is ! " 
 
 "Listen to the infected Toodles," said his sister.
 
 36 AN EBEANT WOOING 
 
 "When we played billiards last night he called out, 
 ' I say, Polly, what a beastly fluke ! ' r> 
 
 " I did n't," contradicted Toodles, growing red. 
 
 "Oh, yes; we are all so. But so long as Roger 
 is happy, what does anything matter? Roger, tell 
 me, when there are six grown-up daughters, as in 
 that family, here ! see ! they are passing us, what 
 do they do for husbands, in the present lack of mar- 
 riageable men?" 
 
 " They touch the button, and the chaperons do the 
 rest. All eligible Englishmen tell you they are 
 obliged to keep a sharp lookout against the mothers 
 and chaperons. Fancy the poor girls brought up to 
 feel they must marry to relieve their families of the 
 dead weight of them, and to fill the purse of the 
 elder brother, so that he may make ducks and drakes 
 at his leisure the way it must drive them on ! No 
 wonder so many of their fellows come after our girls, 
 who keep them in refreshing doubt till the last minute 
 whether they '11 say yes or no." 
 
 " And no wonder the British matron calls us sad 
 poachers on her preserves," answered Polly, with a 
 curling lip. " But I can tell you, Roger, the more I 
 hear and see of the way Englishmen talk about wo- 
 men, the more it makes me want to utter a war- 
 whoop of contempt! Ah! There 'd be no sort of 
 doubt in my mind about the answer I 'd give an 
 Englishman who wanted to marry me." 
 
 "Paulina, the people in the carriage behind can 
 almost hear you," said her mother. 
 
 "Did n't I tell you I want to utter an Indian 
 whoop 9 " cried Polly. " I can't see how an Ameri-
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 37 
 
 can girl can give up her home, and habits, and 
 individuality, to marry over here. If you are so- 
 cially anybody, you live as a marked personage, ap- 
 plauded as they clap a clown when he makes a joke 
 in the sawdust. If you are nobody what outer 
 darkness ! " 
 
 "Lucy Blount has been most kindly received by 
 her husband's relatives," said Mrs. Standish. 
 
 " That 's what we always hear at home, and then 
 we come to England, and find out the reverse of the 
 medal. 'She 's nice-looking, certainly, and not so 
 vulgar as the rest,' was what Helena Van Kort's no- 
 ble father-in-law remarked about her, for instance." 
 
 " That seems incredible, when we remember what 
 the Van Korts are in New York," sighed Mrs. 
 Standish. 
 
 "I second Polly's motion," said Roger. "I don't 
 think American popularity in English society is a 
 prize sufficiently glittering to marry for. And the 
 international marriage does n't appeal to me, other- 
 wise, in the least. / would n't pluck a British blos- 
 som to wear in my buttonhole, if I could. There is 
 enough disparity of taste and temper to be overcome 
 in a marriage between two of a kind, without adding 
 to it a lifetime of petty disputes over what each has 
 been brought up to accept in habit or environment." 
 
 They had decided to spend two or three days in 
 Cambridge, going on to Lady Edmund's on the 
 Tuesday before Whitsunday. In the coffee-room of 
 the Bull they found two mothers, one Scotch, the 
 other English, giving entertainment to their under- 
 graduate sons, and meekly receiving patronage over
 
 38 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 the joint and gooseberry-tart "quite as we do at 
 home/' said the American mama. 
 
 In the clear evening light Eoger carried Paulina 
 off for a stroll among the buildings, and, Mrs. Standish 
 pleading headache, Toodles was invited to accompany 
 the walkers an invitation civilly declined as he sat 
 in the window poring over a book found among the 
 Dead Sea fruit of hotel sitting-room literature. 
 
 "Bless him! 7 ' said his mother, carrying into retreat 
 her aching head. "I never like to interfere with 
 Toodles when he voluntarily takes up a book." 
 
 Long after Polly whose room joined his had 
 climbed into her high, quaint bed, the candle of the 
 studious Toodles was alight. Awakening from her 
 first sleep, and hearing him move, Miss Standish felt 
 herself in duty bound to investigate this phenome- 
 non. There was Toodles, still dressed, his hair 
 tousled, absorbed in reading what? "Miss No- 
 body of Nowhere"! 
 
 "You might have stayed in America for that," 
 said his sister, mildly. 
 
 " Oh, let up on lectures, Polly ! " observed the 
 student. " Can't a fellow have any fun, to make up 
 for being lugged about England ? " 
 
 The first rain of their northward pilgrimage fell 
 on that Sunday morning in Cambridge. Toodles, 
 appearing wan and dull at breakfast, committed the 
 indiscretion of a sneeze, and by his mother was at 
 once dosed with quinine, and sentenced to keep the 
 bounds of their sitting-room, where she left him with 
 a number of interesting views of the colleges, and 
 the lessons for the day, while with the others she 
 repaired to service at Trinity College chapel.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 39 
 
 Sitting stone-cold upon rush-bottomed chairs in 
 the antechapel, under the guardianship of Roubillac's 
 marble statue of Sir Isaac Newton, they saw the be- 
 lated men straggle in to service, to be checked off by 
 an official who kept tally as they passed the last- 
 comer putting on his gown distractedly in the court 
 while he ran, resembling a huge bird just alighted. 
 
 Discomfort of all kinds was happily forgotten 
 when at the afternoon service they had the privilege 
 of listening to the angelic choir of King's. Occupy- 
 ing stalls in the center of the church, their eyes at 
 once soared to the majestic beauty of that peerless 
 interior roof, where scallop-shells of carved stones 
 meet, and are fixed at the point of contact by cor- 
 bels of stone fruit and flowers. The great lustrous 
 East window glowed with the soft radiance of old 
 sapphire-blue glass that has no peer in modern days, 
 with emerald and amber, and blots of deep Burgun- 
 dian red, which, repeated in the four-and-twenty side 
 windows, defied the gloom of the outer world. 
 
 When after a while the organ chime arose, and the 
 voices of the perfect choir rang out like the lark at 
 heaven's gate, Paulina turned, trembling with de- 
 light, to whisper in Roger's ear, "This is the best 
 of all." 
 
 So sitting and rejoicing, Polly little knew of a pair 
 of eyes turned in amused, then pleased, then rever- 
 ent, gaze on her rapt face. 
 
 A man near by, clearly at home in the place, bent 
 over, and called the attention of a young woman be- 
 side him to the girl with a score in her lap, and 
 a face like one of the young-eyed cherubim of an 
 old Italian master. The young woman so addressed
 
 40 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 leaned forward with a gleam of recognition, but, as 
 Polly did not look their way, drew back as it were 
 within her shell, and the opportunity for greeting 
 never came. 
 
 "I have heard the Pope's choir in the Sistine 
 Chapel recently," Polly said, as they walked in a 
 downpour back to the hotel; "but this affected me 
 quite differently ; it seemed as if they were carrying 
 up my own faith, my own prayers, to the great white 
 throne. Then those amens, breathed without organ 
 and all in that glorious place! Do you know, 
 Roger, poking about in Italy and France in their 
 splendid churches and cathedrals, I used to yearn 
 after music to fill up the vast echoing spaces, and 
 there was never any, or rarely. Yes; this is the 
 best of all." 
 
 "Do you remember "Wordsworth's lines, 'Within 
 King's Chapel'?" he asked, while Mrs. Standish and 
 her umbrella and kilted petticoats filled up the nar- 
 row pavement ahead. 
 
 " You know I don't. I never remember Hues and 
 things that are appropriate. But you may say them 
 for me, please." 
 
 " This much will do for you," he answered : 
 
 " That branching roof, 
 
 Self-poised and scooped into ten thousand cells, 
 "Where light and shade repose, where music dwells 
 Ling'ring and wandering on, as loath to die, 
 Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof 
 That they were born for immortality." 
 
 "Roger, I hate myself for thinking it, but how 
 much more these undergraduates have in their lives
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 41 
 
 than ours ! How much loftier in soul they must be, 
 when they sit in such inspiring places of worship, 
 than our men, who go to those dreary, bare chapels 
 of American universities." 
 
 "Hum," said Roger, quizzically, "I don't know 
 that; but I will say most of the fellows I Ve met 
 who have been graduated at Oxford or Cambridge 
 bring away a thoroughly manly love for their uni- 
 versity, and keep up their college friendships ; which 
 is more than we do, as a rule. Perhaps it is your 
 Puritan ancestry, Paulina, that makes you feel such 
 an affinity for Cambridge. Do you know, the foun- 
 ders of New England, or many of the best of them, 
 were trained here ; they took from these parts their 
 Boston, Ipswich, Framingham, Eastham, Dedham, 
 Lincoln, Haverhill, Newbury, and a lot more." 
 
 "You dear, beautiful King's, I am glad even that 
 little piece of you is mine," said the girl, looking 
 back to wave the gray old building a fantastical 
 farewell. 
 
 By the following afternoon the sun had returned 
 all-glorious, and they went rowing on the little river 
 that holds Cambridge in the crook of its arm, and 
 gives a suggestion of Venice to the rear of some of 
 the colleges. At such an hour the famous "backs" 
 show their exceeding beauty in full light. The wide 
 sheets of living green, with their great soaring, 
 black-armed trees misty with foliage, are best to look 
 at when swarming with the young life of the uni- 
 versity on diversion bent. Caps and gowns thrown 
 aside, the men appear in flannels, sweaters, straw 
 hats with their college colors all that is bright and
 
 42 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 spring-like in male attire. "With pipe and dog for 
 companions, some lounge on benches under elms or 
 willows ; some seek the greater solitude of canoes on 
 the Cam. Cricket, tennis, boating in all forms, are 
 the visible amusements of the throng. But upon the 
 river concentrates the chief charm of human interest 
 in the panorama. To row once or twice its length 
 within interesting limits, to try to escape the igno- 
 miny of a bump from some mischief-making boat, to 
 shoot under the triple arches where reflected sun- 
 shine glitters in a golden checkerwork overhead, 
 then to pull in close ashore and hang on by a daisy 
 springing from the velvet bank opposite Trinity or 
 King's, and there idly to watch the floating show 
 pass by, are pleasures safely to be recommended. 
 
 From Polly's lot was not withheld the treat of tea- 
 drinkings in one or two of those luxurious rooms be- 
 hind the flower-boxes looking into the college courts. 
 The pretty American girl, with her gracious smiles, 
 her charming gestures, her ready wit, was speedily 
 the center of attraction among the young fellows she 
 ordered hither and thither with the frank audacity of 
 her species in its native atmosphere. Indeed, when 
 Miss Standish was torn away from the old town by 
 her natural protectors the following day, there was at 
 the station a group of admiring youngsters to bestow 
 on her flowers and photographs, and to pledge future 
 meetings in London or New York, which caused 
 Polly to pronounce Cambridge the most " homelike " 
 place in England. 
 
 And now they were en route through the fen-coun- 
 try, green and monotonous as an American prairie,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 43 
 
 with its intersecting ditches, its great haystacks like 
 cheeses from which slices have been cut, and cottages 
 that loom dimly into sight on the horizon line, as one 
 becomes aware of ships far off at sea. 
 
 A little while for in England, as Polly said, you 
 hardly get used to one county before you are in 
 another and they were running through a region of 
 gorse-clad uplands, where the hillsides were honey- 
 combed with rabbit-burrows, and the rabbits sat on 
 their hind quarters, gazing like village urchins at the 
 train. At one spot a grove of black-visaged pines 
 harbored an almost Southern warmth, but elsewhere 
 there was a free, delicious air that told of the North 
 Sea hard by. 
 
 " Now that it 's over, I '11 admit your week of idling 
 was a success," Polly vouchsafed to Roger. In the 
 last days she had grown to depend upon his ready 
 sympathy, the fillip of his masculine comment upon 
 passing events, and to look almost with regret upon 
 the forthcoming introduction of other people into her 
 life. Roger, in whom this latter feeling was stronger, 
 echoed the faint sigh with which she spoke. 
 
 " If it were not for Billy Lansing's sister, I believe 
 I 'd leave you at the station, and go off and prowl by 
 myself over this East Country, that I don't know. I 
 don't believe I am going to enjoy that houseful of 
 people, where I '11 never be a minute alone with you. 
 I have a presentiment I shall be sorry that we went." 
 
 "Don't grumble, Roger though I confess to a like 
 apprehension for myself. But here we are at Lucy's 
 station, and that must be Lucy's carriage awaiting us. 
 Of course you will be civil to Billy Lansing's sister."
 
 44 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 Grateful to every sense was the change from cush- 
 ioned railway-seat to open carriage, as they drove 
 through a rich rural country, the roadsides spring- 
 ing with flowers; past thatched cottages, and stone 
 churches with round "bell-towers, and wayside inns 
 bearing the quaintest names on their swinging signs 
 everywhere the tokens of a region that knows no 
 change save the passing of generations and the birth 
 of new leaves and lambs. 
 
 " It 's like a page from Hardy," Roger said. " And 
 what a smell of woods and fields ! " 
 
 "Dear me, how the toll-gate and village women 
 drop courtesies to Lucy's livery," said Paulina. "I 
 am beginning to realize that she is Lady Edmund, 
 and that in her carriage I must hold myself with 
 dignity." 
 
 " And when I remember," meditated Mrs. Standish, 
 "what trouble they had to make Lucy's teeth even, 
 when she was a child ! Woodbury, my love, don't let 
 me forget to take you to the dentist as soon as we get 
 back to London. I shall be really glad to see Lucy 
 again." 
 
 Seven miles of smooth going had cleared their 
 lungs of railway smoke, when the footman, turning 
 on the box, touched his hat, and said : 
 
 "Wooton Magna village, sir. The Hall is just 
 beyond." 
 
 Commonplace in the casket of English gems was 
 this sequestered hamlet of thatched-roofed cottages 
 gathered around a pond where water-lilies grew and 
 ducks and children paddled ; where, later in the sea- 
 son, cows, standing breast-high in the water, would 
 seek the shadow of its overhanging trees. From the
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 45 
 
 tiny houses, with their diamond-paned lattices, the 
 unusual warmth had coaxed grandams and grand- 
 sires, who sat sunning themselves under the roses and 
 woodbine trained above their doors, or stood in the 
 garden-patches where already blue comf rey had drawn 
 the bees, who forsake for it flowers of another color. 
 
 Upon the passing of the Hall carriage, these old 
 people blinked and bobbed obeisance, the children 
 stopping play to follow suit. 
 
 And now through a lodge-gate into a deep wood 
 jubilant with bird-songs, through an avenue of Portu- 
 gal laurel, rhododendron, and arbor-vitae, into open 
 park ground, and Wooton Magna Hall came in sight. 
 
 It was a great square pile of brick with marble fac- 
 ings and many windows and chimneys ; and on the 
 front steps, that seemed freshly coated with pipe-clay, 
 so dazzling white were they, two footmen assisted the 
 arrivals to descend, and ushered them across a hall 
 filled with stuffed birds and fishes, into the long 
 chintz-furnished drawing-room, hung around with 
 water-colors, and littered with modern bibelots, where 
 a grate-fire of coal and wood was burning, despite the 
 warmth of the afternoon. 
 
 " I think my lady must have stepped out into the 
 garden," said the footman, who had been gazing in 
 search of her with a faintly puzzled look into china 
 cabinets and jardinieres. Directly thereafter a pair 
 of glass doors leading into a flowery realm outside 
 flew open, and my lady, carrying a rosy English 
 baby in her arms, ran into the room. 
 
 " You dears, you dears, you dears ! " was what 
 Lucy said; and, kissing them all save Roger, she 
 consoled him by letting him hold the baby.
 
 IV 
 
 ES," said Lucy, "this is my little 
 Alan; and I assure you, if he had 
 been an Edith or a Gwendolyn, I ? d 
 have been much less thought of 
 in the family. Is n't he a duck, 
 Roger? But, there, you may give 
 him to nurse now, and hurry with your tea. I want 
 you out in the garden while it is so warm and lovely. 
 There 's no knowing what a night will bring forth 
 in the way of weather here. Yes, Mrs. Standish; 
 Amaranth Clyde came yesterday with whom do 
 you suppose? your old neighbor in Thirty-third 
 street, Mabel Whitman that was." 
 
 "My dear," interposed Mrs. Standish, helplessly, 
 "did you visit the Whitmans at home?" 
 
 "Oh, dear! no; but she 's Mrs. Lancelot Kirby 
 now, and goes everywhere on this side. The men 
 admire that unearthly whiteness of her skin, and 
 lately she 's got a new pose. She walks with a tor- 
 toise-shell stick, and wears black with lots of jet, and 
 does mind-reading. It takes tremendously. Ama- 
 ranth and she are great chums. Be careful, though, 
 how you speak to Mabel of her former home, and her 
 relatives in New York. She will summon them up by 
 
 46
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 47 
 
 the greatest effort of memory, and call them 'those 
 people/ as if they were subjects of Queen Liliuoka- 
 lani. Toodles, you angel, if you don't eat up all that 
 seed-cake I '11 never believe in you again. You and 
 I '11 go presently to see the pheasants on their nests ; 
 and I 've made Ned promise to send you rook-shoot- 
 ing to-morrow, since there 's nothing else to kill at 
 this season. You might shoot rabbits from your 
 bedroom window, but if you hit one of the gar- 
 dener's men he would n't like it, would he? A let- 
 tuce sandwich, Roger ? How we shall talk about our 
 dear old Billy! And whom have we here besides? 
 Oh, Mr. Lucius Cartwright, our swell New York 
 lawyer, who is abroad on a flying journey for his 
 health; and Paddy Blount, my husband's youngest 
 brother, the nicest boy, who wants you and Billy to 
 take him on the ranch. Our great gun is my hus- 
 band's cousin, Lady Emily Borges, a fine lady of 
 London society, who is out riding with Ned just 
 now. She does n't show up till it 's time to ride or 
 drive in the afternoon. Between you and me, Polly, 
 she is painted like a house-front in town in April. 
 Her follower is Gerald Mortimer. He 's been on the 
 stage, but you need n't bother even thinking about 
 him ; he 's perfectly harmless. Lady Emily is mar- 
 ried to a Brazilian baron, who is at present in Brazil, 
 trying to pick up the remnants of his property that 
 went to pot when their emperor went out. Then 
 let me see just one little cup more, dear Mrs. 
 Standish there 's Mr. Clarkson, who was in our 
 legation at Rome last year. Such a nice fellow, if 
 he did n't look at our own country through the broad
 
 48 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 end of an opera-glass. Take him in hand, Polly, 
 and make him get rid of his nonsense. Ted prefers 
 Americans just now, and so there are n't so many 
 of his pals as usual. Lord Barchester 's coming to- 
 morrow, but Amaranth will want him, and there 's 
 not much chance for the rest of us." 
 
 "And does Lord Barchester want her?" queried 
 Eoger. 
 
 "Nobody knows exactly; but if pork remains 
 steady, Mrs. Clyde has hopes. Now, if you are 
 ready, shall we look at the house first, or go out? 
 Go out ? Yes, I think so, too ; as it is n't my house, 
 I feel less interest in showing off the Gilchrist be- 
 longings. By the way, here I am forgetting my 
 greatest achievement! Sir Piers is in England, at 
 the dower-house, and I 've got him to promise to 
 come to dinner this evening. Polly, let 's have one 
 look at his picture before you go just here, in the 
 hall his living image. Now, can't you see why I 
 am proud of my success?" 
 
 "How did you contrive it?" asked Polly, as they 
 stood under the full-length portrait of a remarkably 
 good-looking young man in shooting-costume, his 
 dog at his heels. 
 
 " Oh, Ted and I were riding yesterday, and stopped 
 at the dower-house for Ted to speak to Sir Piers 
 about drains or something, and he came out to be 
 introduced to me. Don't be jealous, Roger, Ted 
 was not, when I say that our landlord is my ideal 
 of manly beauty, and so nice, and, in spite of all his 
 troubles, hardly older-looking than when this was 
 taken, twenty years ago. Forty-one next birthday,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 49 
 
 so the old village women tell you married, soon 
 after he came of age, to that woman in the white 
 satin court-dress, over the door in the library. Stun- 
 ning, dark, sullen beauty, is n't she! while he is 
 fair and open as the day. If I could, I 'd hang some- 
 thing over her portrait before he comes to-night; 
 but I suppose he is hardened by this time. Seven- 
 teen years since she left him who could mourn 
 over a bad woman seventeen years?" 
 
 " She is dead long since ! " asked Roger. 
 
 " Dead and forgotten. Every one wonders why he 
 does n't marry some heiress, and pull his property 
 together, and live in England, and give his daughter 
 a home. Did I tell you the girl is coming to dinner, 
 too? She was presented at the drawing-room last 
 week, and lie has brought her up here to make ac- 
 quaintance with his place and people. The village 
 people treat the child as if she were a disinherited 
 princess returned to claim her own, and I feel more 
 than ever like a usurper. The Gilchrists are just 
 camping out at Itie dower-house with the old Dame 
 Durden who keeps it, and a maid who came with 
 the girl." 
 
 "Lucy, this is exciting!" cried Polly. ""We Ve 
 met Miss Gilchrist. She is like Hans Andersen's 
 Snow Princess, and I don't believe you can get a 
 word out of her at dinner." 
 
 "We will let Roger take her in," said Lady Ed- 
 mund, merrily. " Now come. To-morrow, if it rains, 
 you may study the Gilchrists, root and branch. If 
 you had seen this old barracks before I took it in 
 hand, and put in a cart-load of rugs and cushions,
 
 50 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 and lighted fires everywhere, and made the gardener 
 furious by ordering in half his plants ! Now it 's a 
 nice enough old place. This way o-oh!" And, 
 while crossing the hall, her ladyship stopped short, 
 cocked her head to one side like a bird, and listened 
 with a ravished smile. 
 
 " What is it, my dear ? " asked Mrs. Standish. 
 
 " Nothing," answered Lucy, blushing. " That is, I 
 heard baby crowing in the nursery up-stairs when 
 they opened the door. Now, Mrs. Standish, dearest, 
 you can understand. Tell me if you really ever saw 
 a finer child than Alan ? " 
 
 She led the way, with her arm in the older lady's, 
 across a green-shorn space beyond which a terraced 
 garden fell away, separated by a little lake from the 
 velvet slopes and wooded hollows of the park. Pass- 
 ing through an iron gateway in a high brick wall 
 to one side, they came into a garden whose inner 
 walls were thick with pear-trees in blossom, with 
 white jasmine, flowering almond, Marechal Niel 
 roses, clematis, purple and white all a mass of 
 luxuriant bloom, the beds otherwise stocked with the 
 homely flowers that make the charm of an English 
 spring. In the glass houses finer fruits and flowers 
 were well on their way to perfection ; and there Lucy, 
 noticing Toodles's enamoured gaze at a row of pots 
 of huge strawberries, joined him in nefarious plun- 
 der of a bunch, with which they ran away down a 
 garden walk, and hid from the gardener to enjoy it. 
 
 "Look here, Lady Lucy," said Toodles, casting 
 around for a title for his friend of earlier days, "you 
 are the first person I 've had to tell about it. I don't 
 think Polly is playing a bit fair with Roger."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 51 
 
 " Why, dear ? " said Lucy, guilelessly. 
 
 " He 's the best fellow I ever saw. He could do 
 anything, and yet he just dawdles around after her, 
 and won't go off with me, no matter how I beg. 
 Nobody can stay always with women, you know, and 
 not get kind o' silly." 
 
 " No, certainly," said Lucy. 
 
 "And that Polly does things no fellow ought to 
 stand. She bosses dreadfully, and interrupts Roger, 
 and cuts him up. I can't see why Roger should want 
 to marry her ; do you 1 No ; you take the last straw- 
 berry" this somewhat bitterly "I should think 
 you 'd know I would n't take it away from a girl." 
 
 "Open your mouth and shut your eyes, and I '11 
 give you something to make you wise, Toodles," she 
 cried ; then, seizing the opportunity of his lips apart 
 for protest, popped between them a rich, red, juicy 
 giant that for the moment silenced him. 
 
 " Is n't it a nice old-granny garden 1 " she said, as 
 the others came up with them. " And here beyond 
 is the far-famed "Wooton Magna court for bowls, 
 where we '11 find some of them having their tea." 
 
 A step through an iron gateway flanked by pea- 
 cocks cut from yew, and, behold ! they were in the 
 eighteenth century. In this green-walled close the 
 grass was wonderfully fine, and smooth, and thick. 
 Some preceding generation had set in the middle of 
 it a now moss-grown sun-dial, and planted in the 
 borders a row of standard rose-bushes. At one end 
 an arbor dripping with purple wistaria contained a 
 wicker tea-table, around which fair women and some 
 men were grouped in the westering sunshine. 
 
 The spot, the tall silver urn, the fluted china cups
 
 52 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 that came and went under the superintendence of 
 my lady's footmen, belonged to the period of patch 
 and powder; bnt of the fag-end of the nineteenth 
 century were the people, their ways and talk. 
 
 Mrs. Lancelot Kirby, a pallid, muse-like personage, 
 who wore her hair drawn in night-black bands over 
 her ears, stopped in her talk with Amaranth Clyde 
 and Mr. Cartwright to give a nod and two fingers 
 to her old neighbors from West Thirty-third street. 
 That she was handsomer, better dressed, than Mabel 
 Whitman ever had been, that she had toned down, 
 adopted the soft English speech, was much to Mrs. 
 Kirby's credit. And Mrs. Standish, who had made 
 up her conservative mind to let Mabel at once know 
 she was not to be imposed upon by exotic airs and 
 graces, found the attempt a distinct failure. 
 
 As for Amaranth, she might have been " born any- 
 body," her admirers were wont to say. Her small 
 head, set on a long, white throat, had the features of a 
 certain Greek goddess in the Lateran museum. Her skin 
 was fine and pure of grain ; her brown locks, knotted 
 lightly behind, were silken soft ; the lines of her form 
 perfect. How could such a creature come from pro- 
 genitors whose proudest boast was that they could 
 put a pig in at one end of a machine, and bring him 
 out ham, chine, spare-ribs, or sausages at the other ? 
 
 Yet here was Miss Amaranth, forsooth, prating 
 about the drawing-room, the Row, the good ball and 
 the bad ball, the habits and haunts of duchesses, the 
 late sayings to her of royalty ! She spoke kindly to 
 Mrs. Standish and Polly, however, but was a trifle 
 cool to Roger. Was not Lord Barchester to arrive 
 upon the morrow ?
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 53 
 
 Between these two charmers, sitting well back in a 
 Market Harborough chair, balancing his egg-shell 
 tea-cup with a plate containing buttered brown bread, 
 as deftly as he had balanced the lawsuits that made 
 him rich and famous, was Mr. Cartwright. It was the 
 first time in years that he had been fairly out of har- 
 ness for an acknowledged holiday, and he had run 
 down from London to spend three days with his client 
 Lady Edmund Blount, wooed by the information that 
 other pretty Americans were to be of the party. 
 For Mr. Cartwright, like many another grave and 
 reverend signer, had found out, near the end of the 
 long, hard struggle for fame and fortune in New York, 
 that there are apples of Hesperides to be had for the 
 plucking. He might mention Lady Blount's house, 
 husband, baby, in his weekly letters to Mrs. Cart- 
 wright and the girls, but we question whether he 
 would tell about this rather ponderous little flirtation 
 he had struck up with Mabel Kirby. As good Mrs. 
 Cartwright innocently said to her friends at home, 
 " There is so much he can do on the other side that 
 he can't do here, poor love." 
 
 Into the keeping of Lord Patrick, a kindly, long- 
 legged, red-headed youth in flannels, Master Toodles 
 was consigned for a visit to stables, kennels, and keep- 
 ers' cottages. As they went off across the long shad- 
 ows cast by great trees upon the turf outside the 
 bowling-court, Toodles was surprised by the request 
 from an approaching menial for his keys, which he 
 surrendered in silence, determined not to let " that 
 lord fellow " see that he was not " up to everything." 
 It was a relief to him, later, to find in a yellow room, 
 like the heart of a sunflower, assigned to him in the
 
 54 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 bachelor's wing, that his "belongings were unpacked 
 and neatly disposed in drawers and wardrobe, whilst 
 on the bed lay his evening clothes an attention not 
 paid Toodles since he was valeted by his old nurse 
 Bridget, who, however, never thought of putting the 
 buttons in his shirt. 
 
 Mrs. Standish fell into conversation with Mr. Clark- 
 son, whom she had seen latterly in Rome. Roger and 
 Lucy walked away down a " pleached alley," he to tell, 
 she to hear, about her twin brother in Wyoming. To 
 Polly remained the alternative of joining in conver- 
 sation with the two women and Mr. Cartwright, or 
 (which she attempted) of making it for the benefit of 
 the esthetic Mortimer, who had " been on the stage," 
 and whom she was n't to " bother thinking about." 
 From this intellectual banquet she soon turned, satis- 
 fied, to hear what Mr. Cartwright had to say. 
 
 "It is such a sensible, commendable affair, this 
 five-o'clock tea," that gentleman was remarking, his 
 clear-cut, shrewd face, relaxed in every line, looking 
 from his cup to the beautiful scene about him, then 
 back to the smiling faces turned upon him. " I '11 de- 
 clare, I am perfectly in love with it " 
 
 Here he stopped suddenly. Memory, the pitiless 
 one, had conjured up into the mind's eye of the dis- 
 tinguished American a vision of the tea-table spread 
 religiously by Mrs. Cartwright and the girls in the 
 front parlor of their brownstone house in New York. 
 To this, on arriving from the nearest station of the 
 elevated railway, jaded and captious after a long 
 day in court, with a bundle of papers in his pocket, 
 and his hat a little back upon his head, how often had
 
 AN EKKANT WOOING 55 
 
 he been bidden by the domestic deities ; and how often 
 had he turned away with the remark, " I should think, 
 Maria, by this time you 'd know better than to offer 
 me that stuff ! " 
 
 " I may tell you a rather droll experience of a client 
 of mine on his first visit to England ? " he hastened to 
 observe. " He is a worthy, estimable man, with a 
 keen sense of the ludicrous, and a limited experience 
 in the customs of the leisure class of society. A 
 banker, to whom he was accredited in London in a 
 matter of business, invited him to pass the night at 
 his country house. Arriving at the station late on a 
 winter's afternoon, my friend was driven a couple of 
 miles through a frosty atmosphere to his entertainer's 
 house. Received with all civility, he found the house- 
 hold at tea around a welcome fire, where, standing up 
 to thaw out, he consumed two cups of tea, a few thin 
 slices of bread and butter, a cheese-straw, and a bit 
 of cake, without feeling his appetite appeased. Soon 
 after, seeing the company break up, one by one taking 
 a candle from a table in the hall and gliding away, 
 my client, supposing this to mean bedtime, was led 
 off by a servant. He was ushered into a most com- 
 fortable room, fire burning, easy-chair, all that could 
 be desired, where, after a few moments' indulgence 
 in melancholy reflection upon the frugal notions of 
 British householders as to an evening meal, he un- 
 dressed and went to bed. He had hardly fallen asleep 
 when he was aroused by the noise of a gong, and a 
 touch upon his shoulder by a servant : ' Beg pardon, 
 sir, but the dinner is just served.'" 
 
 " Is that true ? " asked Mabel Kirby.
 
 56 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " Absolutely true." 
 
 " I should think Mr. Cartwright would have more 
 pride than to tell such ridiculous things about one 
 of our own countrymen," whispered Mrs. Standish to 
 Clarkson, who quite agreed with her. 
 
 "Luckily, we are all Americans here," Polly re- 
 marked, overlooking the shadowy Mortimer. 
 
 "Oh, so you are!" said Mrs. Kirby, languidly. 
 " Do go on, dear Mr. Cartwright, and tell me some 
 more of your droll American anecdotes. I am mak- 
 ing a collection of them to amuse Lord Kenmore 
 when we go to Kirkington. Sometimes I can't be- 
 lieve that I was ever really over there in New York. 
 It entertains me to hear about it, really it does." 
 
 " It 's your turn, now, to entertain me. Don't you 
 know what Emerson says ? ' In the art of conversa- 
 tion woman is the lawgiver.' " 
 
 "Emerson 1 ? Is he one of your funny men, who 
 travel about and have dinners given them, and peo- 
 ple tell their jokes over again in country houses?" 
 asked Mrs. Kirby, prettily. 
 
 "I '11 forgive you, Mabel," said the lawyer. "A 
 few nights ago an Englishwoman informed me that 
 Longfellow is the one of the English poets she likes 
 best ; and I recently had the honor of meeting one of 
 your new compatriots, a young lady of high position, 
 who said to me she had never been inside Westmin- 
 ster Abbey much less the Tower of London." 
 
 " When you begin to call to account poor creatures 
 who are in the treadmill of society, it is time for me 
 to leave," said Mrs. Kirby. "Reach me my stick,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 67 
 
 please, Mr. Mortimer. I 'm going to get a little rest 
 for the strain on me this evening. Of course you 
 all know Lucy 's been lucky enough to secure Miss 
 Chester, the mind-reader, to come for a night, and 
 she is to give us an exhibition after dinner. 
 
 "Delightful rubbish!" said Mr. Cartwright. 
 
 "For shame, dear Mr. Cartwright! I thought, from 
 the way you talked of it last night, you were a com- 
 plete convert to my views." 
 
 "I talked of it as the young man who had spent 
 several years in informing himself about the Cau- 
 casus talked with Mr. Gladstone on that subject. 
 After the interview was over, Mr. Gladstone said he 
 had never met any one who knew so much about 
 the Caucasus as this visitor. Man said he had n't 
 once opened his mouth!" 
 
 "But you will promise me to give the matter 
 thought and close attention," pursued Mrs. Kirby, 
 with the important insistence dull people often use 
 to impose their insignificance on clever ones. 
 
 " Yes ; oh, yes. Anything you ask me, Mabel, with 
 that pretty mouth. But I may as well warn you that, 
 in this business of communion with the unseen that 's 
 agitating both stupid and sensible folk nowadays, I 
 heartily indorse a saying of an American woman 
 that deserves to be embalmed : ' If my dead relatives 
 will come to me only through the crack in the brain 
 of an epileptic, I don't want to converse with them.' *' 
 
 " Oh, but I won't be offended. You must talk more 
 with me, and know Miss Chester, and you '11 believe," 
 said Mabel, as with much movement she arose, and,
 
 58 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 leaning on the tortoise-shell stick, went off across the 
 turf with Mr. Mortimer, who at least knew how to 
 lend himself to a pose. 
 
 "I could hardly keep my feelings in/ 7 remarked 
 Mrs. Standish, to whom Mr. Cartwright now turned. 
 " What an absurd creature she has become ! Only 
 three years since she married and came here to live. 
 And never to ask after her aunt and her own first 
 cousins, when she knows they live next door to us in 
 New York!" 
 
 "Fortunately, she has time to live down her fol- 
 lies," answered Mr. Cartwright, who, now that he was 
 deserted by youth and beauty, had lost his enam- 
 oured smile, and was businesslike again. 
 
 Next came upon the scene their host and his cousin 
 Lady Emily. 
 
 It was no wonder to Lucy's friends that she had 
 fallen romantically in love with Teddy Blount, who 
 had an Irish way with him few people could resist; 
 always ready for a laugh, a game, a jest, a lilt, his 
 honest eyes meeting his interlocutor's squarely, his 
 voice clear and hearty, with just a little something 
 in it to suggest his forebears in Erin. 
 
 Lady Emily, the first specimen of a London fine 
 lady with whom Polly had been thrown in familiar 
 intercourse, had the square shoulders, flat back, 
 steady, imperial walk of her class ; but her unnat- 
 urally high bloom, small waist, and darkened eyes 
 suggested a "little" lady of the Bois or the Cas- 
 cine rather than one of England's great. That she 
 smoked cigarettes, used at moments more than strong 
 language, made her luncheon on grilled bones with
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 59 
 
 Scotch whisky and soda, rode splendidly to hounds, 
 boasted of her eleven stone two in weight and her 
 five foot ten in height, and out-flirted any woman in 
 the party, were details to be revealed to the further 
 confusion of Mrs. Standish's Puritan spirit. Just 
 now it was quite enough for her when she heard 
 Lady Emily, who, to her knowledge, had met Mr. 
 Cartwright for the first time only the night before, 
 salute him as " good old boy," and ask him to pour 
 her out a cup of tea. 
 
 For Mr. Cartwright, to whom all was fish that 
 came into his belated net, the sensation was rather 
 a pleasing titillation. At any rate, he laughed and 
 obeyed, going off with Lady Emily afterward for a 
 stroll in the garden, while Mrs. Standish gave up 
 battling with thoughts of what Mrs. Cartwright and 
 the girls would say, and remained astonished in her 
 wicker chair. 
 
 It was in bright sunlight that they dressed for 
 dinner, set for eight o'clock. Polly, in her little 
 white bower of dimity and old mahogany opening 
 from the room assigned to her mama, dawdled, and, 
 leaning from the window, let her eyes plunge into 
 the dewy distance of the park, watching the play- 
 ful rabbits that came out of their burrows to disport 
 on the velvet carpet of turf around the house. What 
 seclusion, what verdure, what grand old trees ! 
 
 To-morrow Lucy and she were to drive Toodles 
 and Lord Patrick to the rookery, and leave them 
 there to shoot. How nice to get away with Lucy 
 from this set of unreal people, so fantastic in their 
 assumption of something to which they were not
 
 60 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 born! And then her mind reverted to and toyed 
 with the image of the English maiden, so fair and 
 shy, whose rightful home this was. What a way, to 
 come back after long years of exile, and find it pos- 
 sessed by a chattering crew who hold nothing in 
 respect ! 
 
 "Poor child!" mused Polly. "It almost makes 
 me cry. I shall be nice to her. She shall be mine 
 after dinner in the drawing-room. It will please 
 Lucy to have me take care of her. And I am really 
 curious to see that father, though he will be less 
 attractive, naturally. A widower of forty-one may 
 be interesting to his tenants, but hardly to anybody 
 else." 
 
 Polly was behindhand. The voice of Toodles at 
 her door, inquiring frantically if she would pin his 
 white tie at the back, as his mother had already gone 
 down-stairs, brought her to a sense of her derelic- 
 tion. She made Toodles wait for her in the vestibule 
 with its swing-doors of baize that shut off their 
 rooms from a longer corridor. As the brother and 
 sister ran along this passageway together, they were 
 overtaken by Lady Edmund. 
 
 " I 'm late, too ; but never mind : come in one min- 
 ute, and see baby before he goes to sleep. I don't 
 doubt we '11 find Ted in there, too; I heard him 
 leave his room five minutes since. Here," opening 
 a door, "is n't this a jolly nursery? Oh, Ted! I 
 knew you were there. Give me my blessed son. 
 Don't you see he 's crumpling your shirt-front? 
 And, besides, whenever he can get you he won't 
 come to me."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 61 
 
 Warmed by this little glimpse of unaffected na- 
 ture, Polly ran down the stairs in the wake of Lucy ; 
 and, looking in at the library door, she saw, in the 
 fuller light of lamps, the splendid, sullen beauty of 
 the last mistress of Wooton Magna gaze down at her 
 with a look almost of menace in her eye. 
 
 A moment later they were in the drawing-room, 
 and Lucy's attention was claimed by some neighbors 
 who had driven to dinner from eight miles distant 
 (fetching their footman to help to wait, after the 
 friendly old county fashion). Directly afterward 
 arrived the rector and his wife, a high-nosed lady 
 wearing a black satin gown of which the front pre- 
 sented a parterre of marguerites painted in oils. 
 Mrs. Trefusis, who also wore white silk mittens, 
 came of a noble family, wrote sweet books for girls, 
 and was to be placed on the left side of her host, 
 Lady Emily Borges taking the seat of honor. And 
 then all eyes centered upon the unpretending en- 
 trance of the owner of Wooton Magna. 
 
 Polly had immediate reason to withdraw her deci- 
 sion that Sir Piers lacked interest save as a landlord. 
 He was without doubt the most striking figure her 
 gaze had ever rested upon: blond, of great height, 
 of athletic person, his face giving an impression of 
 manly force and boyish simplicity rare among the 
 representatives of a similar class in her own coun- 
 try, exhaling straightforwardness, she said to her- 
 self while trying to find a phrase, and so youthful 
 it was hard to imagine the pink-tinted blossom at his 
 elbow had put out from his parent stem. 
 
 Miss Gilchrist, in a white Liberty-silk frock tied
 
 62 AN EKEANT WOOING 
 
 with a yellow sash, looked like a Christmas card. 
 When Roger, obedient to a nod from his hostess, 
 tucked her under his arm, and fell into the long 
 line ending with Toodles and Paddy Blount, he sent 
 a glance, which she well understood, to Paulina in 
 custody of a neighboring young squire. 
 
 The table, decked with primroses in a geometrical 
 pattern of flowers and leaves laid upon the cloth, 
 having bunches of primroses in pale-green glasses 
 between candles with pale-green shades, was scanned 
 by the artistic and political bias of the company with 
 approbation. In the midst of the light discussion 
 that ensued, Polly looked about her with curiosity. 
 
 There was Amaranth, easily the most beautiful 
 woman present, sitting on the other side of Lord 
 Barchester, who had taken in his hostess. Polly 
 wondered whence her young countrywoman had 
 procured her adaptability to the mood of the impor- 
 tant newcomer, who, after a few words with Lucy, 
 had settled down to the business of letting himself be 
 talked at by Miss Clyde. Of his lordship's conversa- 
 tion she caught one sentence only. 
 
 " I wish somebody would tell me why, when most 
 Englishwomen are free, Frenchwomen freer, you 
 Americans are so devilish prudish," he observed; 
 and although the response of Amaranth was inau- 
 dible, Polly felt its fine effect in the manner of a 
 startled fawn that accompanied it. 
 
 "Amaranth is really immensely clever. She knows so 
 well how not to show it," she found herself thinking. 
 
 Mabel Kirby, having left off her jet by day (a 
 good deal of it) and put on her jet by night, had
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 63 
 
 come out in some sparkling black stuff with a great 
 crescent of diamonds above her dusky head, and was 
 giving the benefit of this, her expanse of milk-white 
 shoulders, and her views on thought-transfer, to the 
 rector, who, emitting no suggestion of theology, ate 
 everything and drank everything within reach, and 
 invited his neighbor to a game of billiards after 
 dinner. That Mabel felt rather than saw the stern 
 scorn of the lady of the painted marguerites opposite, 
 assuredly did not decrease her efforts to render the 
 situation agreeable to his Reverence. 
 
 " Now you are looking bored," she said. " I must 
 think of something in your line to amuse you. I 
 heard last week about a dean who asked a Sunday- 
 school child what proof we have of St. Peter's re- 
 pentance, and received for an answer, 'Please, sir, 
 he crowed three times.' And of course you know 
 this : ' Little boy, what is an epistle ? ' ' An epistle 
 is the wife of an apostle.' There, I have exhausted 
 my clerical anecdotes ; but don't laugh, please ; your 
 wife is not at all satisfied with me. We are talking 
 of Sunday-schools, dear Mrs. Trefusis," she added, 
 raising her voice. " Your husband has been telling 
 me about his nice little choir of village boys, who 
 stick pins in each other's calves while he is preaching. 
 What dears they must be ! " 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Cartwright to his host, " I am told 
 that old Moe't, of Moet & Chandon, once said to a 
 visitor: 'You English are the driest people in the 
 world. The Russians are the sweetest; next to them, 
 Prussians ; then the French and Belgians ; then the 
 Americans; and you English are the driest." 7
 
 64 AN EKRANT WOOINO 
 
 " It may be true, but is that very polite to tlie Eng- 
 lish, Mr. Cartwright?" whispered Mrs. Standish, in 
 mild rebuke. 
 
 "God bless me, madam! he meant in the matter 
 of champagnes," blurted her countryman, turning 
 around to look at a literal American. 
 
 The snow maiden had thawed so far as to say to 
 Roger : 
 
 " Piers my father I don't know why, but I have 
 always called him by his name says that I have not 
 been in this room since I was two years old, sixteen 
 years ago, so of course I don't remember it. He has 
 often told me about the pictures and these great 
 girandoles that his grandfather bought in Venice. 
 I feel as if I had dreamed the girandoles. Oh, I 
 have had a happy day! Piers took me to see all 
 the village people, and they were so kind and nice. 
 They have told me so much about him, but nothing 
 about my mother. I don't even know which is her 
 portrait. She died when I was a baby, I believe. I 
 am so wanting dinner to be over, that I may ask 
 Lady Edmund to show me my mother's portrait. 
 Lady Edmund says I am to take luncheon to-morrow 
 with Miss Standish, and play with the baby. If all 
 Americans are like Lady Edmund and Miss Standish, 
 I love them. How dreadful it will be to go away 
 from the dower-house to London ; but Piers must go 
 back to Spain. In summer he goes up and lives with 
 the shepherds in the Hautes- Pyrenees, and in winter 
 he lives in towns, or shoots in Morocco, or travels ; 
 his home is in Granada, where he has a little villa. 
 Do you think I might tell you that he says I am to
 
 AN EKBANT WOOING 65 
 
 go there next year, without my aunt, and visit him ? 
 It is on the side of a steep hill, and there are oranges 
 and lemons and myrtles and palms growing in his 
 garden and a studio inside, modeled exactly after 
 a room in the Alhambra. Every window of his villa 
 looks on the Alhambra walls, or else on the Vega, 
 and the great white, glittering sierra. Do you think 
 I am telling you too much? Would Miss Standish 
 tell this to a stranger?" 
 
 Roger, by whom the foregoing information had 
 been extracted at first in bits, afterward in a timid 
 ripple, found something curiously touching in the 
 confidences of this young person, so utterly removed 
 in habit of thought and expression from the other 
 women at the table. Her eye, meeting his, was that 
 of a pretty frightened animal venturing forth trust- 
 fully in the presence of one who has inspired in it 
 confidence. Out of the shadow of the formidable 
 Lady Watson-Jones, she had taken heart to arise, as 
 a grass-shoot raises itself when a stone has been 
 rolled away. So during the remainder of the dinner 
 he talked to her exclusively, to the disgust of Lady 
 Emily Borges, who had made up her mind that this 
 stalwart American young man offered food for pas- 
 time until her return to town the rector, who was 
 on the other hand of Miss G-ilchrist, having, as has 
 been seen, enough to occupy him fully. 
 
 Polly's bright eyes, noting these things, were re- 
 claimed to her neighbor on the right by the voice 
 of Sir Piers in her ear. 
 
 " May n't I show you the menu ? " was his remark 
 while extending to her the white porcelain plaque
 
 66 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 exhibiting the penciled bill of fare. "No? Then, 
 please, a bit of toast," and a silver rack followed. 
 " You see, I am particular to neglect nothing conven- 
 tional. I don't want you to go up-stairs and write in 
 your diary, ' Met a mad Englishman, who lives on a 
 mountain-top in Spain and kept the toast to himself 
 at table.' Was n't it a stroke of genius for our hostess 
 to send me in with Mrs. Tref usis, then separate us by 
 the whole length of the table ? It was like a reprieve 
 at the moment of execution. Now, I 'm not going 
 to begin by asking you about your country, because 
 I 've been over it from Canada to Mexico; and I 
 spent a season in Central America, and have made a 
 little run into South America. But I 'm going to 
 hope you are pleased with ours. I know you have 
 been taking observations, for I 've watched you off 
 and on ever since we sat down. I know your name 
 too, but not your middle initial. Laurence Oliphant 
 once told me that to get to know Americans to their 
 middle initials is the height of Yankee intimacy." 
 
 " And that speech, I suppose, is what you and Lau- 
 rence Oliphant would call the height of British po- 
 liteness," she said. 
 
 " There, I 've offended you ; I knew I should. I 
 told May, coming here, that I 'd be sure to throw a 
 stone to break somebody's windows among all you 
 Americans." 
 
 " Once for all, if we are to do nothing but fence 
 about England and America, I 'd rather not talk to 
 you." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " It 's stupid, it 's fruitless, and, besides, it 's out of 
 date."
 
 AN ERKANT WOOING 67 
 
 " Go on. I like this. Lady Edmund says you illus- 
 trate the best type of girl in your society that you 
 are a voice, an influence." 
 
 " An influence I may be, but a voice for you no 
 longer," Polly said, the color coming up into her face, 
 as she deliberately turned away from him, irate at his 
 cool tone, the mocking light of his eyes. 
 
 " She won't listen to me," he said, with pretended 
 misery, to Lady Edmund. 
 
 " Nobody is listened to nowadays," Lucy answered. 
 " But perhaps you did not show her sufficient defer- 
 ence. Miss Standish is accustomed to it at home, I 
 can tell you. But I must n't forget to say that we 
 have a request to proffer to you, to lend two or three 
 of your Old Cromes to the exhibition of early British 
 artists in Bond street next month. My husband 
 thinks it a pity to hide such treasures, and he has a 
 man who will see that they are cared for whilst they 
 are in town. Of course it 's for you to say." 
 
 " Just as you like. I have n't even a list of the 
 pictures," he said, a sudden hardening of manner no- 
 ticeable. " I remember I 'd an offer for that i Mill and 
 Cart-horses ' by Old Crome, once ; but though I was 
 hard up, as usual, I could n't consent to sell that." 
 
 " You paint, yourself ? " 
 
 " Not to set the world afire. To amuse myself, I Ve 
 a studio in my house in Granada ; and I make sketches 
 in Morocco every spring." 
 
 " Mercy ! they Ve done talking, down at that end of 
 the table ; and Emily Borges is looking bored out of 
 her wits because I don't move," cried Lucy, making 
 furtive dives in her lap for gloves and handkerchief. 
 
 " Before you go, will you do me a favor ? " he said
 
 68 AN EKEANT WOOING 
 
 in a low voice. " I have told May that you will show 
 her the the portrait that used to hang over the door 
 in the library. It is nothing but a shade to anybody 
 now, but I could n't bring her to this house and re- 
 fuse her request to see it." 
 
 " I understand/ 7 said Lucy, with quick tact, hurry- 
 ing away. 
 
 When the ladies passed through the door, held open 
 by Paddy Blount, Mrs. Standish reclaimed her off- 
 spring, who, standing there in his dinner-jacket and 
 white tie, looked altogether too grown up to be 
 allowed further privileges of manhood. 
 
 Toodles, after silent remonstrance, submitted to be 
 led away, and at the drawing-room door was captured 
 by Lucy, who told him to take Miss Gilchrist to see 
 the aviary, where she would join them presently. 
 
 " I '11 go too," said Paulina. She was already tired 
 of the women, to whose unrelieved society she must 
 otherwise look forward ; and she felt little interest in 
 the mind-reader, Miss Chester, who, arriving late, had 
 dined alone, and was ready for her seance. 
 
 The two girls and Toodles progressed well toward 
 acquaintanceship, Paulina deciding that the skim of 
 ice over May's manner was the result of entire sim- 
 plicity of nature rather than a predisposition to resent 
 advances. In the soft lingering light, they walked 
 back and forth on a flagged path behind the house, 
 listening to the nightingales' trill in the thicket, and 
 talking, till Lady Edmund came to fulfil her promise 
 to Sir Piers. 
 
 "Will you come with me, dear, into the library?" 
 she said to May.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 69 
 
 "Oh, am I to see to see her?" exclaimed the girl, 
 clasping her hands like a young religious devotee, and 
 coloring crimson. 
 
 " Come too, Polly," added Lucy, a little alarmed. 
 " It is this one," she went on, when they stopped un- 
 der the lady in satin court costume. With all her 
 facility in words, she could find nothing more to say. 
 
 " My mother ! " the girl cried, stretching her arms 
 upward by an involuntary movement 5 then, drop- 
 ping them as suddenly, she turned, and threw her- 
 self upon Lucy's breast, sobbing, "I don't think she 
 smiles at me." 
 
 "Take her out in the walk a little while, again, 
 Polly dear," said Lucy, much troubled. 
 
 "And this is our piece of still-life," meditated 
 Lady Edmund, returning to her guests. "Oh! good 
 gracious! To think that woman ever held the poor 
 thing in her arms, and felt what I feel for baby, and 
 then left her ! No wonder they 've kept her a secret 
 from her child ! " 
 
 Following out which train of thought, the little 
 mother ran up-stairs, and swooped down upon her 
 heir, slumbering in his crib, for an act of adoration 
 that relieved her overburdened heart.
 
 HEN the men came into the draw- 
 ing-room after dinner, Mabel Kirby 
 and her new annex, Miss Chester, 
 the mind-reader, occupied, in the- 
 atrical parlance, the center of the 
 stage. 
 
 Lord Edmund, who was much interested in a talk 
 with Roger Woodbury about the wonders of irriga- 
 tion in our Western desert lands, did not welcome 
 being ordered by his wife to sit down, keep silence, 
 and give his whole mind to what he was about to see. 
 "The women are all daft about this medium, 
 Woodbury. It reminds me of what you told us just 
 now. Lucy dear, have you heard Woodbury's story 
 about Brigham Young taking a lot of his wives to 
 see a performance of the ' Lady of Lyons ' at the 
 theater in Salt Lake City? Capital story, I '11 
 swear." 
 
 " Tell me quick," said Lucy, pausing in her work of 
 adjusting the audience. 
 
 ''Oh, when the prophet understood the plot of the 
 play, he just got up and left, saying he 'd be blessed 
 if he 'd stay there and see such a fuss made over one 
 woman." 
 
 70
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 71 
 
 " For shame, Ted ! " said his wife, smiling, though 
 not relenting in her purpose; and the host dropped 
 into an easy-chair, stuck his legs out before him, and 
 looked frankly miserable until the seance was over. 
 
 There was the usual blindfold search for pins, 
 rings, and cards, hidden by some one in the room 
 whilst Miss Chester was out of it ; the usual passes 
 from side to side of the medium's arms as she groped 
 her way successfully to the concealed object; the 
 usual applause ; and when Miss Chester, looking pale 
 and interesting, dropped into her chair to rest, Mabel 
 Kirby, who could not consent to be long left out of 
 public notice, raised her voice: 
 
 "I hope everybody understands that I have no- 
 thing at all to do with Miss Chester's success," she 
 said affectedly. 
 
 "Nobody suspected you for a moment," observed 
 Lady Emily. 
 
 " When there is another medium present, I make it 
 a point to keep my intelligence absolutely in check," 
 she went on, unabashed. 
 
 " How admirably you succeed ! " returned her foe. 
 
 " Now, if you will give me again your close atten- 
 tion," interposed Miss Chester's soft, weary voice, " I 
 will ask some gentleman present you, if you will 
 be so kind" stopping before Sir Piers Gilchrist, 
 who stood behind Paddy Blount and open-eyed Mas- 
 ter Standish, at the fireplace " to permit me to read 
 the thoughts that are now passing in his mind. I ask 
 you to retain those thoughts ; to let me put my hands 
 on your wrists and on your forehead. I will then 
 communicate the result to the company, or to any
 
 72 
 
 friends you may select. I should like to tell you that 
 you are entirely unknown to me ; that I arrived here 
 this afternoon, knowing nobody in the house. Par- 
 don me, ladies and gentlemen; I see some of you 
 smiling. If you are not serious, I can do nothing 
 absolutely nothing." 
 
 There was intense stillness in the room. Care- 
 lessly, and with entire incredulity, Sir Piers dropped 
 into a chair. Carefully, strainingly, perspiration com- 
 ing out on her broad white brow, Miss Chester went 
 through the promised manipulations ; then sat, cover- 
 ing her eyes with her hands, in a corner. 
 
 "I am ready now. To whom shall I speak?" she 
 asked in an unnatural whisper. 
 
 "To Mr. Cartwright and me, I think," said Lucy, 
 coming forward ; and taking her by the hand, she led 
 her, with Sir Piers, into the adjoining room. Lucy, 
 with everybody else, was astonished at the .change 
 wrought in Gilehrist by what Mr. Cartwright called 
 "unmeaning mummery." He looked dazed, broken, 
 as if a weight had been rolled upon him. May, who 
 just then came in at the door with Paulina, ran to- 
 ward him, asking if he were ill, but was not answered 
 as he hastened away. 
 
 "Miss Chester begs to be excused," said Lady 
 Edmund, at last returning with the lawyer. "She 
 has done enough for her strength to-night; and Mr. 
 Cartwright and I are convinced that she has done 
 too much for some of the rest of us. Sir Piers has 
 gone with the butler to get a drop of brandy." 
 
 "But the answer, the revelation?" cried several 
 eager voices.
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 73 
 
 " I can only say that, for the hit-or-miss guesswork 
 of an anemic and hysteric female, it was the cleverest 
 thing I ever heard," answered Mr. Cartwright. 
 
 "Don't ask me. It was wonderful wonderful," 
 said Lucy, quite overcome. 
 
 "And we are to have nothing more?" said Ama- 
 ranth Clyde, pouting; "just when Lord Barchester 
 was getting himself in the state to be interpreted?" 
 
 " Are n't you a little premature, my dear girl ? " 
 said Lady Emily in her ear. " Chi va piano, va sano, 
 remember. After this, Mabel Kirby, with her little 
 cheap-Jack tricks, will be nowhere." 
 
 "Paulina, listen," said Lady Blount, coming into 
 her guest's room, in her dressing-gown, that night. 
 " The strangest part of Miss Chester's divination was 
 that she mentioned you in connection with what was 
 passing in Sir Piers's mind. Now, you know she 
 never saw or heard of you. Directly after dinner 
 you went out on the terrace. But she described you 
 accurately." 
 
 " What on earth could he have been thinking about 
 me? That I thought him very saucy and tiresome, 
 I hope." 
 
 " She did not quite grasp your connection with his 
 thoughts, and Sir Piers would not help her. Of 
 course, as everybody must have guessed, she told 
 him he was thinking about his wife, and their first 
 arrival in that room after their marriage things 
 that could not have been at all pleasant for him to 
 have Mr. Cartwright and me hear." 
 
 "Lucy, it is absurd your looking so awe-stricken. 
 Go to bed ; let Sir Piers and the seeress, who, I am
 
 74 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 happy to hear, returns to town by the 9:30 to-mor- 
 row, manage their own mysteries. They can't con- 
 cern me, and I 'm awfully sleepy. Unless Sir Piers 
 keeps an ancestral ghost in the arras of this dear lit- 
 tle white room you 've given me, I expect never to 
 think of him again." 
 
 "ANOTHER fine day, miss," said her mother's 
 maid, who brought Paulina's letters and a cup of tea 
 betimes next morning to her bedside. Declining the 
 tea, and glancing hastily at the correspondence, Miss 
 Standish enjoyed her tub and her toilet, as a right- 
 minded person does who has slept the sleep of per- 
 fect health. 
 
 Glimpses from the window at park and gardens 
 made her quicken her movements in the desire to get 
 out into the beautiful green world. In the dining- 
 room a few people were having what Mrs. Standish 
 called a "hugger-mugger" breakfast jumping up 
 with their plates to carve for themselves slices of 
 cold ham or lamb on the side table ; diving down to 
 the covered dishes before the fire to secure hot kid- 
 neys, fish, or bacon; and laying hold, across the 
 table, of eggs, butter, scones, and marmalade. 
 
 "I '11 declare," said Mrs. Standish to herself, "I 
 think it would be nicer to sit still and have servants 
 to wait, as we do. This is like eating in a gale of 
 wind." 
 
 " You see, my wife has taught us your American 
 way of beginning with hominy porridge or grits 
 how do you call them f Only we have n't quite the 
 hang of cooking it," said Lord Edmund, coming back
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 75 
 
 with her plate, with which he had been careering 
 about the room in search of provand. 
 
 " Ted, toss me a scone," cried Lady Emily, who sat, 
 in her habit, on the other side of the table. 
 
 "All right. Catch," said Lord Edmund, briefly; 
 and to Mrs. Standish's horror, the desired dainty was 
 neatly sent sailing through the air, to land in Lady 
 Emily's bread-and-butter plate. 
 
 "Well played!" exclaimed Toodles, with irresisti- 
 ble satisfaction. 
 
 " And to think, Polly," the lad said, when he went 
 out on the flagged walk with his sister to await Lord 
 Edmund and Lord Patrick, who were to show Pau- 
 lina the pheasants, "how awfully well we have to 
 behave when they come to see us ! But, you know, I 
 think these English fellows are the nicest men I ever 
 saw, except Roger. They are so kind and jolly, and 
 they have such pleasant voices. Did I tell you 
 Pa'ddy Blount says he '11 stop in New York and see 
 us, if we want him, when he goes out to the ranch ? 
 Of course we want him. He says he 's nearly stone- 
 broke, and his governor won't stand any more, and 
 Ted 's going to give him the cash to get to the States 
 upon. And Paddy " 
 
 " Do you call him that, Toodles ? " 
 
 "Oh, of course he made me, first thing. Every- 
 body does. He told me about Eton and Oxford and 
 about a master he had when he was my size that 
 flogged him, but of course he did n't ' blub ' ; and he 
 calls a sling-shot a ' catapult'; and he thinks North 
 and South America are the same, I believe. He 
 don't know much, that 's certain, except ridin' and
 
 76 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 shootin' and huntin' ; but I think Paddy 's bully, all 
 the same. Here he comes. We '11 go ahead, and 
 you can walk along after, with Lord Edmund." 
 
 In a wood near the head keeper's cottage they 
 found an array of boxes containing the setting phea- 
 sants, many of them so tamed by petting from the 
 keeper's children as to peck food from the visitor's 
 hand. 
 
 "They '11 be wild enough when the young ones 
 get out into the woods," said Lord Edmund. "Be- 
 fore the shooting-season sets in they are practically 
 wild birds." 
 
 "All the same, it seems to me very inglorious 
 sport," ventured Polly. "Oh! I beg your pardon; 
 I '11 never say that again." 
 
 " If you '11 come to us then, you '11 see whether it 's 
 inglorious," returned the proprietor, good-humoredly. 
 " Now, if you '11 allow me, as I Ve an appointment 
 with Sir Piers at 10:30, I '11 stroll with you through 
 what we call the ' Pheasants' Walk,' and we '11 let my 
 wife drive around and pick you up at the dower- 
 house, as she tells me she 's promised to take Miss 
 Gilchrist on your drive." 
 
 Paulina thought she liked all better than the sug- 
 gestion of another encounter with Sir Piers. 
 
 They met him, however, coming toward them in the 
 Pheasants' Walk. This was a long arcade of moist 
 greenery, mossy underfoot, with a fringe of prim- 
 roses on either side, and periwinkles, purple and 
 white, overrunning the hollows of the wood, in which 
 pheasants sought retreat, and rabbits scudded with
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 77 
 
 tails erect, at the approach of a human footstep. In 
 the boughs that met overhead a congregation of birds 
 made delicious melody. Thrushes, chaffinches, black- 
 caps, nightingales, and many another, had here each 
 his time for song. In this tunnel of verdure and 
 sweet sound, where the sunshine fell intermittently, 
 the advancing figure of the owner of "Wooton Magna, 
 dressed in rough tweeds, with knickerbockers, wear- 
 ing a billycock hat and swinging a thorn stick, 
 seemed to have found its proper setting. As he took 
 off his hat, and stood bareheaded to talk with them, 
 Paulina was struck with a sense of the extraordinary 
 freshness of his beauty and the manliness of his bear- 
 ing. Of the bitter experience of his past life, his 
 wandering from home, his poverty, the fact that he 
 was now tramping, as a visitor only, over the acres of 
 his own patrimony, no trace was apparent on the fair, 
 frank face, in the keen blue eyes. To encounter a 
 man like this, Polly felt, was an exceptional experi- 
 ence; and, so feeling, she grew angry with herself, 
 and turned away her gaze. 
 
 " I was on my way to you," he said to Lord Ed- 
 mund; "but since you are so near the dower-house, 
 we '11 go on there." 
 
 As Paulina with compressed lips stalked ahead with 
 Toodles and Paddy Blount, she indulged in a mental 
 overhauling of her own contemptible weakness. 
 
 " There is something out of joint why should I 
 have had that throb of pleasure when I looked at an 
 Englishman? Why should I even sympathize with 
 one ? Granted he is handsome, debonair ; is that an
 
 78 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 excuse for my deplorable lapse from dignity? I "be- 
 lieve it is nothing but the influence of this enchanting 
 old wood, and the sooner I get out of it the better." 
 
 She quickened her pace, to be joined, almost im- 
 mediately, by the object of her thoughts. 
 
 " Blount has gone back/' he remarked carelessly. 
 " He has deputed me to see you safe into Lady Ed- 
 mund's hands." 
 
 " Then I '11 just take the youngster across by the 
 spinney," said Patrick. " It 's a roughish walk for a 
 lady, and there 's the bull in the pasture that might 
 give us a run." 
 
 " No, Polly ; you can't possibly come," added Too- 
 dles, with authority, answering the appeal of his 
 sister's eye. 
 
 " You are basely deserted, are n't you ? " said Gil- 
 christ, laughing at her evident dismay on being left 
 alone with him. " This affords me an opportunity I 
 needed, to tell you that I am sorry I gave you offense 
 last night. Pity a wanderer who has lived so long 
 out of conventional society that he forgets what is due 
 to the conventional young lady." 
 
 " But I am not a conventional young lady ; at least, 
 not if that was conventional society." 
 
 " I saw something was worrying you. Will you let 
 me thank you for being nice to May ? As we drove 
 home she could talk of nothing but your graciousness 
 and your charms. I see how good for her is a com- 
 panionship like yours. I don't need to tell you that I 
 dreaded her first visit to the Hall. It seemed best for 
 her to go, as she did, when there were others present 
 and of course she had not the goad of old associa-
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 79 
 
 tion to overcome. You wonder why I talk to you like 
 this. In two words, because I am grateful. Even 
 gipsies do not forget benefits conferred." 
 
 Grave, simple, courteous, this was quite another 
 man from the mocker of the night before. She an- 
 swered him as simply, as cordially ; and from a dis- 
 cussion of May they passed to many themes of in- 
 terest to her. In addicting himself to the task of 
 removing a first bad impression, Sir Piers found metal 
 more attractive than he knew. His observations, be- 
 gun at first sight of her, were more than confirmed in 
 his leisurely survey. He thought he had never met 
 such a wild virginal spirit so charmingly embodied 
 as this. So eager were they when touched by a real 
 interest, he could see the flame of the spirit shooting 
 up in her brilliant hazel eyes. Her ease of speech 
 and gesture, her wit and indifference to the effect of 
 words, might, in another girl, have seemed reckless 
 abandonment. But he, who had known women in all 
 lands, was quick to read the true character of this 
 young American, so ready to break lances with him. 
 Excepting May, who was still a child, he thought 
 Paulina the most innocent creature he had ever 
 encountered. 
 
 In all her outward seeming Miss Standish pleased 
 Sir Piers. Her figure was slight and elegant; her 
 hands and feet were small, her movements impetu- 
 ous and not to be counted upon a moment in ad- 
 vance; her clear-cut lips were wont to break into 
 charming smiles, to dissolve the little frown often 
 gathered on her straight, dark brows. The one thing 
 apparently lacking was that touch of tenderness es-
 
 80 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 sential in man's eyes as the crowning charm of wo- 
 men. But, again, what of her kindness to his May? 
 
 " Oh, how happy I am here in this wood ! It is like 
 walking in a fairy-tale. If I were only clever enough 
 to make a sketch that would suggest it to me when 
 I get back to the prosaic places of the world ! " 
 
 " If I dared, I should offer you one I made the 
 other day." 
 
 " I hope you won't test me by offering, and expect- 
 ing me to refuse it," she said, smiling. " But no one 
 could picture this light and shadow, the wavering 
 wind-flowers in the hollows, the color, the fragrance 
 of it all and the thrill of these songs overhead." 
 
 " No ; I felt my incapacity when I attempted it. I 
 am glad to hear you like this spot ; when I think of 
 my home it comes almost first. I used to play here 
 by the hour in my solitary boyhood." 
 
 " There is a dead thrush ! " she exclaimed, stooping 
 to pick up an object from the path, and caressing it 
 with the tip of her gloved finger. " To think, to think, 
 he has sung out his brief day in this lovely place, and 
 must go out of it, and give place to others ! " 
 
 " I am sure I understand that better than another," 
 he answered, with a clouded brow. 
 
 "How stupid! How unfeeling I am! Will you 
 please forgive me?" 
 
 "Never mind," he said, a smile dissipating his 
 momentary depression. " I 'm past being sensitive. 
 The rent Blount pays for Wooton Magna enables me 
 to live like a grandee in Granada; and among my 
 shepherds in the Pyrenees I am a king. Now your 
 eyes have a filmy look, as though you were about to
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 81 
 
 divide your tears between me and the thrush. Pray 
 don't. Consider how deadly dull it would be for me 
 to live here alone, and have Mr. and Mrs. Trefusis 
 to dinner once a week." 
 
 "But your people your duties your politics, 
 of which all you English think so much. Ought not 
 you to live at home for them ? " 
 
 "So, my dear young lady, you are kindly volun- 
 teering to act as my conscience. What could I ac- 
 complish without funds!" 
 
 "In our country you 'd go to work and make 
 them." 
 
 " But in our country I can't ; and I 'm like many in 
 the same box. I always notice Americans vaunting 
 themselves upon the hard work they do to amass 
 cash, and looking down on the other people in the 
 world who are content to live upon what they already 
 have. What a tremendously electrical atmosphere it 
 must be over there, where even the babes and suck- 
 lings and pretty girls rise up and adjure a man to 
 practise all the things most disagreeable to him, in 
 order to lay up a few more dollars in the year ! " 
 
 "Now you are making fun of me." 
 
 " Never ! I swear it," he said dramatically. 
 
 "Oh, yes, you are. And I wish you would walk 
 faster. I think we have been a long time in this 
 wood." 
 
 "No, no. I am not going to let you go without 
 telling you that I 'm not always chaffing at the things 
 you spoke about. Since I Ve been here this time, es- 
 pecially, and found May capable of being a compan- 
 ion to me ; since I went to the Hall last night, and
 
 82 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 saw what it is, under a sweet, kind woman's manage- 
 ment I Ve felt it is going to be a tug to give old 
 England up, as I 've never felt it before. But you 
 would n't have me whining over what cannot be 
 remedied, would you f No. May will marry, I hope. 
 I believe Aunty Watson-Jones has promised my girl 
 her savings, so she won't always feel the pinch of 
 iinpecuniosity. Some day she may come to the Hall 
 to live, and her little chaps will play in the Pheasants' 
 Walk, and talk of their grandfather who died in 
 Spain grandfather ! by Jove ! " he added, stopping 
 short to contemplate the unwelcome apparition he 
 had conjured up."
 
 VI 
 
 HAT were you two doing?" asked 
 Lady Edmund when the. derelict pair 
 emerged at last from the wood that 
 had held them enthralled. 
 
 She was sitting with May in an 
 open carriage in front of the dower- 
 house, a gray thatch-roofed building half buried in 
 the foliage of two ancient willows, the sole bit of 
 relief from surrounding green, the pink purple of the 
 rhododendrons growing up almost under the windows 
 a sad, half -ruined spot, that smote the heart with a 
 sense of desolation. 
 
 At the feet of the ladies were guns and shot-bags, 
 while Toodles and Paddy Blount stalked about with 
 every indication of masculine impatience. 
 
 "Polly, we have been waiting more than half an 
 hour," cried Toodles, splenetically. 
 
 " Miss Standish has been approving of the Pheas- 
 ants' "Walk," said Sir Piers. 
 
 "Come, jump in, Polly," snapped Lady Edmund. 
 " And, to show that I forgive you, Sir Piers, when 
 we Ve deposited our sportsmen, let us call for you to 
 drive home with us to luncheon." 
 
 " Thanks, but since you are taking May, if I don't 
 
 83
 
 84 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 stop here to eat the strawberries I see you have left 
 like fairy tokens on my doorstep, who will I Let me 
 have May in time for our so-called dinner, please. 
 Good-by." 
 
 As they drove away, Paulina, determining not to 
 look back, did so. He was standing alone at the 
 portal of the old ruined house, and as he caught her 
 glance lifted his hat. 
 
 " I know why he interests me," she thought, with a 
 sudden illumining. "He is so entirely picturesque. 
 He is no drawing-room hero. He seems to have al- 
 ways lived in the open air. He brings a breath of 
 nature, of travel, of originality, into all he says. And 
 I like his quiet way of taking ill fortune. If I mis- 
 take not, that man could never be mean, or jealous, 
 or false, or cruel, or egotistic. Never, never ! " 
 
 After Polly had adjusted herself with her usual 
 facility to this lightning-like change of base, she pro- 
 ceeded to enjoy the scene and the pleasant company. 
 After a five miles' drive through a tranquil country- 
 side, the carriage pulled up at the entrance of a field 
 where a keeper and a boy in smart velveteens awaited 
 the sportsmen to conduct them to the rookery. 
 
 "You have your luncheon?" asked Lucy. "Yes; 
 that 's right. Now clear out your belongings from 
 under our feet, and let us go. I mean to drive 
 around by a longer way home. Good luck to you, 
 and good-by." 
 
 " I 'd like to see myself going out at home with all 
 these contraptions and two keepers, to shoot crows," 
 Toodles managed to whisper to his sister, then 
 marched off in a shooting- jacket and gaiters lent by 
 Lord Edmund, in which he resembled Puss-in-Boots.
 
 AN EKRANT WOOING 85 
 
 On the "way around" proposed by Lucy, it be- 
 came evident a new variety of weather was at hand. 
 Over the hitherto dazzlingly blue sky a curious cloud 
 was forming. 
 
 " I should n't wonder if we were to be caught in a 
 storm," said Lucy, ordering her coachman to quicken 
 speed. 
 
 They had come to where the road, running be- 
 tween high banks covered with ivy netting, violets, 
 and cowslips, was topped with hedges of hawthorn, 
 whose polished green foliage hid from sight branches 
 welded like the ironwork of the old smiths of Nu- 
 remberg. At intervals in these verdant barricades 
 arose holly-trees globular in shape and lustrous in 
 the intense light of the sun coming from under the 
 edges of the cloud. 
 
 In the narrow sunken way thus formed, from 
 which there was escape on neither side, they met an 
 oncoming flock of sheep and lambs herded by two 
 collie dogs in charge of a moon-faced rustic in a 
 smock-frock. Nothing for it but to pull up, the 
 horses standing stock-still on the verge of the sea 
 of yellowish- white, foolish, struggling creatures, who 
 had parted with the little wits they once possessed. 
 Now came into play the professional skill of the col- 
 lies, who abandoned themselves to an agony of so- 
 licitude lest the affair should in some way do them 
 discredit and miscarry. Hither and thither, bark- 
 ing imperiously, they darted, through gaps where 
 it would seem impossible to penetrate, to the outer 
 edges of the woolly mass, remonstrating, coaxing, in- 
 sisting, till the last dullard was made to understand 
 the necessity of single file on either side of the car-
 
 86 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 riage, and the last lambkin was conveyed in safety 
 past the horses and wheels. 
 
 " A pretty sight, and pure English/ 7 Polly said, for 
 the first time wishing that Roger had been of their 
 party, and at once reproaching herself for the tardi- 
 ness of this impulse. 
 
 "Drive as fast as you can!" cried Lady Edmund 
 to her man. For, drifting rapidly across the sky 
 came the strange blue-black cloud, now shaped like 
 a bottle with a long, slender neck. 
 
 In wood and field, and among the animals in pas- 
 ture, there was a movement of panic at the ap- 
 proaching storm. The wind got up, and went moan- 
 ing. In the farm-houses they passed, people were 
 making preparations to meet they knew not what, 
 but something a little out of the way. 
 
 All at once the cloud burst, and emptied itself of 
 hailstones like bullets, that in a short time covered 
 with a white mantle the women huddling under the 
 fur robes of the open carriage. The coachman, 
 whipped in the face, could see little, but held on 
 stoutly to the reins (it would have been difficult for 
 Horlock to do anything that was not stout), and, 
 with cheeks like winter apples, soothed and con- 
 trolled the frightened horses until they became ac- 
 customed to the sting of the hailstones. 
 
 " Best take short cut to the dower-house, my lady," 
 suggested he at a place where four roads met; and 
 at the dower-house they finally pulled up, after a 
 thirty minutes' drive exposed to the unrelenting fury 
 of the downfall. There, laughing and rosy, with 
 spirits strung to high pitch, the three were extracted
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 87 
 
 by Sir Piers from under their thatch of ice-covered 
 fur, and brought in to the fire to thaw. 
 
 " I suppose I ought to go home," said Lucy, when 
 their tale of adventure was told. " They won't wait, 
 however. Our butler would announce luncheon in 
 exactly the same way if he came in and found Ted 
 had just cut my throat. And Emily Borges would 
 call for those grilled bones if she had just had a 
 telegram saying the baron had quitted this mundane 
 sphere. But I really must get on, and send Horlock 
 back for our poor rook-shooters, since it shows no 
 sign of clearing up." 
 
 "I have an inspiration. Stay to lunch with me," 
 said Sir Piers. " Now, May, don't look pathetic, my 
 dear girl ; I know the resources of the dower-house. 
 There are eggs, and cold meat, and beer, and Lady 
 Edmund's strawberries; and old Clichett is keen at 
 making scones. And I 'm sure there is marmalade." 
 
 " It 's only that it would frighten poor Clichett to 
 death, Piers," replied his daughter, "if she thought 
 she had to lay the cloth for Lady Edmund." 
 
 " Don't let her lay the cloth," cried Lucy, throwing 
 away her toque in an ecstasy ; " we '11 do it ourselves. 
 We '11 do everything except the scones. Tell her to 
 make lots, May ; and to put in plenty of butter when 
 she splits them. Oh, Sir Piers, is this the dining- 
 table ? And where do you keep your cloth ? " 
 
 " If you are not afraid of a little onion, I know a 
 capital dish of eggs such as we make in bivouac in 
 the Basque country. And in coffee I consider myself 
 unsurpassed." 
 
 " Coffee, by all means, and Basque eggs ; only be
 
 88 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 saving with the onion," said her animated ladyship, 
 by whom, Paulina and May serving as lieutenants, 
 the machinery of the midday meal was set into prompt 
 motion. 
 
 Wearing aprons borrowed from May's helpless and 
 scandalized maid, the trio invaded the kitchen, de- 
 priving old Mrs. Clichett of breath, but furnishing her 
 with material for gossip to last the remainder of her 
 days. Into this gay assemblage presently arrived the 
 storm-beaten Patrick and Toodles, who, warned of its 
 futility by the keepers, had abandoned their pursuit 
 of the rooks, and were well on the way home when 
 met by Horlock. 
 
 " Run, Paddy dear tell Horlock to go back to the 
 Hall and say I Ve taken a situation as cook here, 
 and Ted need n't bother about me any more ; but he 
 may give my love to baby," exclaimed Lady Edmund, 
 who, with the exception of a smudge across her nose, 
 had come very well through her ordeal of manual 
 labor. "And if they like, but we don't urge it, 
 Ted and Roger may come over and fetch us home by 
 and by." 
 
 " This is first-class ! " remarked Toodles, who had 
 been put to mixing a salad dressing. "How good 
 that Spanish dish smells already ! Miss Gilchrist, 
 don't you wish we could do this every day, instead of 
 having everything so stiff? It is like life on Roger's 
 ranch. Roger is my cousin Mr. Woodbury." 
 
 " Yes, I know," answered May, who was scraping 
 radishes at the window-ledge by him. 
 
 " He is Al, and no mistake." 
 
 "A I beg your pardon ? " asked she.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 89 
 
 "That means fine smooth; do you understand?" 
 
 " I think you mean he is the best." 
 
 "Yes, the best; the only trouble with Roger is 
 Polly, don't you see." 
 
 " I am afraid I don't." 
 
 " He 's got to marry her, and she 's got to marry 
 him, and it 's all been settled by grandpapa, and 
 they '11 have ever so much money, and live in the 
 town house, and be stupid like anybody else ; and I '11 
 never get to the ranch, though my mother promises 
 me every year I shall." 
 
 " They are to marry ? " she said, looking at him in- 
 tently. "Are you sure you should have told me 
 this?" 
 
 " Why not ? I 've heard people talk of it, all about 
 at home. But they are a funny kind of lovers. Oh, 
 I just wish he had the sand to tell her he won't have 
 her, and then grandpapa would have to give it up." 
 
 " Please," she said, blushing, " I am quite sure you 
 should n't." 
 
 "All right," said Toodles, looking out of the win- 
 dow, which commanded the approach to the house. 
 
 " If there are not Roger and Lucy's husband com- 
 ing through the rain and wind as if they had on 
 seven-league boots ! " 
 
 " There won't be enough to eat for all," cried Lucy, 
 when the new arrivals had swelled their group, and 
 laughter and explanations made the dim old kitchen 
 ring as it had not in many a long year. " The only 
 thing I see is for somebody to cook bacon." 
 
 " I volunteer," said Roger, throwing off his wet coat, 
 and washing his hands under the tap. " That is my
 
 90 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 special accomplishment. Billy says that whenever he 
 asks, ' What shall it be for dinner, old fellow ? ' I say, 
 ' Ham and eggs.' " 
 
 " Tell them your story about the cow-boy," cried 
 Toodles to Roger. 
 
 " By all means," chimed in Sir Piers. 
 
 " You know I never weary of the chronique of cow- 
 boys," said Lucy, on being consulted. 
 
 "Very well, then," said Roger, preparing his iron 
 pan, while Toodles cut the bacon. " This relates to a 
 gentleman who, having made his pile, journeyed east- 
 ward to spend it. Arrived at Chicago, en route, he 
 went into a restaurant, and, calling for the bill of fare, 
 studied it from end to end, then cast it away in de- 
 spair and, in a large, confident manner, as one certain 
 that cost and splendor could no further go, observed, 
 ' Gosh darn it, waiter, just you bring me fifteen dol- 
 lars' wuth o' ham an' eggs ! ' " 
 
 "I don't know when I have taken such a strong 
 liking as to your cousin," Gilchrist observed to Pau- 
 lina at a pause in their merry meal. "I hope you 
 have a great many more like him in America." 
 
 " Like Roger ? Oh, no ; there is no one," she said, 
 and then, seeing Lucy's laughing eye fixed upon her, 
 blushed furiously. 
 
 " Lady Edmund was just about to tell me what she 
 called 'the romance' of his position, when we were 
 interrupted last night," he went on. 
 
 " She told you nothing ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " And you know nothing ? " 
 
 " Is it indiscreet to ask you, his cousin, almost his 
 sister, to enlighten me ? "
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 91 
 
 " Not now. I can 't speak of it now." 
 
 " When we meet again, then. But, now that I think 
 of it, when shall we meet again ? " 
 
 " You are going ? " 
 
 "Yes; to-morrow." 
 
 "I had forgotten," she said, almost stammering 
 with the surprise of finding the announcement caused 
 her pain. 
 
 " To-morrow ; and I leave England two days later. 
 When I come back to this old tumble-down house, 
 with its meager furniture and bare walls, don't think 
 I shall not see you in it. It has been such a sunburst 
 in my life and May's, this day with you and your 
 agreeable compatriot. And I shall never see the 
 Pheasants' Walk again without the figure of a girl 
 in a Bond-street frock and hat, holding a dead thrush 
 in her hand. But then, who knows whether we may 
 not meet again ? " 
 
 " Sir Piers, Sir Piers," cried Lucy, " what are you 
 saying to make my girl so sober ? Do you hear Ted 
 telh'ng you that after you Ve saved us from freezing 
 and starving to-day, he '11 never forgive you if you 
 don't bring May to dinner this last evening before 
 you go?" 
 
 "I shall be most happy," said Gilchrist, smiling; 
 then, turning again to Paulina, added : " What did I 
 tell you ? We are to meet again." 
 
 " Am I so glad as that ? What in the world made 
 my heart jump 1 ?" Polly queried of herself while 
 they were driving back to Wooton Magna in the 
 wagonette. 
 
 "You are none the worse for your hail-storm, dear ? " 
 asked Roger, leaning toward her, and observing an
 
 92 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 expression he could not fathom in her transparent 
 face. 
 
 Toodles and Paddy were talking. Lucy, nestled up 
 to her husband, was making the most barefaced love 
 to him. No one noticed Roger as he took Paulina's 
 little, cold, ungloved hand in his. 
 
 " Don't, please," she said, drawing it away. " I am 
 well ; I was never better ; I love to be caught out in 
 storms, as you very well know." And putting her 
 hands in her pockets, in default of the gloves ruined 
 in the storm, she summoned Lucy into the conversa- 
 tion, which again became general, and so remained 
 until they arrived at the doorway of Wooton Magna. 
 
 That evening, in dressing for dinner, Paulina saw 
 her face in the mirror with still another start of sur- 
 prise. She remonstrated with it, rebuked it with 
 passionate humility, owned herself a goose; but a 
 smile, that would not be banished, played around 
 her lips when she thought she would soon again be 
 near the man whom she had seen for the first time 
 the night before! 
 
 When she reached the drawing-room, they were all 
 going in to dinner. 
 
 " Is n't it too bad f " said Lucy, on the wing. " Pat- 
 rick will take you, dear; I have just had a note 
 from Sir Piers, saying they had decided to go up to 
 town in the evening train, and asking to be espe- 
 cially remembered to you. After our pleasant day 
 together, when we knew each other better than if we 
 had had a whole season's meetings in town ! Polly, 
 perhaps it 's as well for Roger's interests that Sir 
 Piers did leave. If I were a girl, I 'd never be able
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 93 
 
 to resist him. And add to the odd circumstance that 
 he was thinking of you last night, when Miss Chester 
 detected him, that I saw his eyes wander to you re- 
 peatedly to-day! There, don't mind my nonsense, 
 child! But, oh, dear! I do wish I knew what sent 
 the Gilchrists back to town ! " 
 
 Paulina, in a dazed sort of way, wondered, also; 
 but that did not soothe her disappointment. Natu- 
 rally, it could not be supposed that either young 
 woman would connect this change of plan with the 
 fact that, immediately after the departure of the 
 guests from the dower-house, May had informed Sir 
 Piers of Paulina's engagement to her cousin. 
 
 ON Sunday Lady Edmund sternly marshaled her 
 party on foot to the little church, all decked with 
 primroses for Whitsuntide, ranging them in the Hall 
 pews, close under the rector's nose and the clerk's 
 prayer-book. During service, the good example of 
 others had the effect of making Mr. Cartwright who, 
 at home, had for years past caused his wife and 
 daughters concern, through his habit of doubling up 
 in a corner of the family pew and remaining, with his 
 eyes shaded from the light, suspiciously quiet be- 
 have like a model of propriety. In his immaculate 
 black coat, tan gloves, and Gladstonian collar, he here 
 stood up, sang aloud, and delivered all the responses 
 in a sonorous voice that commanded the admiration 
 of beholders. 
 
 When the pouch for contributions was handed, he 
 put in an offering of golden guineas that caused the 
 eyes of the clerk to blink with astonishment; alto-
 
 94 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 gether acquitting himself, as Lucy afterward confided 
 to Paulina, " in a manner to do us proud." 
 
 A pretty feature of the occasion was the wearing of 
 natural flowers primroses, chiefly by all the vil- 
 lagers in the congregation ; and some people thought 
 the sermon was of a satisfactory length twelve min- 
 utes, neither more nor less delivered without a final 
 " g n from start to finish. 
 
 Till the great people had passed out, the lesser ones 
 kept their places j and as Paulina looked at the cour- 
 tesying and bowing rows on either side the aisle, she 
 detected, dressed decently in black, and wearing the 
 usual knot of primroses, old Mrs. Clichett of the 
 dower-house making her way to the front. 
 
 " If you please, miss, I was told to give this into 
 your hand," the old dame said, offering her a flat par- 
 cel addressed to her in masculine chirography. " My 
 orders were, as 't was a trifle, there was no hurry, an' 
 the young lady would understand. An' my duty to 
 the gentry, miss j an' I hopes they are none the worse 
 for the mortal queer food they ate at the dower-house 
 o' Wednesday." 
 
 A series of dips, punctuating this speech, excited in 
 the hearer a wish to smile ; but she was also conscious 
 of sensations of quite an opposite nature. Thanking 
 Mrs. Clichett with enforced indifference, she regained 
 her room, and, locking the door, tore open the parcel. 
 It contained a sketch, boldly and brilliantly done in 
 water-color, of the Pheasants' Walk, and on the mar- 
 gin a penciled suggestion of a girl holding a dead bird 
 in her hand, with the donor's initials underneath. 
 
 When they awoke next morning, it was to look but
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 95 
 
 upon a veritable Whit-Monday, the ground covered 
 with snow, the great trees of the park rising from 
 little green islands of turf to which the snow could 
 not penetrate through the thick leafage. The sweet 
 songsters were all hushed j the nightingale that had 
 been wont to begin her " jug-jug ' ; trill at 3 A. M., and 
 continue it in a flood of melody till dawn, had given 
 no sound that night. The rabbits, venturing out, re- 
 mained in attitudes of astonishment around the house. 
 From the drawing-room, filled in all its corners with 
 flowers cut under the veil of snow that morning, peo- 
 ple looked at the unwonted scene without ; they poked 
 the fire, grumbled, exclaimed; then settled down to 
 play halma, billiards, and the usual bad-weather 
 games. 
 
 Roger, searching for Paulina, found her in the li- 
 brary. When he came in, he rather fancied she wished 
 him not to observe that she had been looking at the 
 picture of Lady Gilchrist. Then asking himself what 
 possible reason Polly could have for such secretive- 
 ness, he went to the other extreme by speaking of it 
 in a serene but somewhat loud-pitched voice. 
 
 " You 've been looking at the Gilchrist pictures, 
 eh ? Lady Edmund was telling me the little scene 
 the poor girl made before this portrait of her mother. 
 Miserable business altogether, and one that, I fancy, 
 is at the bottom of Gilchrist's not wanting to live in 
 England. Do you know, Polly, when I get back to 
 town, I have an idea of going to beard Lady Watson- 
 Jones in her den, and call upon Miss Gilchrist? I 
 can't get that flower-face of hers out of my thoughts, 
 and the way it brightened up when we spent those
 
 96 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 racketing hours together at the dower-house. From 
 what she told me, I fancy she has hard lines in the 
 clutches of the old witch, though she has no idea she 
 let out anything. Polly, do you think, if you rode 
 more, it would bring up your color to be like that of 
 these girls over here ? I think you are a little pale." 
 
 " No, no, Roger," she answered, laughing in spite 
 of herself ; " my color is what it always was. And I 
 should advise you by all means to call on Miss Gil- 
 christ when we get back to townA 
 
 " The best thing about getting back to town is that 
 I shall have more of you/' the young man said gal- 
 lantly. 
 
 " I suppose so." 
 
 " How unenthusiastic ! Can't you be a little warmer 
 in view of my model behavior in giving way to every- 
 body we 've met here, and always taking a back seat ? 
 Really, Polly, say what you will, you are a trifle pale." 
 
 " Roger, don't be tiresome," she said, with a sudden 
 rush of color. 
 
 " Then you are out of spirits." 
 
 " I am not ; I am not. But I am glad we are going 
 from here to-morrow." 
 
 " You share my feeling oh, Polly! " 
 
 " Roger, how long are you to stay on this side of 
 the Atlantic?" 
 
 " I have three weeks longer. Why ? " 
 
 " Oh, nothing." 
 
 "When I do go, Polly, I shall count the days till 
 you follow me." 
 
 " Ah, me ! " sighed Paulina. She then remembered
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 97 
 
 suddenly her fear, expressed on arrival at Wooton 
 Magna, that she might be sorry she had come. 
 
 In packing to return to town, she put the sketch of 
 the Pheasants' Walk resolutely at the bottom of her 
 trunk. Common sense told her there was no likeli- 
 hood that the giver would ever again cross her path, 
 and equally that, some day when she should take out 
 the token to recall the spot, she would by that time 
 have faded into a mere incident of his travels. 
 
 " IT was a most pleasant visit," said Mrs. Standish, 
 when they were in a train tearing up to London at 
 breakneck speed. " We must ask the Lansings to dine 
 directly we get back to New York, my daughter, and 
 tell them how beautifully we think Lucy has taken 
 her place in the English aristocracy. Polly, you are 
 not listening. I said, how beautifully we think " 
 
 "Of course we do, mother. Shall we have the 
 Whitmans too, and tell them about Mabel? And 
 Mrs. Cartwright and the girls, and tell them about 
 the giddy head of their family ? " 
 
 " You know that I have never visited the Whit- 
 mans, and I see no reason to change now. I consider 
 Mabel Kirby perfectly idiotic, and I hope I showed it 
 when I said good-by to her." 
 
 " You looked as sweet and affectionate as possible. 
 I think Mabel was much encouraged by your ap- 
 proval." 
 
 "And, Paulina, I took especial care to notice, 
 Lord Barchester paid no attention, that I could see, 
 to Amaranth. He let her fetch and carry for him,
 
 98 AN EBB ANT WOOING 
 
 and hardly took the trouble to be polite. If I were 
 consulted, I should say she has n't the ghost of a 
 chance of catching him." 
 
 " Oh, mother dear, what a revelation of your real 
 malignant inner self ! Who could have believed, when 
 you sat there doing that piece of drawn-work, that 
 you were so engaged ? " 
 
 " No ; I Ve no idea she will succeed," went on the 
 elder lady, comfortably. "It must be very hard to 
 have one's daughter's settlement in life always on 
 one's mind, like poor Mrs. Clyde. I suppose I, who 
 feel so differently, ought to be more sympathetic with 
 these people who are still uncertain whom their daugh- 
 ters are to marry." 
 
 " How this train is rushing ! " said Paulina, giving 
 a glance over at Roger, who was playing cards with 
 Toodles on the opposite seat, to see whether he had 
 overheard her mother. 
 
 " Paulina, I understand Lord Edmund has decided 
 to lease Wooton Magna for a term of years. It seems 
 Sir Piers had refused to do this while he was here j 
 but yesterday, on the point of leaving England, he 
 wired an acceptance of the offer." 
 
 " He has left England ? " 
 
 "Yesterday, Lucy said. Considering his age, I 
 think he is a very interesting man, don't you ? " 
 
 " I never thought about his age." 
 
 " Well, my dear, you know how you look upon me 
 how ancient you think I am. I am only two years 
 older than Sir Piers Gilchrist; and, dear knows, I 
 don't set up to be an object of interest to society. No 
 doubt he has an excellent digestion, which keeps him
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 99 
 
 in a good temper. Your poor father was forever tak- 
 ing this remedy and that, and was very hard to keep 
 in spirits. Sir Piers is certainly in a fine state of pres- 
 ervation teeth perfect, all his hair, eyes clear, good 
 color. I should think some woman with a fortune 
 somebody of a suitable age might be found 
 glad enough to marry him and be a mother to that 
 poor girl." 
 
 "Oh! "said Polly.
 
 vn 
 
 OME months after her return from 
 England to spend, as usual, the 
 summer in Massachusetts, where 
 Mr. Woodbury owned a country 
 place, Mrs. Standish was called on 
 to attend her father in his first 
 serious illness during a long and rugged life. An 
 attack of pneumonia, weathered by the grace of God 
 and the old man's robust constitution, left him, early 
 in January, a prisoner in his town house with every 
 prospect of being detained there until the most 
 treacherous season of the year in New York the 
 breaking up of winter should have passed. 
 
 In this emergency it was manifest that some one 
 of his family should devote constant attention to 
 the convalescent ; and as Mrs. Low (Paulina's Aunt 
 Sophy, who will be remembered as possessing mar- 
 riageable daughters) had also an exacting husband, 
 " The back is fitted to the burden," sighed Mrs. Stan- 
 dish 5 " I am the only one to be counted upon, and I 
 must go." 
 
 By Paulina her mother's proposition to let their 
 own house, and remove to her grandpapa's to live, 
 was received quietly, as a mere episode in interrupted 
 
 work 5 for our young lady had this season thrown 
 
 100
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 101 
 
 herself into occupations educational and philan- 
 thropical that absorbed her days completely, and 
 was quite lifted above the consideration of shelter 
 and whereabouts. 
 
 To Toodles the matter was one of equal indiffer- 
 ence, for, alas! a great cloud had passed over the 
 fond mother's empyrean: Toodles had gone to board- 
 ing-school ! How this climax had been reached Mrs. 
 Standish hardly knew. A little of Roger, a little of 
 Paulina, and a great deal of the boy himself, had 
 been contributed to influence her consent. She had 
 let him go, dragging her heartstrings with him, and 
 was convinced he would not be able to stand it any 
 more than she. But Toodles had flourished and con- 
 tinued cheerful. He had thrown himself with zeal 
 into school affairs, had taken his place creditably in 
 scholarship and athletics, had made friends had 
 become a different creature entirely from the dawd- 
 ling and dispirited traveler of the year before. While 
 his mother sighed and prayed for him at home, he 
 from time to time remembered to write her the letters 
 in roundhand, beginning with an apology and plung- 
 ing at once into details of events in athletics, that 
 were like Greek to her puzzled brain. Against her 
 calmer judgment, he had almost convinced her that 
 foot-ball is the aim and end of adolescent existence ; 
 and although secretly agitated by the risk to Toodles's 
 beautiful aquiline nose, she perused the reports of the 
 games in which he had taken part, burning with ex- 
 citement over a goal kicked or a touchdown made on 
 Toodles's side. When, during one of these encoun- 
 ters, her heir had temporarily disappeared from sight
 
 102 AJST EEEANT WOOING 
 
 under a mass of struggling young humanity, to 
 emerge with a broken collar-bone, she, who had 
 heard of it in New York, decided that the world 
 must immediately cease to revolve. But this did not 
 occur; and when, next day, she arrived upon the 
 scene, the sufferer was found complacently looking 
 on at another game of foot-ball, and wishing his 
 bandages would permit him to take part. 
 
 Toodles had arrived at his home for the Thanks- 
 giving holiday in russet shoes his hair a mop of 
 startling length, with which he obstinately refused to 
 part. Mrs. Standish had therefore tried to persuade 
 herself of his moral decadence, and wondered whether 
 he should not be taken away from school. But a few 
 days' observation of his development in manhood, 
 joined to a healthy content of spirit, convinced her 
 there was no excuse for tampering with a boy estab- 
 lished in his right place. 
 
 Still, home was not home without Toodles; and, 
 Paulina acquiescing in the change, Mrs. Standish 
 found tenants for her house in some friends who, in 
 October, had set up an " English all-the-year-round " 
 establishment in Westchester, and by Christmas were 
 already quite prepared to move into town. 
 
 " How I wish papa could breathe that soft air of 
 the Riviera ! " said Mrs. Standish to Polly. "At least, 
 when it is soft. And there 's Corfu ! Don't you re- 
 member, dear, Mrs. Malbrooke, that we met in Venice, 
 had just come from Corfu, and she said there was 
 nothing like it?" 
 
 "There was always somebody just arrived from 
 some place where we had not been, mother ; and she
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 103 
 
 always declared it was better than anything we had 
 
 seen. 
 u 
 
 That 's true, my dear ; but I 'm convinced if we 
 could once get papa abroad we could find the right 
 place for him. However, I suppose there is no use 
 talking. Polly, why do you sigh ? You are so busy 
 nowadays with all those classes and lectures, I hardly 
 have time to notice how you seem. Are you happy, 
 my daughter ? " 
 
 "Happy! Why not?" 
 
 "Why not, indeed? You are certainly a very 
 lucky girl. Mrs. Manhattan, when she was calling 
 yesterday, said she considered your prospects as 
 brilliant as those of any young woman she knows. 
 You must see, my love, what respect all old New- 
 Yorkers have for the Woodbury estate." 
 
 " Oh, of course ! I respect it, too, and all that 
 relates to it except myself," she added sotto voce. 
 
 " You hear regularly from Roger ? " 
 
 " Every week. He is a model for Toodles in regu- 
 larity." 
 
 " When your grandpapa awoke from his afternoon 
 nap yesterday, he asked me, quite eagerly, about you 
 and Roger. I think, dear, he has an idea that if the 
 wedding could come off this spring " 
 
 "Mother, I won't hear another word. Please tell 
 grandpapa not to think of it. I have till next Sep- 
 tember free." 
 
 " My dear child, what ails you ? " 
 
 " Did you ever see me better ? " 
 
 "In health, no; but you are nervous restless. 
 Where are you off to now?"
 
 104 AN ERKANT WOOING 
 
 "To Music Hall, to listen to one of those lovely 
 concerts. That 's the only place in New York where 
 the world of workaday stands absolutely still, to let 
 the conductor's baton lift it up into the region of 
 pure sentiment. Now, kiss me, and don't forget to 
 tell grandpapa that, if I 'm to keep to my compact, he 
 must to his. Grandpapa will see that ; he 's always 
 just." 
 
 By the middle of February Mr. "Woodbury's physi- 
 cians the medical fraternity of New York are so 
 well trained in the art of suggesting agreeable reme- 
 dies to solvent patients ! announced that in order 
 fully to restore the convalescent's tone he must spend 
 the ensuing months in a climate more equable than 
 that of New York. Mrs. Standish, who had awaited 
 in vain the explosion usually following any proposi- 
 tion for the old gentleman to leave his home, here 
 ventured on a suggestion. 
 
 "I suppose you will prefer Florida or California, 
 papa," she said meekly. 
 
 " Nothing of the sort," said Mr. Woodbury, snap- 
 pishly. 
 
 "Bermuda?" 
 
 "You will please engage rooms in one of those 
 boats that sail to Genoa," he said, with decision. 
 " We shall go about March 1 ; you and I, Paulina and 
 Roger. Now, no lamentations about Toodles, Rose. 
 The boy is perfectly well off where he is; and you 
 know wild horses could n't drag him abroad with you 
 again, even if you were weak enough to propose it. 
 "Wire Roger at once, and write him particulars by 
 this evening's mail. Did you get a blank from my
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 105 
 
 table? What are you delaying about? Here is 
 Wilcox ready to take it. What are you doing with 
 your fingers, Rose?" 
 
 " Counting ten words, papa ; but I can't get it all 
 in. ' Come prepared sail Genoa March first 
 Grandpapa's health Paulina and I poor 
 Toodles remains at school.' I might leave off 
 ' health ' ; he would understand simply ' Grandpapa.' 
 Of course Roger knows if you go to Genoa it would 
 be because of your health." 
 
 " Suppose you leave off ' poor Toodles remains at 
 school,' " said her father, grimly. " But, there ; give 
 it to me as it is. Wilcox, send this message at once. 
 Now, Rose, write to the steamboat agents, and, if you 
 like, you can tell them about Toodles remaining at 
 school, and any other little family details of the sort 
 ladies generally introduce. The chief thing for me is 
 to secure Roger. I can't get about in foreign parts 
 with only you two women and Wilcox." 
 
 The admission, unwonted in his independent lif e, of 
 a belief in any one's power to help him touched Mr. 
 Woodbury's daughter. She obeyed instructions, and 
 by the time Paulina returned from her rounds, just 
 before dinner, and stopped to speak with her mother 
 on her way up-stairs, preparations for their journey 
 were well under way. 
 
 " You like the idea ? " Mrs. Standish said, conclud- 
 ing her narrative. 
 
 " Like it ? " But Polly caught her breath, and would 
 say no more. 
 
 "And it will be particularly nice having Roger. 
 He has such an influence on your grandpapa. And
 
 106 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 you remember how delightful Roger was in England. 
 How long ago that seems does it not, my dear? 
 when we were with Lucy and those nice interesting 
 Gilchrists ! One almost regrets getting to like peo- 
 ple, and then having to put the sea between one's self 
 and them." 
 
 " You have no idea where we shall bring up ? " 
 
 "Not the slightest. I did not like to ask. Papa's 
 old friend Professor Cranleigh was here a few nights 
 since, talking about a journey he made last year along 
 the Barbary coast. It may be we shall be riding on 
 mules, with those Arabs, in slippers, running by our 
 sides ; and it may be Sorrento, or Cannes ; or, since 
 papa is so very fond of Lockhart's Spanish ballads, it 
 might turn out to be Spain. When Roger comes, he 
 may have the courage to ask, and then we shall 
 know." 
 
 " What a jolly way to set out ! " said Paulina. 
 
 " Polly, I am so relieved. I thought you would n't 
 like it ; and, with all my sorrow over parting with my 
 precious boy, what should I have done ? " 
 
 " I '11 be Toodles and Polly in one, darling," cried 
 the girl, kissing her mother tenderly. 
 
 For the rest of the evening she was radiant, a new 
 light in her eyes, a new spring in her feet. On awak- 
 ening next morning, cold daylight and common sense 
 brought the usual quietus to hope's flattering tale told 
 overnight. But still, during the days before sailing, 
 Polly was more like her old bright self ; and Roger, on 
 answering in person his grandfather's summons, felt 
 that when larks fell his platter did not fail to catch them. 
 
 It was not a cheerful procession that of two car-
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 107 
 
 riages and an express-wagon shrouded in falling 
 snow which left Mr. Woodbury's house one wild 
 March morning nor was it enlivening to pick a way 
 through streets encumbered on either side with 
 weeks-old banks of snow, black with mud in the more 
 frequented parts, and strewn here and there with 
 ashes and kitchen refuse, which the high intelligence 
 of the city fathers had not yet been able to decide 
 how to remove. While jerking from side to side to 
 avoid street-cars, the occupants of the carriages felt 
 grateful for the fresh falling snow that sometimes 
 distracted attention from such eye-sores, and less 
 than commonly regretful at bidding adieu to the 
 proud metropolis. 
 
 Crossing the river to the steamer's dock in Hobo- 
 ken, they had barely time to be installed in their 
 large, clean cabins when the big North-German liner 
 turned her nose in the direction of the Narrows, and, 
 amid wind and sleet, steamed safely out to sea. 
 
 A businesslike embarkation, and a contrast to the 
 gossiping and emotional sailings of crack ships in the 
 early summer. On this blustering Saturday, people 
 shunned the deck and drafty companionways, mostly 
 hastening below to make preparation for the rough 
 time that awaited them outside. 
 
 There were few hints of the joys of a southern At- 
 lantic passage during the f our-and-twenty hours after 
 leaving New York. Wind, sleet, angry cross-seas, laid 
 low all but the proudest among the Kaiser Wilhelm's 
 passengers. Even Polly, commonly defiant of ocean's 
 pranks, remained on her lounge under the port-hole, 
 content to watch the fierce green waves knock for ad-
 
 108 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 mission against its heavy glass, and then fall away 
 repulsed, to gather and pound again. 
 
 To Roger, who came intermittently to hold confer- 
 ences through the curtain at her door, she languidly 
 confided that she was not sick, only not interested in 
 anything living ; that she liked to see the waves, and 
 fancy herself a mermaid under their crests ; that there 
 was a funny steward, with electrified hair, always 
 bouncing in to wait on them j and that she had con- 
 sumed two grapes since leaving New York, and would 
 thank him not to propose anything more to eat. 
 
 Mrs. Standish's seasickness took the happy turn of 
 sleep, and Polly, watching the enveloped form of her 
 parent in the berth opposite, had abundant time for 
 meditation as the ship yielded to the buffeting of 
 mighty billows. 
 
 By the following afternoon she had had enough of 
 quiet; and, averring she could no longer endure ly- 
 ing still to hear the band play hymn-tunes that re- 
 minded her of her latter end, she shook off her sloth, 
 and dressed, going on deck to find Roger among the 
 few promenaders who had ventured out. 
 
 " Polly! This is fun ! " he cried, joyfully tucking 
 her arm in his. 
 
 " I never saw such a dismal-looking sea," she said, 
 as they staggered about together. 
 
 " Never mind. "We are still off our own blustering 
 coast. By to-morrow we '11 have summer weather. 
 You should see how pluckily the old gentleman keeps 
 up. His man is a good sailor, and, between us, we 
 had him out for a half hour to-day. How did you 
 manage to dress ? Of course your maid is worse than 
 useless. They always are."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 109 
 
 " She sent mama warning by the stewardess to-day, 
 but I think she will recant if it ever is fine again. 
 Roger, I 'm so desperately hungry that if I don't get 
 something to eat now, this minute, I can't answer for 
 the consequences." 
 
 Roger laughed as he took her under shelter, and 
 with champagne and biscuits and a cup of broth sum- 
 moned back the brightness of her looks. By dinner- 
 time she was pronounced cured. When, a day later, 
 the sun set in a clear sky, the disagreeables of their 
 start were already among the things forgiven and 
 forgotten. 
 
 And now behold them rewarded by an ideal voyag- 
 ing over a brilliant blue sea, under a brilliant blue sky 
 islanded with silver clouds. Early one morning they 
 passed " Flores in the Azores " where " Sir Richard 
 Grenville lay," and all day walked the deck quoting 
 the stirring lines of " The Revenge," while trying to 
 fancy they smelled odors drifting seaward from the 
 flowers that, sheltered in deep ravines, have given the 
 island its name. 
 
 By noon, when, leaving Terceira, they came in 
 sight of the bold western headland of Fayal, run- 
 ning, as the day progressed, close enough inshore to 
 see sheep feeding on the cliffs, and men with oxen 
 plowing on the slopes, there was no doubt of the 
 fragrance of young vine-leaves and wood-blossoms 
 that followed the ship and tantalized its passengers. 
 Here the high hills, with their tightly stretched cov- 
 erings of mossy green, were streaked with black fis- 
 sures marking the passage of volcanic streams. Vine- 
 yards and orange groves clothed their flanks, and 
 along the shores caressed by curling lines of foam
 
 110 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 nestled whitewashed villages, each with its dominating 
 church or convent, its red-tiled roofs, its windmill 
 shaped like a Maltese cross. Peasants, following 
 the plow, stopped to gaze at the apparition of the big 
 steamer in their lonely waters. Then, while the ship 
 rocked along like a huge cradle, the lion couchant of 
 Fayal faded from sight, Pico was left behind, St. 
 Jorge became a mist on the horizon they were off 
 again in the open sea, and ho ! for the coasts of Por- 
 tugal and Spain. 
 
 "Polly, what would you say to exile with me on 
 one of these moist green islands ? " Roger had asked 
 as they leaned together over the rail in the starlight. 
 
 Polly shivered a little. As luck would have it, 
 she had been caught in the act of supposing herself 
 alone with somebody, leading an existence hidden 
 from their world, upon these verdurous shores. But, 
 strange to say, the somebody was not Roger. 
 
 "This is very nice, dawdling in a stanch ship in 
 such perfect weather," she answered prosaically. 
 " Who could suppose that only last Saturday we were 
 shivering under furs in a snow-storm in New York ? 
 I am glad we sha'n't see those stupid docks at Liver- 
 pool. Roger, have you yet found out where we are 
 to land?" 
 
 " I have n't the ghost of an idea/' said the young 
 man, smiling. "My grandfather is having it out 
 with the guide-books in his deck-chair, and I don't 
 doubt, with his usual habit of acquiring information 
 solidly, could now pass a competitive examination in 
 Murray, O'Shea, and Baedeker, on all the Southern 
 countries of which they treat. As for me need I
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 111 
 
 say? I don't care a rap. Whatever is, is best, so 
 long as we drift in tropic waters, and your temper 
 keeps what it has been latterly." 
 
 " Take care ! " she said, but was unable to sustain 
 her threatening attitude in the spell of the fairy isl- 
 ands, from which, however, the screw was carrying 
 them steadily away. 
 
 It was not until Monday evening, off the southern 
 coast of Spain, that the oracle chose to divulge their 
 destination. From Cape Trafalgar, spot of glorious 
 memories, the watchers on deck were reclaimed for 
 the " Captain's dinner," at which much bunting, the 
 band, champagne, and a procession of illuminated 
 stewards bearing illuminated ices under the minia- 
 ture flags of Europe and America, gild the hours be- 
 fore separation of those who are to land in Spain and 
 those who are to keep on to Italy. 
 
 " Mr. Woodbury's compliments, m'm, and we shall 
 spend the night in Gibraltar," said Mr. Woodbury's 
 man to Mrs! Standish, as she came out from table to 
 the deck. 
 
 " Oh, my dears, I am never surprised ! " commented 
 that lady to her daughter and nephew. " Supposing 
 this might occur, I have had Justina pack all the 
 cabin things. And, indeed, I 'm glad to take that 
 girl ashore, as she spends half her time talking to 
 the very foolish-looking young steward who is in our 
 entry. However, I had better go below and see that 
 all is ready." 
 
 Polly and Roger, head to head, were peering 
 through the darkness when the ship steamed gal- 
 lantly in under the shadow of the great rock, coming
 
 112 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 to anchor with the firing of a gun as the clocks of 
 Gibraltar were striking nine. Then the indefatiga- 
 ble band, that had not parted with its wind and 
 energy in the fierce international effort of the last 
 two hours, clashed out a proud announcement of 
 their arrival to the town. But in vain: the town 
 and its inhabitants gave the Kaiser Wilhelm a cold 
 shoulder, no response of any kind greeting the ears 
 of the expectant on the ship. "Was it too late? 
 Were they contraband of war? Must they remain 
 aboard till morning, or would their commander's 
 haughty spirit take intending travelers in Spain past 
 Spanish ports and on to Genoa ? 
 
 These queries were at last answered by the late 
 arrival of a small uncovered tender drenched with 
 moisture, into which the Gibraltar passengers, amid 
 maddening confusion, were hastily invited to de- 
 scend over a long, steep ladder ending apparently 
 in the sea. 
 
 "Very pleasant indeed," said old Mr.Woodbury, as, 
 on his valet's arm, he was first to go down the Sty- 
 gian incline. Under all contrary circumstances the 
 indomitable old gentleman shone with peculiar luster, 
 and he now sat on a small wet bench, with his feet in 
 a puddle, smiling into the darkness. When Mrs. 
 Standish, who followed, announced to him that she 
 had lost her maid and her hand-luggage, Mr. Wood- 
 bury smiled more broadly. His daughter's struggles 
 with Justina were at all times refreshing to his sense 
 of humor; and when Roger and Polly, having cap- 
 tured Justina without the hand-luggage in a parting 
 flirtation with the steward, came down the gang-
 
 AN EKRANT WOOING 113 
 
 plank as the tender was about to push out upon a 
 dark, oily sea, amid a babel of hoarse voices, Spanish 
 and English, that offered no comfort for his daugh- 
 ter's woe, Mr. Woodbury laughed aloud. 
 
 " You are very droll, my dear Rose, over your im- 
 pedimenta. Everything will come ashore in the next 
 trip of the tender. But I think if you had been wise 
 you 'd have brought the bags and left the woman. 
 I forgot to mention that the courier for whom I ca- 
 bled the day we sailed came aboard just now, and he 
 will look out for everything." 
 
 "Then that was our courier," said Polly "the 
 mysterious being who presented me with a bunch of 
 violets as I left the ship, and told me all will be 
 right. I had no idea who he was, but I was so glad 
 to get fresh flowers, I just took them, and thanked 
 him, and ran along." 
 
 "If I had known," said Roger, "you should have 
 had a flowery welcome here, like a girl who came out 
 by this line last year. The young man whose life 
 her absence had left a blank dropped in at one of 
 those florist places in New York where they under- 
 take to cable bouquets to all parts of the world ; and, 
 being rather doubtful of results, ordered ten dollars' 
 worth of flowers to meet his fair at Gibraltar. The 
 ship got in by daylight ; the passengers standing on 
 deck saw a rowboat full of lilies and roses and 
 orange-blossoms pull under the landing-stage, and 
 two men came aboard staggering under the weight 
 of them. The poor girl was overpowered, in every 
 sense, with her trophies." 
 
 "I have never had enough flowers," cried Polly.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " This bunch of violets seems to me the sweetest I 
 ever smelt. I wish it had been you, Roger, who 
 presented them not the stately being whom I took 
 to be at least a grand duke of Gibraltar." 
 
 Roger observed in his cousin's manner, after her 
 feet touched the old stone quay at Gibraltar, an ex- 
 hilaration not altogether to be attributed to the ex- 
 citement of landing at night outside the gate of a 
 grim walled fortress. Of Spain, Spain, was all her 
 talk. She must hear the ways and means of getting 
 upon actual Spanish soil. When the courier rejoined 
 them at the hotel, she asked him so many questions 
 on this head that Gillson felicitated himself upon 
 having at least one properly appreciative tourist in 
 his charge. Polly's last query for the night, before 
 her mother ordered her off to bed, was in which 
 direction lay Granada. 
 
 From the steamer Gib-el-Tarik next day, while 
 they waited for the complement of passengers that 
 would justify sailing across the strait, our heroine 
 looked back regretfully at the rock, which the splen- 
 dor of a midday sun had not induced to part with its 
 nightcap of cloud. Mr. Woodbury, who had arisen 
 refreshed like a giant from his sleep, had whisked his 
 pai-ty aboard the Tangier boat, and was now trotting 
 up and down the deck in high good humor with his 
 own success. 
 
 It was a perfect day and scene, the bay glinting in 
 sunlight, and alive with every variety of craft. Far 
 away they saw the black line of a P. & O. steamer ; 
 close to their bows passed a Moorish felucca filled 
 with fruit. Around her all was life, animation, color,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 radiance and yet the unreasonable Polly looked 
 back at the Spanish shore, and sighed. 
 
 "Do you think, Roger, they have newspapers 
 printed in Gibraltar that contain the lists of arrivals 
 at the hotels ? " she ventured wistfully. 
 
 " I hope not. I pray that I may not see the printed 
 name of any human being I know, for a month of 
 Sundays," he answered, laughing. 
 
 "I fancy grandpapa will return here," she added 
 tentatively. 
 
 " I don't know, 1 7 m sure. The grand duke Gillson, 
 who is a most persuasive creature, is much more of a 
 potentate on Spanish soil than elsewhere, and it is 
 possible that he (and old Cranleigh, who recom- 
 mended him) may have convinced my grandfather 
 of the charms of Spain in March and April." 
 
 " All travelers go to Granada, do they not ? Is n't 
 the Alhambra quite a hackneyed place ? " 
 
 "Hackneyed! Is St. Peter's hackneyed? Is St. 
 Mark's hackneyed? Is the Taj hackneyed, or the 
 Sphinx, or either of the great immemorial monu- 
 ments of the world? There is but one Alhambra, 
 and to be so near it, and not see it, would be a dis- 
 grace to any party not controlled by our respected 
 progenitor. As it is, we are like the feuittes 6pMmbres, 
 that go where the zephyr leads them. Just now, 
 Polly, I confess I ask nothing more. Look across 
 yonder shining, dancing sea. Let me tell you, you 
 are going to fall in love with Tangier, arriving on 
 such a day. It will be like clapping your hands and 
 seeing forty thousand black slaves appear, bearing 
 jars of jewels on their heads, or any other genie's
 
 116 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 work, to find yourself in this sunshine in the unadul- 
 terated Bast. I wish you would look a little livelier." 
 
 "I do. I am/' she cried, throwing off in secret 
 shame the haunting thoughts Roger could not divine. 
 
 By the time they had passed Tarifa, the last 
 stronghold of the Moors in Spain, and, leaving the 
 Spanish coast with its Moorish watch-towers, its 
 blaze of yellow gorse, the boat had steamed out 
 where the Atlantic pours its volume into the Medi- 
 terranean, she was again as gay as a bird on the wing. 
 
 In truth, nature here withheld no coaxing from the 
 depressed in body or spirit. Behind them the great 
 rock and the purple line of the Sierra melted into 
 the softer hues of distance. Before lay the verdant 
 coasts, the golden sands, the snow-clad summits, of 
 northern Africa. In the marvelously clear atmo- 
 sphere they could almost believe that by stretching 
 out a hand it were possible to seize the snow lying 
 in the clefts of the Atlas Mountains, which, as sun or 
 shade struck their bold masses, took on varied tints 
 of azure the blue of turquoise streaked with the 
 blue of lapis-lazuli. And all too soon, away to the 
 southwest, were pointed out the white lines, like 
 clothes hung out to dry upon a green background 
 of hills, announced to be the houses of Tangier. 
 
 Full of delighted curiosity, Paulina found they 
 had come to anchor in the bay of Tangier before 
 she was aware of the arrival of a fleet of small 
 boats, crowded with strange, wild figures, barelegged, 
 black or brown, of majestic proportions, an escaped 
 chorus from an Eastern opera, clad in a variety of 
 picturesque robes and rags, who stood up shouting,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 117 
 
 gesticulating, struggling, quarreling, and clearly 
 thirsting for the blood of those they sought to 
 decoy into their several crafts. 
 
 Justina, indeed, a timid blossom of forty summers, 
 wept with alarm at the invasion, and was little com- 
 forted by the courier's assurance that this hurlyburly 
 meant no more than the usual acclaim of hackmen at 
 railway-stations of other countries. Roger told his 
 aunt that her maid, invited into the arms of one of 
 " them savages," to be deposited in the stern of a rock- 
 ing boat piled with luggage, wore the expression of 
 Virginia when she declined to be saved for Paul.
 
 VIII 
 
 T was a trifle disappointing to Pau- 
 lina who found herself, upon touch- 
 ing African soil, with her brain ablaze 
 like a child's in a toy-shop that the 
 first bedroom assigned to her in the 
 East was supplied with the usual 
 commonplaces of comfortable living. A soap-dish, 
 mug for tooth-brushes, bell-pull, mosquito-net, a door 
 that locked, were considerations so banal in an apart- 
 ment where by running to the window one might see 
 veiled ladies taking the air on flat roofs under a sky 
 of vivid blue, or by looking down into the narrow 
 street take observation of a common school in the 
 house opposite, where delicious amber infants with 
 topaz eyes squatted on the floor, rocking back and 
 forth over hornbooks containing selections from the 
 Koran. 
 
 So lost in interest was she in an altercation between 
 the teacher Father Abraham himself, turbaned, caf- 
 taned, and with a long, flowing white beard and a 
 naughty little Moor finally sentenced to stand on one 
 leg for misdemeanor, that Miss Standish delayed in 
 brushing her hair, and was, as usual, late when called 
 to go down-stairs. 
 
 118
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 119 
 
 In the lower hall of the hotel, with its Moorish fit- 
 tings and curiosities arrayed for sale, they sat in a 
 pleasant sea breeze, and drank their tea. At little 
 tables, here and there, groups of people similarly em- 
 ployed showed that the trail of the tourist was over 
 Tangier. Polly took special note of an English bride 
 and groom, the latter a handsome, fair man in knick- 
 erbockers who surveyed his own legs in worsted 
 stockings alternately with evident approbation, and 
 spake no word to the partner of his joys. And then 
 Miss Standish became aware of the vicinity of some 
 transatlantic steamer companions she had desired to 
 avoid. 
 
 "Let me give you some cream, Roger," she said, 
 seizing the jug and deluging her cousin's cup. "I 
 don't want to see those Montana horrors, don't you 
 understand ? " 
 
 "All right, though I take no cream, as you know. 
 I thought I was used to the vagaries of young women 
 in tea-cup time, but this " 
 
 "Never mind; here 's another cup. I wish they 
 would give us something Moorish to eat, not English 
 tinned biscuits. There, I knew it! Grandpapa is 
 affably conversing with Senator (or Judge, is it?) 
 Galusha "W. Treat, whom he considers a 'fine, deserv- 
 ing self-made man.' I wish he had let somebody else 
 make him! On the crossing to Tangier the Treats 
 never left the cabin of the Gib-el- TariJc, she crochet- 
 ing, he reading a copy of the Paris edition of the 
 'New York Herald' bought in Gibraltar." 
 
 " I did that myself, with great satisfaction," quoth 
 Roger, doughtily.
 
 120 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "Now we are about to become the Treats' bosom 
 friends. Mama is answering her vapid questions. 
 Roger! She is talking about her cooks ! And grand- 
 papa has launched into American politics with him ! 
 What did they come abroad for? They are practi- 
 cally deaf, dumb, and blind to what we enjoy, and yet 
 they are the kind who swarm in foreign parts, and 
 become our national reproach, while hundreds of 
 eager, ardent poetic spirits stay at home, forced to 
 lead narrow lives, and eat their hearts out with long- 
 ing for the opportunity of travel. Tell me, Roger, 
 what will the Galusha W. Treats get by being in these 
 parts ? " 
 
 "All Americans desire to see what all Americans 
 have seen. You know we have stopped being one 
 of the 'races' Henry James once spoke about, 'for 
 which the type of domestic allurement is the parlor 
 hearth-rug.'" 
 
 "Look at those dear Arabs," said Paulina, jumping 
 up to cross the hall and survey a group of runners 
 for the hotel, picturesque figures with bare legs and 
 feet, and flashes of vivid color about their drapery, 
 who stood inside the front door. " Oh, I can't rest 
 here! I did not come to Africa to take tea with 
 Judge and Mrs. Treat. Come, grandpapa, mama, let 
 us explore the town." 
 
 "I should be very glad to do so," said Mrs. Stan- 
 dish, while the courier discussed their arrangements 
 with a white-robed official, whose function seemed to 
 be to talk for hours about the idiosyncrasies of each 
 individual mule to be engaged. " But I think it would 
 discourage Justina to leave her alone in a strange
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 121 
 
 hotel. The poor thing is feeling very nervous since 
 we arrived." 
 
 "Put Justina on one donkey, and "Wilcox on an- 
 other, and let them keep each other company/' said 
 Roger, promptly. 
 
 " Oh, thank you, Roger ; you always settle things," 
 responded his aunt. " But then, I have n't your cour- 
 age with servants, or Paulina's. Polly dear, would 
 you mind letting Justina know she is to come, and see 
 that she has had her tea, and tell her she may use my 
 lavender salts if her head aches ; and " 
 
 "I think that is enough, Rose," said her father, 
 dryly. 
 
 In the narrow lane outside the chief door of the 
 hostelry were assembled a drove of eight or ten mules 
 in process of saddling by as many Moors. The 
 words, cries, threats, gesticulations, disputes, ex- 
 pended in this performance passed computation by 
 the visitors, who thought, like the Irishman going 
 on an excursion in a sedan-chair without a bottom, 
 "If it was n't for the honor of the thing, I might 
 just as well have walked." 
 
 At last mounted, the women upon crimson pads 
 inclosed on three sides, and offering every facility 
 for sliding to the ground, they set off over the 
 pointed cobblestones of the so-called streets, in 
 which, to avoid collision with innumerable pack- 
 donkeys carrying all a Tangerine eats and wears and 
 drinks and uses, a rider must either have had experi- 
 ence, or be content to think of nothing else. Thus, at 
 the bridle-rein of the newcomer is generally seen a 
 native to whom are committed the "cares that infest"
 
 122 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 the way of the filthy, fascinating town ; and to Polly 
 was assigned Shamar, a bright-eyed, good-looking 
 young fellow in red fez and slippers and blue bur- 
 noose. He managed to make himself understood in 
 a compound of French, Arabic, and English, and 
 marched gaily beside her, calling out at intervals, 
 "Balak! Balak!" the usual warning to living ob- 
 stacles to get out of one's path. 
 
 Roger, leading the procession, had secured a little 
 white Arabian mare that minced like a fine lady 
 through the dirt of the streets, but could, on occa- 
 sion, " go like smoke," as Shamar said. After Pau- 
 lina came Mr. Woodbury, on a donkey so small that 
 his respectable old legs nearly swept the pavement. 
 Mrs. Standish was escorted by the courier, and in the 
 wake of the Treats (invited by Mr. Woodbury to use 
 two extra mules brought in for his party) were seen 
 Justina, on a tiny beast selected by her as being 
 nearest the ground in case of a fall, and Wilcox, try- 
 ing to preserve his smug dignity astride of a large 
 flea-bitten mule. 
 
 Passing between the whitewashed house walls that 
 seemed to hide tempting mysteries ; under the mosques, 
 the gay summits of which glittered with blue and 
 green faience; between the gay little shops, honey- 
 combed on either side the way, where high-bred old 
 dealers sit inside on their yellow slippers, and the 
 artificer plies his trade as his forebears plied it hun- 
 dreds of years ago, Paulina resisted all Shamar's wiles 
 to induce her to purchase of his uncles and cousins 
 along their route. 
 
 "No money," she cried again and again, showing 
 empty hands.
 
 AN EKEANT WOOING 123 
 
 "All right, lady," Shamar responded, grinning 
 amiably. That she had left plenty of money in New 
 York, the guileless native managed to convey to her, 
 was a fact he perfectly understood. Shamar, indeed, 
 begged Polly to take him to America, where he 
 pledged himself to run by her mule and pick up the 
 gold lying in the streets ! 
 
 " The Soko is just ahead, through that old gate in 
 the city wall," said Roger, turning to speak with his 
 cousin. " As the rest of the party seem to be unac- 
 countably delayed, I think I '11 go back to look for 
 them. You can wait in the market-place till we 
 come. Shamar will take care of you. You 're not 
 afraid?" 
 
 " No," she cried, with a sigh of satisfaction. " Ex- 
 cept that I shall never know whether I am in the Old 
 Testament or the ' Arabian Nights.' " 
 
 " This is the only town I was ever in where I do 
 not prefer to walk," Roger remarked as he rode 
 away. 
 
 " I had not thought of that," said Polly, suddenly 
 becoming unpleasantly aware of the condition of 
 things underfoot, while above her the splendid Afri- 
 can sun, tempered by an intermediate veil of sea- 
 mist, made the world seem too bright and beautiful 
 for mortal use, and the breeze bore to her nostrils 
 odors of orange-blossoms and wood-violets. 
 
 Under an arched gateway of the ancient crenelated 
 wall, whereo'n grow moss and stonecrop and tufts of 
 flowering plants a flower bursts where a seed falls 
 in Morocco they passed into the Soko. It is a 
 broad open space on the slope of a sun-baked hill, 
 capped by a line of melancholy tombs. Throughout
 
 124 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 the length and breadth of it she saw a gray-brown 
 moving mass of men, women, children, donkeys, 
 dogs, so closely welded that collision and annihila- 
 tion for some seemed inevitable. 
 
 Here, amid a confusion of sights and sounds, the 
 cries of showmen and venders, of camels, cattle, asses, 
 sheep, calves, the beating of native drums, and blow- 
 ing of native whistles, Paulina sat upon her mule, 
 thankful for that means of isolation from the dirt of 
 the crowd, and strove to disentangle her first impres- 
 sions of this page of the historic East. 
 
 The people tawny, tattered, pathetic paupers, of 
 no use to themselves or to humanity steeped in the 
 depths of degradation of past ages seemed to her 
 to be mere animated grains of sand from some des- 
 ert of antiquity. It was all sad, depressing. And 
 then the ineffable beauty of the golden atmosphere 
 fell with a sudden glory over her, and over the scene; 
 the elixir of the air passed into her veins; she saw, 
 at every turn, pictures by Ge"rome or Henri Reg- 
 nault; the dirt, the misery, the rags, blended indis- 
 tinguishably with color, life, and movement to make 
 the Orient of her dreams. 
 
 At the upper end of the market-place a train of 
 camels just in from the Fez country dropped on their 
 weary knees as they were called to a halt, and, stretch- 
 ing their long necks vainly around in search of some- 
 thing to eat while their packs were taken off, made 
 mournful remonstrance because food was not. Fol- 
 lowing the camels came another file of beasts of bur- 
 den in silhouette against the sky-line women with 
 splay feet and bare legs, who, carrying babies in the
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 125 
 
 coarse mantles that constituted their sole coverings, 
 bore on their heads huge bundles of furze for fire- 
 wood. 
 
 At every turn Paulina collected pictures to hang up 
 in the gallery of memory. Here passed a stunning 
 pair : a Rif mountaineer, wild and haughty, carrying 
 his matchlock, without which one of these desperate 
 fellows would not care to venture forth from his 
 eyrie in the hills ; at his heels, his wife, less veiled 
 than the women of Tangier, handsome and bold, 
 tattoo-marks showing under the silver clasps and 
 chains over her breast, a net containing live chickens 
 swung upon her back. 
 
 Next, a graybeard Moor carrying on his shoulder 
 above the crowd a naked cafe-au-lait cherub, as lovely 
 as any Murillo ever painted round limbs, fat little 
 paunch, eyes like diamonds, a mischievous rosy mouth. 
 " No wonder the patriarch is proud," thought Paulina, 
 " of the admiration his charge creates." This pictur- 
 esque couple was succeeded by an old hag, a mass of 
 wrinkles, her single garment, a piece of burlap, serv- 
 ing also as a veil. Ah ! could wife and mother sink 
 to be like this ? 
 
 A sister of charity, hurrying along; a priest or 
 two ; of Jews a plenty; a sprinkling of tourists, Span- 
 iards, Rock-Scorpions, Soudanese, Berbers; types of 
 all tribes, samples of all colors of children of the dark 
 continent. And amid the shrouded shapes of the na- 
 tive women, by whose eyes only could one judge of 
 their beauty, came tripping, with the gay insouciance 
 (and perhaps other characteristics) of Carmen, a 
 pretty Spanish girl, bareheaded, with a pink-and-
 
 126 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 white camellia in the parting of her jetty locks, and 
 a shoot of green bamboo in the knot behind. Her 
 cheeks were highly rouged, her eyes darkened, but 
 her clean pink calico spencer and blue skirt were in 
 refreshing contrast to her surroundings. 
 
 Then a fierce, warlike brown man, with hideous red 
 gashes where eyeballs had been a notorious robber 
 and murderer, whose eyes had been put out by the 
 paternal Sultan to keep him from further mischief. 
 
 Again, a tall soot-black negro, standing aloof, with 
 a forest of black hair, parted in the middle, bound 
 with a fillet, and braided with cowrie-shells, upon his 
 shoulders, wearing his ragged mantle with an air of 
 senatorial dignity. 
 
 " He is really much more my idea of a senator than 
 Judge Treat," mused naughty Polly, who, finding at 
 that moment near her hand a pate shaven except for 
 the long plaited lock depending at the back, by 
 which appendage the wearer believes he will be 
 jerked into paradise when his time comes, was 
 seized with a desire to pull it, and stand by the con- 
 sequences. 
 
 "You darling!" she exclaimed, her attention ar- 
 rested by a lovely unveiled maiden of thirteen or 
 fourteen who stood motionless, clasping to her bo- 
 som a white chicken. The little girl had walked, 
 Shamar explained, ten miles, from the flower-enam- 
 eled country where she lived, in hopes of selling her 
 fowl for twenty sous. "Give her this, Shamar; yes, 
 you shall. I must be obeyed. In America ladies are 
 always obeyed, and, besides, it is only half a franc." 
 
 "No good," said Shamar, while submitting; and
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 127 
 
 the flower face was illuminated with a look of grati- 
 tude that made Polly wish she had given twice as 
 much. 
 
 Turning, she saw another young girl, timid and 
 terrified, her arm in the grasp of a black man who 
 appealed to the passers-by in harsh gutturals. 
 
 "Oh! what is it?" Paulina asked; but Shamar 
 could not or would not answer; he was now, with 
 thwacks and adjurings, bent upon leading her mule 
 to view the performance of a serpent-charmer, whither 
 Shamar's own taste evidently turned. 
 
 The way, as they advanced, was more encumbered. 
 The eternal donkey was everywhere struggling, car- 
 rying in his panniers bales of stuff, barrels of water, 
 crates of bread, meat, vegetables, eggs, coops of 
 fowls, live lambs and calves, fagots for kindling, 
 baskets of fruit and sweetmeats, dates, nuts, and 
 medlars, amphora of milk and sheep's butter, native 
 confections of orange and jujube, sheaves of callas 
 and heliotrope, oranges and lemons decked with their 
 own flowers, red dye-stuff for women's nails and for 
 the wool of sheep. 
 
 " At last I can understand," quoth Paulina to Sha- 
 mar (who said, when she had finished, "Yes, lady," 
 although he naturally did not comprehend ten words), 
 " the shopping excursion of that damsel in the l Ara- 
 bian Nights ' who engaged the porter to carry home 
 so many nice-sounding things for her to eat, and 
 afterward entertained him by whipping little dogs." 
 
 They had now reached the outer verge of the 
 throng surrounding the snake-charmer, and saw that 
 a double bill had been provided by the management
 
 128 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 for the diversion of the public. A terrible old wiz- 
 ard with black ringlets, like a nightmare, was lighting 
 wisps of dirty straw picked np from the ground, and 
 stuffing them into his mouth ; while his comrade sor- 
 cerer, by frenzied leaping to the music of a drum and 
 pipe, strove to excite himself and deaden his sensibili- 
 ties for the introduction of the heads of two disgust- 
 ing snakes into his mouth, whence they were expected 
 to draw blood. 
 
 "I won't stay here," said Miss Standish, positively; 
 but again Shamar was attacked with convenient 
 deafness, and she was fain to turn away her head 
 altogether, and look over on the other side of the 
 slope, where a professional story-teller, a handsome, 
 olive-skinned young man with mobile face, in clean 
 white robes, wearing a hat like a candle-extinguisher, 
 waved a long black wand to emphasize his tales be- 
 fore an audience of men and boys sitting cross-legged 
 around him on the ground. 
 
 " Oh, dear ! I want to tell some one how this strikes 
 me. I am enchanted, but all the same I am just in 
 the state to worship the first clean white person of 
 my own kind I see. I wish Roger would come. I 
 feel as if I know nobody but Shamar in the whole 
 wide world," went through her mind in whimsical 
 meditation. " I wonder how it would seem to know 
 only one person in the world. A woman told me 
 once she can never get enough of the society of those 
 she loves; that she would like to sit for an eon on the 
 verge of a star talking to her best friend. The ques- 
 tion is, of course, who would the best friend be? 
 Roger could I sit with Roger for an eon ? No, no,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 129 
 
 no ! There never was but one, and oh ! what in the 
 world makes me so silly as to think about him now?" 
 
 "Balak! Balak!" 
 
 " Whose voice was that ? " said Polly aloud, quickly 
 swinging around in her saddle, and looking up the 
 path. 
 
 "Balak! Balak!" 
 
 There was no mistake. It was he, riding down 
 toward her, the man who for months had possessed 
 the fortress of her virgin heart ! In another moment 
 they would be face to face. 
 
 Sitting his horse with the negligent grace she re- 
 called as part of him, cleaving the tawny multitude 
 with good-humored command, into this scene of foul- 
 ness and squalor he seemed to bring a breath of the 
 lavender and iris from the hills. Following, also on 
 horseback, came May Gilchrist; and Paulina, to whom 
 this overture would not have been so easy had he 
 been alone, bravely and joyously called out his name. 
 
 "You here ! " exclaimed Sir Piers, with a look of 
 pleased astonishment that fairly matched her own. 
 " May, it 's Miss Standish ; or is it still Miss Stan- 
 dish ? " he added, in what Polly forlornly felt to be 
 altogether too matter-of-fact a tone. 
 
 She explained their presence in Tangier, learning in 
 return that the Gilchrists had been making expedi- 
 tions to Ceuta, Tetuan, etc., keeping Tangier as their 
 headquarters ; that May had proved herself a famous 
 horsewoman and raider of the hills, meeting with- 
 out flinching many severe tests of her endurance of 
 fatigue. Paulina saw at once the change wrought in 
 May by a life of independence in her father's com-
 
 130 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 pauionship. The awkward girl had bloomed into the 
 beautiful young woman, whose eyes met one's frankly, 
 whose native gladness of spirit now gave itself free 
 rein. Beside May's large, fair radiance Paulina in- 
 stinctively felt herself to be a brownie, a creature to 
 be overlooked, ignored, noticed only when she might 
 give utterance to some saying saved by wit. 
 
 And (there was no doubting this) in the ten minutes 
 while they talked Paulina disposed savagely of her 
 last lingering belief that Gilchrist had ever felt for 
 her anything more than a man's passing admiration 
 for " rather a jolly little girl." 
 
 "Oh, yes," she thought; "that 's what he calls me, 
 no doubt. I 've been a fool, a fool, a fool. He looks 
 me full in the face, coolly, as if I were any other 
 tourist in brown serge ; there is not a tremor in his 
 voice, while I am trying so awfully hard to squeeze 
 mine into steadiness. I deserve it. All girls who are 
 so untrue to higher womanhood as to fall in love un- 
 sought, should be punished just as I am now. It 's 
 all over forever, slain in the Soko at Tangier. I 
 ought to put up a little tablet here, with that on it for 
 an inscription, to warn other idiotic girls. What 1 7 ve 
 got to do is to reward poor Roger for his lifetime of 
 devotion, I suppose. Poor Roger, who has suffered 
 so long by me ! There he conies through the gateway, 
 my family after him. Here, Roger, look this way ; 
 rescue your poor Polly from this ogre of an English- 
 man who has come so near crunching her bones ! Oh, 
 I shall laugh at myself I won't cry; nobody shall 
 say I 'm suffering. And to think how I 've been look- 
 ing over at those hills where they tell me Granada is,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 131 
 
 and longing and yearning yes, yearning (I may 
 tell my inside self the truth) to be there only to see 
 Sir Piers once more ! The sole comfort is, he 's not 
 unworthy of all I 've felt for him not a bit un- 
 worthy. He 's a man, if ever there was one a big, 
 true, noble, tender man, no matter where he came 
 from. Here 's Roger! Ah!" 
 
 And with a sigh of relief the self -tormentor leaned 
 from her saddle, calling out a welcome to her cousin, 
 while bestowing on him the sweetest smile he had 
 had from her for many a long day. 
 
 Roger, properly astonished at Paulina's company, 
 exchanged handshakes with the Gilchrists, explain- 
 ing in due time the cause of his delay. Justina's don- 
 key, having slipped on a trifle of a dead rat in the 
 middle of the Tangerine Piccadilly, had fallen, precipi- 
 tating its burden upon the greasy breast of Abdallah, 
 her attendant; and, this combination proving too 
 much for the nerves of the lady's-maid, she had fa- 
 vored the onlookers with what Wilcox called " high- 
 strikes," necessitating another steed, and the return 
 of Justina to the hotel. "We had much ado," he 
 added, " to keep your mama from accompanying her, 
 till a few expressive words from my grandfather deter- 
 mined my aunt's progress in this direction. You '11 
 be glad to learn, Paulina, that we left the Treats pur- 
 chasing brass trays in a little shop, where they will 
 probably remain till dinner-time." 
 
 While speaking, the young man toyed with a spray 
 of fresh orange-blossoms ; and as the Gilchrists rode 
 forward to greet Mrs. Standish, he laid it timidly on 
 Polly's lap.
 
 132 AN ERE ANT WOOING 
 
 " Oh, thank you, dear Roger ! " Paulina said, with 
 emphasis ; and, casting away the bunch of red roses 
 she had hitherto worn at her girdle, she put in their 
 place Roger's flowers a substitution of which Gil- 
 christ did not fail to take note. 
 
 "That might be called a pretty little hint," the 
 Englishman observed to himself when, having agreed 
 to meet that evening at a discreet cafe cJiantant 
 where stranger ladies were made welcome, the party 
 separated. 
 
 " ROGER, I have asked you twice if you don't think 
 May Gilchrist the most improved girl you ever saw," 
 said Paulina, after dinner, as, in the wake of two lan- 
 terns of pierced brass swung by white-robed atten- 
 dants, they followed the courier and Hadji with his 
 staff and turban from the hotel into the mystery of 
 the night. 
 
 " What a delicious soft atmosphere ! One can hear 
 the sea, without seeing it; and I smell orange-blos- 
 soms," he said dreamily. 
 
 "They are yours I 'm wearing still they Ve kept 
 perfectly fresh." 
 
 " If you like, I will order a cart-load of them daily 
 to the hotel." 
 
 " I should die of sweets like a fly in honey. But 
 you may give me every day, with your own hand, a 
 spray like this, and I will promise to wear nobody 
 else's flowers." 
 
 "Polly, what do you mean by being so adorable?" 
 he cried, taking the hand that lay upon his arm. 
 
 "I '11 tell you some other time," she said, drawing
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 133 
 
 her fingers sharply out of his. In spite of herself, 
 his touch troubled, offended her. 
 
 " You asked me a question," he resumed, trying to 
 cover his mortification. "I do think Miss Gilchrist 
 improved. I may say I never saw such a magnifi- 
 cent young girl." 
 
 "Is n't she?" said Polly, generously. "You can't 
 imagine what a little insignificant thing I feel beside 
 her. She is almost as tall as you." 
 
 " She is charming in her vigor, her simplicity, her 
 utter freedom from conventional fripperies. I think 
 she gets that from her father; for he too is cast in 
 a big mold. It is nice that you have met them, 
 Paulina. You needed a girl-friend; and, if my in- 
 tuitions are right, Miss Gilchrist is of all girls the 
 one I should choose to do you good." 
 
 "Well done, Roger! "When you praise, you are 
 not begrudging." 
 
 " Did you observe what a strong fancy our grand- 
 father took to Gilchrist?" went on Roger. "This 
 morning he was vituperating the whole English na- 
 tion, and after two minutes' talk with Sir Piers he 
 agreed to an excursion with them to-morrow, in his 
 most hearty fashion. Bless the dear old fellow ! He 
 has no idea what a bundle of inconsistencies he is. 
 As to Aunt Rose, she, like everybody else, has bowed 
 to and worshiped the all-conquering baronet." 
 
 "Not everybody, Roger," said Paulina, nestling a 
 little to his arm. "I don't lose my head because 
 a great golden-haired, blue-eyed man comes riding 
 down the Soko in the midst of those dirty camel-col- 
 ored natives, do I ? And you won't forget the orange-
 
 134 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 blossoms, Roger, every day ? And when we go to the 
 country to-morrow, you are to keep by me you hear?" 
 
 Hadji turned, and marshaled his party up the 
 outer steps leading to a doorway around which slip- 
 pers of all grades clustered. They found within it a 
 clean, well- ventilated room, dadoed with matting hav- 
 ing a border of dried rice and grasses, and supported 
 by pillars set with blue and yellow azulejos. On a 
 shelf above the dado were ranged plaques and jars 
 of native pottery, full of dried grass and seed-pods. 
 Over these again were maps of Africa and of the In- 
 dian Ocean, a clock, and various bits of beaten brass 
 and Moorish faience. On the matted floors sat a 
 number of men smoking pipes and cigarettes, the un- 
 married distinguished by the fez, and all engaged in 
 playing chess, cards, or checkers. 
 
 To one side, in a division made by boards, were the 
 musicians: two violins, two guitars, a little mother- 
 of-pearl fiddle with two strings, two tambourines, 
 two men to clap hands and mark the time. A fine, 
 strong-featured set, the members of this orchestra, 
 preserving perfect dignity of manner; and during 
 the evening they furnished a liberal supply of their 
 characteristic music, accompanied by the slightly 
 nasal chanting of which it is possible in a short time 
 to have enough. 
 
 On benches running around the walls were placed 
 the lookers-on from the hotels and elsewhere, at 
 whose beck barelegged waiters ran hither and thither, 
 carrying the tin tripods upon which was served black 
 Turkish coffee, made from the berry crushed between 
 two primitive stones.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 135 
 
 In a corner beneath the open window the Gilchrists 
 had saved places for Polly and Roger, who enjoyed 
 the arrival, directly after theirs, of the valet, Mr. 
 Wilcox, looking determinedly rakish, until, at the un- 
 expected sight of his employers, he became painfully 
 proper in a flash. 
 
 " I want to make a memorandum of these musical 
 instruments for my grandfather, who has a little col- 
 lection of his own," said Paulina to Gilchrist. " Have 
 you a pencil and a bit of paper ? Anything will do. 
 Don't tear your note-book." 
 
 Sir Piers persisted, however, and a leaf from the 
 book was given her with its accompanying pencil. 
 
 "Take care," he said, "lest they suspect you of 
 making a sketch of them, which is an unpardonable 
 offense to their religion." 
 
 And, truly, a grave violinist had already taken ob- 
 servation of the young stranger, and was shaking 
 his head at her with a dark frown. Quickly Pau- 
 lina held up her bit of paper, exhibiting her writing, 
 and as quickly the Moor flashed back at her his 
 white teeth in a smile of apology, laying his hand 
 upon his heart with the charming gesture so com- 
 mon to his race. 
 
 "Oh, see!" said Polly. "You had drawn something 
 on the other side. Luckily, I did not show him that." 
 
 " Give it to me back," he answered, after bestowing 
 on it a glance, " and I '11 surrender to you any other 
 leaf you may select." 
 
 Polly, trying to make believe she had not seen, did 
 as he asked her ; but she had recognized the outline 
 and attitude of her own figure, as in her sketch of
 
 136 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 the Pheasants' "Walk only in this the girl's hand 
 held a heart with an arrow piercing it. 
 
 " It reminds me of something for which I never 
 thanked you," she said impulsively. 
 
 " This is only an illustration for some vers de societe," 
 he replied lightly ; and Polly felt ready to bite her 
 tongue for having allowed herself to be repulsed. 
 
 " You would not have supposed me to be such a 
 jessamy kind of fellow, would you?" he went on. 
 "But in my nomadic life I must find diversion as 
 I can. To-morrow, when you get outside the town, 
 you 'II understand that here we leave behind the rules 
 that bind ordinary mortals, and behave as if in the 
 region of eternal sentiment. Have you had enough 
 of this ? I am sure May has, and so we '11 meet to- 
 morrow in a better atmosphere. I must make the 
 most of our pleasant rencontre, for Thursday we go 
 back to Gib." 
 
 " So soon ? " she asked, unconscious of her depth 
 of expression in look and tone. 
 
 " Our outing in Morocco finishes as yours begins. 
 Maybe you will look in upon my pied-a-terre at Gra- 
 nada, if you come there, and if you remember it. But 
 we shall soon be wending our way to Seville for Holy 
 Week, like everybody else." 
 
 " Shall you ? Did you know that Lucy Blount, who 
 has been ill of influenza and was ordered to Biarritz, 
 wrote, before we left home, urging us to meet her in 
 Seville at Easter ? " 
 
 " Then I advise you by all means to do so. The 
 religious processions are fine, and the wailing of the 
 bands that accompany them is, of itself, worth the
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 137 
 
 journey. You, who are so sensitive to music of that 
 kind, should not miss the thrill it will give you." 
 
 "How do you know I am sensitive to music of 
 that kind?" 
 
 " There ! The cat jumped, did n't she ? Turn your 
 memory back to a dolefully rainy Sunday last spring, 
 when a young girl sat in one of the stalls in the 
 choir of King's College Chapel at Cambridge, with 
 a score upon her knee, and alternately followed the 
 singing and looked up at the vault over her head." 
 
 "Were you there?" 
 
 "I stopped over Sunday, on my way to "Wooton 
 Magna, to let May see my alma mater and hear its 
 choir at evening service." 
 
 " So that is your college ? Oh ! I'm glad, I 'm glad ! " 
 
 " I 'm glad also, if it brings such a note of approval 
 into your voice. "When I saw you again at Lady Ed- 
 mund's, it was like an answer to my thoughts." 
 
 The monotonous music, the whining chant, went 
 on. The odors of coffee and Turkish tobacco drifted 
 out over their heads through the lattice, in at which 
 looked the bright African stars. But Paulina's spirit 
 had flown back to green England; and, as Gilchrist 
 watched her, a mighty conviction that this woman or 
 no other was nature's mate for him came again into 
 the citadel whence he had once dislodged it. Just 
 then he noticed that with one of her rapid movements 
 she had let fall something upon the floor ; and, stoop- 
 ing, he picked up the spray of orange-flowers she had 
 been wearing at her breast. 
 
 At once a chill was upon him, and was evident in 
 his voice.
 
 138 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " This is yours, is n't it?" 
 
 " Oh, yes," said Polly, awe creeping into her tones. 
 "It is mine, of course. I suppose you know that 
 I am I am " 
 
 She glanced furtively around at Roger. He was 
 carving a date with his penknife upon the long staff 
 May carried as an aid in walking, while May looked 
 on laughing. 
 
 "I am oh!" Polly went on, bravely swallowing 
 her distaste "I am to be married in the autumn." 
 
 " Yes, I know," he answered awkwardly ; and poor 
 Polly felt that the light of the universe had gone 
 out for her. England, Africa, America, it was all 
 one! There would never be anything but duty to 
 live for, after this.
 
 IX 
 
 THINK, if you will be so kind as 
 to take my daughter in charge," 
 said Mrs. Standish to Sir Piers Gil- 
 christ ou the day following Pau- 
 lina's visit to the cafe chantant, " I 
 should be better satisfied to remain 
 with my father to-day, and let you chaperon the 
 young people." 
 
 "But, mama, grandpapa promised to go on this 
 expedition," cried Paulina, hastily ignoring Gilchrist's 
 half-quizzical assent. 
 
 " You know, my dear, grandpapa must not be per- 
 mitted to do all he thinks he can do ; and I intend to 
 take him, a little later, for a nice, quiet ride of an 
 hour or so outside the town, with the courier and 
 Wilcox to look after us. Sir Piers, having his own 
 daughter, will perhaps not mind being troubled with 
 the care of another young lady. You will find Pau- 
 lina very obedient, Sir Piers, for all she pretends to 
 be bent on having her own way 5 and if you see her 
 inclined to do anything reckless about her health, or 
 venturesome, I rely on you to check her ; and I am 
 quite sure she will show you the deference she might 
 not extend to Roger. She is a little given to teasing 
 
 139
 
 140 AN ERKANT WOOING 
 
 Roger, and in this wild country I 'd be better satisfied 
 if she 'd promise to stay by you. Now, Polly, don't 
 remonstrate. I do not often make a point, but I ex- 
 pect in this to be obeyed. If you took it into your 
 head to do anything rash, Roger would feel obliged 
 to follow, so it is better to let him ride with Miss Gil- 
 christ, who is experienced in this sort of thing, and, 
 as I sa}', let Sir Piers, if he really does n't mind, keep 
 by you." 
 
 " I really don't mind," said Gilchrist, not venturing 
 to look at Polly, as her mama paused to take breath. 
 
 He put her upon the horse he had himself secured, 
 which, with an English saddle, promised a day of 
 comfort. 
 
 " I hope I can live up to your good mother's con- 
 ception of my age and dignity," he observed, while 
 tightening the girth. 
 
 "It is fate, fate," Paulina said to herself, trying to 
 keep down the triumph that lent luster to her face. 
 Gilchrist, bidding May and Roger follow, led the way 
 with her to the beach at the southeast of the town, 
 keeping the track along a sandy coast, where gray, 
 leafless bushes, with long branches like whip-cord, 
 waved in a light sea-breeze. Seen thence, at every 
 turn, bay and mountains took on some new combina- 
 tion of beauty to witch the gaze. 
 
 No fair-minded man could, in like circumstances, 
 discern in a woman's eyes what ingenuous Polly let 
 Gilchrist see in hers without deriving from it food 
 for grave reflection. On parting from her the night 
 before, he had gone back to his lodgings, determined, 
 for her sake, to trifle no more with the perilous
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 141 
 
 charm of her society. And yet to-day chance had 
 thrown them together, to be for hours almost alone 
 in an Eden of bloom and brightness. She looked 
 such a pretty, helpless thing, in her shirt of poppy- 
 red silk and her short, dark skirt, riding bareheaded, 
 as she preferred to do, her hat hanging to her pom- 
 mel, her happy face turned on him, her slight figure 
 swaying toward him involuntarily as they talked. 
 He was enchanted anew with her innocent wiles, her 
 saucy rejoinders, her self-possession backed by timid- 
 ity. But he resolved to put a stronger curb upon 
 himself and guard her against herself, like the honest 
 gentleman he was. 
 
 " THEY have got quite away from us ! " exclaimed 
 May, suddenly aware that during her long talk with 
 the young American their horses had been plodding 
 with loosened reins. " But I 've been so interested in 
 what you were telling me ! Ever since I was a child, 
 your great, boundless country has been a wonder to 
 me. I like large rooms and houses, and empty 
 spaces, and great rivers and mountains and forests 
 and plains. Even here, in Morocco, where I thought 
 I was going to see a country not crowded like the 
 rest, Piers and I have come on so many miserable 
 people huddled together, it seems as if we could not 
 get out of the way of over-population." 
 
 "You must make haste to visit America, then," he 
 said, laughing. "In a few years it will be filled with 
 cities of twenty-story buildings, and electric lights, 
 and cable-cars. Do you know that we have nearly 
 eight and a quarter millions of men available for
 
 142 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 military duty, in the United States ? I wish you could 
 induce Sir Piers to bring you over to see our Exposi- 
 tion in Chicago this summer, and, after that, to make 
 me a visit at my ranch." 
 
 "That would be too delightful," she exclaimed, 
 with a flushing face. 
 
 "To let you into a little secret, I cannot induce 
 Paulina to take more than a perfunctory interest in 
 any of those things. She would fire up and declare 
 herself immensely patriotic if any one pulled a fea- 
 ther out of the American eagle's tail ; but she is an 
 old-rock New-Yorker, and if you knew us a little 
 better you would understand what that means 
 kind to the rest of our country, but indifferent 
 withal." 
 
 "And yet she seems to me what shall I say? 
 romantic." 
 
 "About nature entirely so, but not about American 
 society. Like a great many others she cannot look 
 above the crude, hard vulgarity of its foundations, 
 at the beautiful original structure that is rising to 
 cleave the skies. And she cannot see that the people 
 who have drifted out of older civilizations to help in 
 the shaping of ours are of endless variety and pic- 
 turesqueness. I don't mean in New York, mind you. 
 After living as I have done for some years, from 
 choice, in the freer western world, I myself do not 
 admire New York ; and I dread going back to estab- 
 lish myself in one of the little social pens they erect 
 there in which to isolate themselves from suspicion of 
 being too intimate with one another. For the society 
 of the old countries this has been done and handed
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 143 
 
 down. In our metropolis, where all begin pretty 
 much on the same level, and scramble up more or 
 less rapidly, it seems to me laughable to draw such 
 lines. But I don't venture these remarks before Mrs. 
 Standish, you '11 observe. My good aunt is a con- 
 servative ; 'and when I shake this sort of a little red 
 rag before her, she thinks anarchy is in the wind." 
 
 " I can't conceive of caring for the things so many 
 Americans lay stress upon. To me, if a man or 
 woman tries to live his or her own life consistently, 
 wherever it is cast, the rest is nothing. One can al- 
 ways find people to interest one, and that is enough." 
 
 " You would think so if you met the queer charac- 
 ters I live among. Not to speak of the ' wash-lady/ 
 who rides to us on horseback, dressed in a green vel- 
 vet habit with gold buttons, and always presides at 
 our table during her stay, there are men as full of 
 quaint talk and real sentiment as any I ever met at 
 Eastern dinner-tables. This 'Judge' Treat, for in- 
 stance, at whom my cousin turns up her little nose as 
 an impossible associate, is many times a millionaire, 
 a large holder of government securities, a bank presi- 
 dent, and has been United States senator. But com- 
 paratively few years ago he was wandering over the 
 Montana hills, almost penniless, searching for ' pros- 
 pects.' One day he found in an old forsaken gulch 
 a bit of gold quartz ' float ' which had been washed 
 from the parent lode perhaps centuries before. Fol- 
 lowing this up, he came on another spark of gold, 
 and after a search of days struck his victorious pick 
 into the shoot of ore that was to make his everlasting 
 fortune. The great point about Treat is his tenacity.
 
 144 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 Single-handed, he dug the tunnel in the mountain- 
 side that led finally to a splendid mine of gold-pro- 
 ducing quartz. Then riches and influence, and power 
 like that of a great prince, came to him easily. He 
 married a little Dame Trot of a woman, who does 
 not know how to spend his money, but has feeble 
 ambitions to do things like ' everybody else.' Hence 
 their journeys abroad. This is the second, I believe, 
 and he, poor man, is already bored to extinction." 
 
 " I saw your cousin go over and speak to the poor 
 lady, and advise her about her crochet." 
 
 "Oh, yes; Polly is capable of any sacrifice for 
 kindness. But she is too near to such people, sees 
 too many of them, to appreciate their picturesque- 
 ness. No ; I take that back. Even I can't see any- 
 thing picturesque about Mrs. Treat. In our country, 
 Miss Gilchrist, men preserve their original broad out- 
 lines long after their wives have become contorted 
 with borrowed airs and pretensions." 
 
 "My aunt told me she had heard that, when they 
 stay in America, American ladies all sit in rocking- 
 chairs in boarding-houses because they find it too 
 much trouble to manage 'help' in their own homes; 
 and let their husbands work in the city for the money 
 the wives are to spend ' traveling in Europe.' " 
 
 "I don't know about the rocking-chairs, and I must 
 deny the exploded boarding-houses ; but there is no 
 doubt my countrymen are inclined to make figure- 
 heads of their charming wives." 
 
 " You contradict yourself, don't you ? Just now 
 you said they are airy and pretentious." 
 
 " If I did, I have been recreant to the fair female
 
 THE MAIN STREET OF TANGIER.
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 145 
 
 who is our national badge and pride," he replied. 
 "May my 'right hand forget the very little cunning 
 it possesses! I was thinking of the large class of 
 more or less developed Mrs. Treats. Take my cousin 
 for a sample of our best." 
 
 " How shall you ever be able to induce her to like 
 the way you live ? " 
 
 " Unfortunately, Paulina and I are to come into 
 conventional bonds long ago laid out for us. Our 
 grandfather has exacted of me that on my marriage 
 I shall live near him in New York, and assume the 
 charge of his estate, which will at least give me occu- 
 pation. Before we join the others, Miss Gilchrist, I 
 want you to tell me why you have never vouchsafed 
 to say you were sorry to miss my call in London last 
 spring, just before I sailed for home." 
 
 " Your call ? " she asked, confused. 
 
 "I left two cards at Lady "Watson-Jones's house 
 in Bryanstone Square when told by the servant that 
 you had just gone out to drive with your aunt. To 
 own the truth, when I met you again here, and you 
 said nothing whatever about that visit, I was inclined 
 to be miffed. An American girl would have begun by 
 saying, with the most gracious emphasis, 'You don't 
 know how sorry I was to miss you, Mr. "Woodbury '" 
 
 " If I said that to almost a stranger," May replied, 
 looking at him with candid eyes, "I should have to 
 mean it thoroughly." 
 
 "Then take a smart London girl, such as I have 
 danced with and knocked about with in the sea- 
 son. Even she would have said something nice and 
 chummy, and suggestive of widening horizons." 
 10
 
 146 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "You are laughing at me. Are Americans never 
 serious? I did not hear of your visit. 7 ' 
 
 "Then, Lady Watson- Jones, I may lay this to 
 your door," he said. " Do you not think, Miss Gil- 
 christ, that your aunt's prejudice against iny coun- 
 trymen may be safely said to lie behind the failure 
 of my card to reach your hands?" 
 
 " I don't know," she faltered, genuinely distressed. 
 " Yes j I should tell you that you are right in think- 
 ing my aunt does not quite understand your country- 
 men. She has a queer idea they are all alike." 
 
 " She thinks, with Andrew Lang, that ' what makes 
 one New-Yorker better than another is so incon- 
 spicuous.' " 
 
 " Forgive me if I said anything you fancy unkind. 
 I hope, if you have a chance to come to see us in 
 Granada, you will let my father make you welcome." 
 
 "Have I forgotten the hospitality of the dower- 
 house ? Pray count on me not to suffer from Lady 
 "Watson-Jones's misapprehension, so long as you and 
 Sir Piers are so kind to me. See, they are stopping 
 at an old bridge. Shall we make a little speed to 
 join them?" 
 
 " This is a jolly old relic of the Eomans, is n't it?" 
 said Gilchrist, as they rode up. " How abundantly 
 they left their trace in these Southern countries! 
 "When you go to Seville, miss anything rather than 
 Italica, and let me be your guide there. Now we '11 
 strike inland, and show Miss Staudish what she says 
 she has never seen enough flowers to satisfy her 
 love for them." 
 
 The path into which they turned, aiming for higher
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 147 
 
 ground, was a mere cattle-track passing some of the 
 market-gardens which in these environs supply suc- 
 culent delicacies to the garrison and town of rock- 
 bound Gibraltar, and coming out into a region laugh- 
 ing with fields of young wheat and barley. 
 
 Few trees were in sight, thanks to the herdsmen 
 who for generations had been burning out the un- 
 derbrush to secure pasture for their goats; but of 
 lesser vegetation there was an extraordinary wealth : 
 grass, vines, shrubs, flowers, heather in golden masses. 
 
 At one point they rode through a sandy lane bor- 
 dered with thorn-hedges over which the eglantine and 
 honeysuckle of their own native wilds had thrown 
 flowery arms. On the right, behind an inclosure of 
 agaves, was a cluster of gray huts like hornets' nests, 
 whence a band of fascinating little Arab children, 
 dressed in robes of blue and yellow and crimson, 
 came running pell-mell to peer through the prickly 
 barrier. 
 
 To the left strange contrast! was a settlement 
 of humble Spanish homes, with white walls, and roofs 
 of fluted tiles, their open doors giving a glimpse of 
 patios with fountains and orange-trees. 
 
 And now, leaving the town, the sea-views, and the 
 villas, they had pushed on into the new world of 
 emerald hills, girdled with belts of wild flowers, va- 
 ried by acres of incense-breathing heather. 
 
 Above, mountains everywhere, mountains! Peak 
 and scar and cliff and shoulder of gray basalt rising 
 out of the green valleys, and massed with indescrib- 
 able beauty and variety under a dazzling sun. So 
 clear the air, dots on the farthest hillsides could be
 
 148 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 seen to be nibbling sheep. Through the sea of green 
 ahead, the last of a camel-train vanished as they 
 watched it; and, after that, all was solitude and 
 flowers. 
 
 In this largess of nature to Moorish wilds, they 
 distinguished marguerites, iris, asphodel, j^ellow and 
 blue lupine, anemones, crimson Adonis, lavender, a 
 pale-blue daisy, orange marigolds, vetches, borage 
 and trefoil, cistus and white convolvulus, and many 
 another of name unknown save to the botanist. 
 
 These sprang in the grass so close together that 
 their blossoms overlapped. They sent up into the 
 mild, pure air a fragrance gently intoxicating. The 
 feet of the horses trod them down, but immediately 
 they arose elastic. 
 
 And, that the flowery desert might not be without 
 animated life, in and out of its balmy recesses flut- 
 tered and twinkled an infinitude of butterflies and 
 tinier winged jewels of the air. A stork was seen, 
 and crows and swallows ; and yonder, king of all, an 
 eagle sailing to the heights of Atlas. 
 
 " No one who has not breathed it in camping can 
 understand the peculiar quality of this air," said Gil- 
 christ, as they drew rein to let the horses drink at 
 a little spring welling among cress and myosotis. 
 " When I am alone, shooting and exploring, I am in 
 a species of cerebral excitement, and rather enjoy 
 having only my natives around me. May can tell 
 you of her rides farther into the interior, and of the 
 prevailing monotony of this redundant bloom." 
 
 "It needed just this," cried Polly, as, appearing 
 from behind some bushes where she had apparently
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 149 
 
 been resting, a small, white figure passed near them, 
 walking rapidly. 
 
 To Paulina's delight, it was the little maiden with 
 sloe-black eyes to whom she had given silver in the 
 market-place the day before, now returning and 
 happily without her chicken to her distant home ; 
 as fearless as Una, crossing the flowery mead under 
 the shelter of the grim, gray rocks. 
 
 "Come here, you delightful little person," called 
 Paulina. "Roger, some money, please. All the 
 silver pieces you have. I want to be an epoch in her 
 life. I want her to tell her grandchildren about me." 
 
 But Roger was begrudging, and a single Spanish 
 dollar produced by him was transferred by Polly 
 into the little Moorish paw. In her awe and wonder, 
 the child, who had not seen the transaction between 
 the cousins, chose to associate Polly with Gilchrist ; 
 and, after kissing the hand of her benefactress, flew 
 to kiss his, pouring out a flood of grateful words 
 while looking from one to the other with exceeding 
 grace and archness. 
 
 Gilchrist, laughing, answered her in Arabic, and 
 with a final smile the little creature sped away across 
 the plain. 
 
 " "What did you say to her ? " queried Paulina, with 
 curiosity. 
 
 "Nothing, but to disavow certain honors thrust on 
 me," he said in a tone meant for her ear only. " If 
 Woodbury understood Arabic, he might cherish a 
 grudge against me; but as it is, I '11 say nought, 
 and we will let your fleet gazel carry her hallucina- 
 tions to her mountain home."
 
 150 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 Was Polly mistaken, or did a sigh exhale with this 
 speech, begun so lightly ? 
 
 " She is only a little ignorant chicken-girl," she said 
 rather defiantly. " One person is just like another to 
 her." 
 
 " No doubt. What I like in you are those sudden 
 dashes into tenderness about trifles, and your at- 
 tempts to prove that you did not mean them." 
 
 " I won't have you analyzing my character, away 
 off in these desert wilds or at all, indeed ! It is very 
 presumptuous. Tell me what sort of home our that 
 little footpad is going back to. What is her future ? " 
 
 "Dreary enough. The youth of these women is 
 brief, like their spring; and after it they toil in 
 degradation till they die. I suppose the position of 
 a woman is nowhere worse than in this beautiful 
 barbaric land. When she is born, she is a curse 
 upon her family ; and as a wife and mother her rat- 
 ing is deplorable. Don't think of what your protegee 
 will be ten years hence. It will not make you happy. 
 The only woman who has any position in the Mogreb 
 empire is the Shereefa, who is away from Tangier 
 just now. May took tea with her a few days ago, 
 and found her an agreeable, commanding woman, 
 wearing her high rank as if born to it. Miss Keene 
 was an English governess in the family of the British 
 minister here when the late Shereef fell romantically 
 in love with her. He had been in England, France, 
 Italy, and other countries, and was extremely fin-de- 
 si&cle for Morocco. She married him ; and their two 
 sons, lineal descendants of the Prophet, are very fine 
 fellows. The present Shereef is said to have second
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 151 
 
 sight, or to be a mind-reader, or something of the 
 kind. By the way, I have always meant to apologize 
 to you for getting you mixed up with that mind- 
 reading business at Wooton Magna. I hope it did 
 not annoy you." 
 
 " No," replied Polly, briefly, as they rode treading 
 out the life-blood of a bed of large red anemones. 
 
 " I would have apologized then, but there seemed 
 so little to excuse my cheek in dragging you into the 
 mental vagaries that confounded eery woman got at 
 so cleverly." 
 
 " It seems to me we do nothing but return to back 
 chapters," she said, for want of anything better to 
 bridge the silence. 
 
 "And yet our actual acquaintance could be num- 
 bered by days. May ! " he called out to his daugh- 
 ter, now ahead, "take the path beyond, to the left. 
 I have ordered luncheon to meet us in the orange- 
 grove of a good old Moorish friend of mine, who has 
 no objections to our taking him by storm; and we 
 shall call afterward at a couple of villas, in order to 
 show our American young lady how we do things in 
 Tangier." 
 
 " How very kind ! " said Polly. " But you need 
 not expect me to find anything more to my taste 
 than that lonely valley where the flowers blazed and 
 the sun blazed back at them. Dear me ! How are 
 the horses expected to get down into this ravine? 
 To let themselves go, and roll down, I suppose we 
 after them?" 
 
 "Follow May. She is an expert, and absolutely 
 fearless. There ! You are safe, are n't you ? " as, at
 
 152 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 the foot of a perilous decline, Polly looked back at the 
 cliff down which the sure-footed beasts had slipped 
 and scrambled. 
 
 " I 've done as much in Switzerland and the Tyrol, 
 and in the Yellowstone," she said; "but, here, there 
 is no such thing as a choice between roads or paths ; 
 one may plunge anywhere into a river, or else go on 
 forever over green slopes. I don't know in the least 
 where we are, how we came here, or whither we are 
 bound." 
 
 "I am too familiar with the country to lead you 
 astray. Gather up your feet as May does, or you 
 will get wet in this stream. Once over it, and on the 
 top of yonder bank, we follow a straight course to 
 luncheon." 
 
 " How proud you must be of May ! She is a splen- 
 did creature." 
 
 " I am, truly. At first, before I reclaimed her from 
 my grim-visaged old aunt, who has a conscience in 
 her way, and has really taken good care of my girl, 
 I dreaded the charge tremendously. But May and I 
 have hit it off together famously." 
 
 " She tells me you are mistaken for brother and 
 sister everywhere." 
 
 " May likes to natter me," he said. " She has had 
 to do so utterly without the relation of a parent in 
 her life that she has finished by discarding it alto- 
 gether. Poor girl ! I see now what we have both 
 lost by living apart. The trouble is, I shall never 
 persuade her to go back to England, and take her 
 place in society under the wing of Lady Watson- 
 Jones."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 153 
 
 " Oh ! do you blame her ! " cried Polly, in heartfelt 
 tones. 
 
 "She, like me, loathes towns, and loves the free, 
 full air of the country, and has fallen in love with 
 our little niche on the sierra. I talked with that 
 agreeable old gentleman, your grandfather, and he 
 tells me he 7 s given the courier orders to wire for 
 rooms at various hotels in Spain, including Seville 
 for Holy Week." 
 
 "He told you?" 
 
 " This morning, at the hotel." 
 
 " How perfectly delightful ! " she exclaimed, facing 
 him, with all her ingenuous soul in her gaze. "Then, 
 when you go to-morrow, we shall not be I mean, I 
 shall see May again." 
 
 She stumbled in vain. He saw it was not May, 
 but himself, Paulina was thus flushed with joy at the 
 thought of meeting. His heart, in a tumult of tender 
 satisfaction, strove in vain to curb itself as before. 
 
 "Ah, thank God!" he said simply; and at that 
 moment Eoger turned in his saddle ahead of them, 
 and, waving his right arm, called back to her : 
 
 " The sea, Polly ! the sea ! " 
 
 It was enough of a reminder. Paulina, like a 
 guilty thing, rode on rapidly, and, joining the other 
 two, found herself on a plateau overlooking the bay, 
 almost the whole extent of the Straits of Gibraltar 
 lying beneath their gaze. 
 
 " Are n't you well, dear ? " said Eoger, quickly es- 
 pying the disturbance of her face, and going around 
 to her other side, while Sir Piers, joining his daughter, 
 talked with her at a little distance apart.
 
 154 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "Roger, yes, I am feeling very well, tell me, 
 what is it right to do? To take the things laid down, 
 for one by others, or to choose for one's own innermost, 
 truest, realest self the self that is just as Glod made 
 it, and before the world got hold of it ? " 
 
 " What a moment for psychology ! Why, what an 
 intense little face it is ! Ask me when I am more in 
 the mood for that sort of thing, won't you? Just 
 now I 'm abominably hungry, and can't lift my base 
 nature above the pigeon-pie Miss Gilchrist tells me is 
 ordered to meet us in the garden of the Moor." 
 
 " Roger, I 'm in earnest ; and you foil me, as you 
 always do ! " 
 
 " Why, Polly, those are not tears ! What can have 
 upset you ? Where is my posy, dear ? I don't see it 
 in your frock." 
 
 " I threw it down, and let the horse walk on it ! " 
 she said fiercely. 
 
 " You won't get me to quarrel," her cousin replied. 
 "By and by, when this mood has passed, you '11 
 come of your own accord and tell me I 've done no- 
 thing to deserve such a look and tone as that." 
 
 "Oh, no, no, you have n't! I wish you had! 
 Roger, forgive me now. I 'm the most horrid girl, 
 without an exception, that ever came to Africa ! " 
 
 " The most darling girl," he answered in a whisper. 
 
 " Roger, I don't know why you keep on liking me. 
 I don't really believe you do; you 're only under a 
 spell. But I 've got to be loved and indulged, I 
 should die without it; and as long as you are be- 
 witched, please stay so. Where is that ring you 've 
 been carrying around in your pocket all this long 
 time, till I could make up my mind to put it on ! "
 
 AN ERKANT WOOING 155 
 
 Roger had dismounted, and was standing close to 
 her, his head on a level with her elbow, the cool 
 breezes playing around them; below, the wide view 
 of land and water. At her behest he, smiling a little, 
 put his hand into his inner coat-pocket, and brought 
 out a case containing the long-neglected token of 
 their bond. 
 
 " Give it to me," she said, almost snatching at the 
 ring, and herself putting it upon her left hand, un- 
 gloved for the purpose, with burning fingers. 
 
 "There! At last I have my what is it the cate- 
 chism says? 'outward and visible sign of an in- 
 ward and spiritual grace.' This is the cementing of 
 our engagement, is n't it? An odd time and place, 
 but that 's the thing I like best about it. Oh, no ; I 
 don't mean that, exactly. If I wear your diamond, 
 Roger, I '11 excuse you from giving me any more 
 nasty orange-blossoms. I do so hate the smell of 
 them. I wonder if I '11 live to see this ring sink down 
 into my finger, that will be all puffy and ugly around 
 it, like fingers of so many good wives I 've noticed. 
 And then I '11 look over and see you broad and red 
 in the face, reading the newspaper, and not listening 
 to me when I say anything clever. And I '11 remem- 
 ber the heights above Tangier, where I sat on horse- 
 back, and seemed to feel the whole world young and 
 at my feet, and cry my eyes out because we are old. 
 Roger, don't look at me with those puzzled, wounded 
 eyes. I can't bear to feel that a person is always be- 
 ing trampled on by me. I 'd far rather he 'd trample 
 upon me. But that you '11 never do, I 'm afraid." 
 
 " Never," said the young man, steadfastly. 
 
 Paulina, looking as if she meant to indulge in
 
 156 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 a burst of penitence, here changed her mind and 
 snapped : 
 
 "Now, I suppose we 've got to be civil to these 
 English people. This is an inconvenient kind of a 
 party two engaged lovers who want only to look 
 into each other's eyes, and a father and daughter who 
 naturally can't have too much to talk to each other 
 about. But married people are worse, are n't they, 
 Koger 1 You always know them in traveling because 
 they are so mum and glum. I suppose, when they 
 are away from home, she can't even tell him the 
 coal is out, or that the kitchen boiler has burst. Sir 
 Piers, please come here, and tell me how far we are 
 from your pigeon-pie." 
 
 "MY love," remarked Mrs. Standish, who had 
 stepped into her daughter's room, that evening, to 
 chat during Polly's preparations for dinner, " it is so 
 nice to think you have had a happy and successful day." 
 
 "And you, mother? " asked the girl, at whose brown 
 locks, hanging on her shoulders, an ivory brush plied 
 by her right hand made little nervous dabs. " I don't 
 think you told me all you did." 
 
 " No, dear ; you got in only for tea, and there was 
 so much to hear from you and Roger. It is too bad 
 you are to lose your friend, Miss Gilchrist, to-mor- 
 row, and her father, so indulgent as he was to you 
 girls, taking you to those villas, and planning that 
 lunch for you under the orange-trees. I told him 
 we really appreciate his kindness to our young peo- 
 ple, when it must have been something of a sacrifice. 
 Men of that age prefer older company, of course. 
 The courier told us Sir Piers is a hero among these
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 157 
 
 Arabs accustomed to attend him in his expeditions. 
 He has done all sorts of run-mad things, I call them, 
 and has been in many dangerous situations with 
 lawless natives; but I should think, with a grown 
 daughter in society, he must now settle down. I hope 
 you did n't neglect to be polite to him, my child. 
 Young people, when they get together, are so apt 
 to ignore their elders." 
 
 " But you have n't told me what you accomplished, 
 you and grandpapa, all by your little selves in this 
 barbarous country." 
 
 " We rode, my love, on mules, and I can't tell you 
 what the courier did not insist upon our seeing: a 
 garden outside the town where our conservatory 
 flowers grow in hedges ; and a law-court, where your 
 grandpapa was amused to watch a cause argued. The 
 learned counsel left their slippers outside, where the 
 judge sat in a sort of recess in a wall; and the judge 
 wrote notes or something, just as I have seen them 
 do in a court-room in New York, while the lawyers 
 were speaking. Then we looked through a round 
 hole at some prisoners an awful sight ; and I 
 bought some of the baskets they make and throw 
 out, for Justina to carry home to her friends. Poor 
 Justina! she is so very dull here. I must get a lot 
 of things for Toodles to-morrow." 
 
 "So that was all?" 
 
 "No. Did n't I tell you, Mrs. Treat and I she 
 is so lonesome, Polly, I feel sorry for her, and I 
 asked her to go with me and Justina went to 
 visit the harem of the pasha. When I was young, 
 everybody read the letters of Lady Mary Wortley 
 Montagu about her visits to a harem, and I had no
 
 158 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 idea I should ever be doing the same. I was quite 
 excited as the men led our mules through those hor- 
 ribly dirty alleys that lead up to it, full of dead things 
 they had not pretended to clean out of them. They 
 say you must n't judge anything by the outside in 
 Morocco, and I think it 's so ; for when the courier 
 rang a bell at a dingy old door, it opened, and there 
 was a smiling slave-girl you would have liked to 
 see, a tall, active creature, with bare feet, and her 
 toe-nails stained red, and gold hoops in her ears, 
 and her clothes of some white muslin stuff wrapped 
 around her, rather than fitted in an ordinary way." 
 
 " Go on, mother ; I like you better than Lady Mary 
 Wortley Montagu." 
 
 " She took us in, leaving the men with the mules 
 outside ; and we went through a corridor into a patio 
 as clean as hands could make it all marble, with 
 a fountain in the middle. Beyond this, a long, nar- 
 row, bare room like a niche had smaller niches in 
 the two end walls, with curtains of cheap Notting- 
 ham lace, for sleeping bunks. There we were re- 
 ceived by the pasha's chief wife. All of his other 
 wives, including the youngest, a girl of seventeen, 
 were away on a visit to the country for change of air. 
 I really should have liked to see that youngest wife." 
 
 " Fie, mother ! With your views, you ought not to 
 want to see her." 
 
 "The only thing Mrs. Treat has seemed to care 
 much about was missing all those wives." 
 
 "Then what happened?" 
 
 "I am glad, my dear, that I have something to 
 interest you with you so generally know everything
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 159 
 
 before I have a chance to find it out. The lady of the 
 harem was handsome. She must have been still more 
 so, once a stately woman, strikingly like our friend 
 Mrs. Manhattan in New York, but faded. Her eyes 
 were darkened, and her nails reddened, and she 
 wore gold-striped muslin things. After she had seen 
 me seated on her best cushion opposite her, and 
 Mrs. Treat and Justina my dear, Justina was so 
 pleased ! on two other cushions, she proceeded to 
 talk to us in signs. As she knew no French, and we no 
 Arabic, it was a little slow. So, after she had spread 
 over my lap a silk-worked muslin napkin, the slave- 
 girl brought in a tray with gilded glasses, a tea-can- 
 ister, pot, and sugar-bowl, and another slave brought 
 a brass caldron of charcoal, blew it up with a bel- 
 lows, and put on a beaten-brass kettle of water to 
 boil. Then the governor's wife made tea as we do, 
 except that she half filled the pot with lumps of 
 sugar, and then crammed in cinnamon and mint. As 
 the pretty little gilded tumblers were handed me 
 first, I had to drink it and praise it, with the hostess 
 looking on." 
 
 " Poor mother ! You are not an accomplished de- 
 ceiver, are you 1 " 
 
 " Justina was so flattered, she drank three glasses, 
 and the hostess evidently thought her a greater lady 
 than either of us. After tea she made her women 
 bring out her needlework ; and, Polly, what do you 
 suppose those poor, benighted, shut-in women spend 
 their time over? Crazy-quilts, in every variety and 
 shape! This ended the visit, and I must say, any 
 lady receiving her guests might take pattern by the
 
 1GO AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 perfect hospitality and politeness of ' that Mrs. Pasha/ 
 as Mrs. Treat called her." 
 
 " So Mrs. Treat was pleased ? " 
 
 " She said nothing till, when we got on our mules 
 again, she wondered why a right nice housekeeper 
 like Mrs. P. did n't send out and have a man clean 
 her alleyway. And I quite agreed with her. Polly ! 
 What is that ? My dearest girl, you don't mean you 
 have consented to wear Roger's ring ! " 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 " To-day, for the first time ? " 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 ''Oh, I am so happy it needed only this! As 
 long as you refused to do that for him, I felt uncer- 
 tain and perplexed. Now all is as it should be, 
 and you may depend grandpapa, who seems to see 
 nothing, will notice it, and be as pleased as I am. 
 Let me kiss you, my daughter ; and tell me how you 
 got a chance to talk with Roger alone, to-day of all 
 days." 
 
 "We were on a pinnacle looking down on the 
 beauty of the world, and I did n't happen to be talk- 
 ing to anybody else." 
 
 " The point was whether he happened to be talking 
 with anybody else. I had several pangs, after you 
 left, at the idea of Roger being exposed to a long 
 day in the society of that beautiful girl. For she is 
 beautiful, Polly ; and, as vain a mother as they think 
 I am, I consider you rather variable in your looks. 
 May Grilehrist has that transparent rose-and-cream 
 complexion Roger always admired, and hair just like 
 a child's in its bright gold. Why, your grandfather 
 actually noticed her coloring, and praised it ! A wo-
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 161 
 
 man would see she has 110 style, and knows nothing 
 about dress ; but a man sees only what he wants to 
 see when he has taken a fancy. Then May and Roger 
 are such a fine contrast, and I have always heard 
 that men seek their opposites, while : 
 
 " While Roger and I, in a subdued light, might be 
 mistaken for one another is that what you meant 
 to say, and stopped?" 
 
 " No ; but you have a certain family resemblance." 
 
 "I know it. When I see Roger crook his little 
 finger exactly as I do mine, I have to look away 
 in utter weariness. He had all the opportunity he 
 could desire to pay tribute to May's beauty to-day ; 
 for, except for ten minutes, he has spent it with her." 
 
 "I hope, dear, that Sir Piers fully understands 
 Roger's ahem ! preoccupation ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes. He knows it, she knows it, everybody 
 knows it ! " 
 
 "I only thought it would be most regrettable if 
 that poor girl were to form hopes. Come in ! Yes, 
 Justina; say to Mr. Woodbury that we shall be 
 down directly. Polly, on the whole, it is just as 
 well those Gilehrists are going to-morrow." 
 
 " I think so. Let us hurry down. The soup must 
 be over, and the fish cold. Grandpapa will be fum- 
 ing, and ' thou hast been the cause of this anguish, 
 my mother.' " 
 
 "Nothing makes much difference to me the day 
 you wear Roger's ring! Polly, we shall quite cer- 
 tainly be in Paris in June, and then I shall set about 
 your trousseau. Say what one will, a mother must 
 always be glad to get her daughter's marriage well 
 
 off her mind." 
 11
 
 X 
 
 ND where are we bound to now, Gill- 
 son!" asked Mr. Woodbury, in a 
 mild voice, of his courier. 
 
 It was a source of secret amuse- 
 ment to Mr. Woodbury's famity that 
 the autocratic old gentleman, like 
 themselves, was under hack to the personage to 
 whom Paulina had given the name of the Grand 
 Duke of Gibraltar. In a correct morning costume 
 of the latest English fashion, a crisp, wide-brimmed 
 straw hat, white duck gaiters over his well-polished 
 boots, with an irreproachable scarf and pin and 
 gloves and walking-stick, Gillson conducted their 
 movements of travel, and lent tone to the party. 
 
 They were back in Gibraltar, reposing after a 
 return passage from Tangier in a small open boat 
 half filled with cattle and crowing cocks, over a 
 course wherein the Atlantic and the Mediterranean 
 had played a game of cross-purposes, giving assur- 
 ance to the passengers of their ability to wrench, with- 
 out breaking, the foundations of human existence. 
 
 In Gibraltar a terral (the northwest wind) was now 
 blowing a wind the prevalence of which produces 
 such excitement in the nervous system, say old au- 
 
 162
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 163 
 
 thorities, that courts of law consider it a circonstance 
 atUnuante in cases of crime. 
 
 Without knowing the cause, almost everybody in 
 the party had felt its influence ; though it is fair to 
 say that upon Mrs. Standish's familiar, Justina, the 
 effect was most manifest. Only old Mr. Woodbury 
 rose superior to the terral, as he had done to the 
 crossing from Tangier. 
 
 At this point it was that the Grand Duke of Gib- 
 raltar,, inspired by Wilcox, took occasion to bring 
 about a reform in Mr. Woodbury's attire. One of 
 the autocrat's prejudices, respected by his household, 
 was against wearing gloves, and for appearing always 
 in public in an old felt hat, bent and faded, the occa- 
 sion of frequent comment from casual observers. To 
 propose any other headgear would have been regarded 
 by the family as on a par, in irreverence, with sug- 
 gestions to the Pope to doff his tiara, or the Czar his 
 imperial crown. "What, therefore, was their surprise 
 on hearing, through the partition between their 
 sitting-room and Mr. Woodbury's chamber, the fol- 
 lowing conversation: 
 
 " And where are we bound to now, Gillson ? n 
 
 " I think, sir, we shall try Roiida, and Cordova, and 
 rest there before we go on to Seville. And, if you 
 will allow me to observe v (" hallow me to hobserve," 
 was what Gillson actually said), " I would advise you 
 to buy your new hat and gloves here in Gibraltar, al- 
 though the gloves are fair in Seville, and I can take 
 you to the place there where I always get mine in the 
 quantity. I 'ave hordered the man with whom I gen- 
 erally deal in Gib to send in some straw 'ats from
 
 164 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 which you can make selection ; and if Mr. Wilcox 
 will step below, I dare say the messenger is now 
 waiting in the hall." 
 
 " Straw hats, Gillson ! " came the response, in tones 
 of honey. " Well, if I am in Spain, I must do as the 
 Spaniards do, eh? You think we shall find the power 
 of the sun sufficient to necessitate straw hats ? " 
 
 " Not a doubt of it, sir. I should not venture to 
 conduct my party at this season unless properly pro- 
 tected in all matters of 'ygiene. When I 'ad the 
 honor to travel with their Roy'l 'ighnesses the Prince 
 and Princess of " 
 
 The rest was moonshine to the listeners. They 
 were now well acquainted with Gillson's Royal High- 
 nesses, and the main point established was that 
 grandpapa's outer man was to be rehabilitated. 
 
 When he appeared ready for the railway journey 
 to Ronda, and descended the steps of the quay into a 
 rowboat to cross the bay to Algeciras, all of his party, 
 with common consent, looked at the mountains, the 
 sea, the oarsmen. None dared be first to fix the eye 
 upon grandpapa's new straw hat. At last Paulina, 
 ever dauntless, glanced aside at him, and beheld not 
 only a new hat, but a decidedly smart one, with a blue 
 band, and a string to attach it to the buttonhole; 
 and, to complete the marvel, Mr. Woodbury wore 
 reddish-brown dogskin gloves with flat brass buttons, 
 at which he ever and anon glanced down, half shy, 
 half fascinated. 
 
 "Good gracious!" she whispered to Roger, "if 
 this keeps on, Gillson will have him rejuvenated, and
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 165 
 
 perhaps falling in love, before we get out of Spain ; 
 and oh ! Roger, how grandly that would settle us." 
 
 " I '11 swear, Polly, a man never knows how to take 
 you," he said, with some show of petulance. 
 
 "If only, Roger dear, you would try not taking 
 me ! " she rejoined. 
 
 Drops of such bitter, falling daily into Roger's cup, 
 forced the young man to make up his mind that he 
 must have some explanation from Polly, or else bind 
 her over to keep the peace. The fancy that at times 
 he had detected in her clear eyes eyes that could 
 hide nothing from those she trusted a "hunted" 
 look, pained him exceedingly. But again, when, 
 during their expeditions, he fell into private conver- 
 sation with his aunt, Mrs. Standish always expressed 
 her satisfaction with what she was pleased to call 
 the " beautiful " way all things were tending to the 
 goal desired. Polly was " so good " about it, grand- 
 papa " so pleased." That morning she had written to 
 Sophy Low to say that when it came Sophy's turn to 
 have a girl engaged, she could only hope it would 
 give the "comfort" Polly's affair did to every one 
 concerned. And then, after letting the active brain 
 of the kind matron spring ahead to the point of fur- 
 nishing their house and engaging their servants, how 
 refreshing it was to Roger to come up with Polly and 
 be held at arm's length like a stranger ! 
 
 Roger knew himself to be well supplied with proper 
 pride. In another girl he would have resented many 
 things accepted, because it was the habit of the family 
 to accept them, from the little Juggernaut, Paulina.
 
 166 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 He had the American idea that girls worth having, 
 like trout worth having, must always be played be- 
 fore landing. Vague imaginings assailed him of the 
 pleasure he would experience when Polly, tired out, 
 should cease to struggle, should submit to be drawn 
 in ; but these were beginning to be more vague. 
 
 Melted long ago into thin air were a young fel- 
 low's dreams of the sweet comradeship in which he 
 should be loving ruler, she happy subject. He had 
 no such illusions now. The best he could hope from 
 his wife must be that she would come to him in a 
 series of stormy repentances, and bewitch him into 
 saying that what had passed made no difference. 
 
 It was in Ronda, when sallying forth in a party 
 in the wake of Gillson, that he resolved to ask her 
 what ailed her, and be done with it. They had come 
 to the Tajo, that mighty cleft in the rock made, so 
 tradition said, by the sword of a Moorish magician 
 to be a resource for the old town when beleaguered 
 by an enemy. Ahead of them, Gillson, in full pro- 
 fessional career, was administering information as 
 to the fate of the architect of the bridge they stood 
 upon "which 'e fell from this dizzy 'ight, and 
 was himmediately dashed to pieces in the chassum 
 below " 
 
 " Suppose we run away and explore on our own ac- 
 count," suggested Roger to his affianced, in a whisper. 
 
 " Good ! " said Polly. In a moment they had fled, 
 not to pause to .draw breath till at respectful distance 
 from the scene of Gillson's eloquence. 
 
 After long wandering they came out under the cas- 
 tle, and, climbing up to the grassy parapet springing
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 167 
 
 with poppies, rested in the shadow of the one most 
 lovely tower remaining of an ancient citadel which 
 once covered as much ground as the Alhambra. 
 
 " What is that line, like a streak from a lead-pencil, 
 far away over there on the mountain ? " asked Polly. 
 
 " Probably a road leading into the town, where any 
 day you may see a train of charcoal-bearing donkeys 
 wending their way down, the owner asleep in the last 
 pannier," said Roger, who had been practising his 
 Spanish in getting information from one or two 
 pretty landladies. " Over it, too, no doubt, come the 
 smugglers, who, with the bull-fighters, are the joy 
 of the populace. The civil guards, who patrol these 
 approaches to Ronda, make a feint of overhauling 
 the tobacco, clothes, and jewelry brought from Gib- 
 raltar by the contrabandista, in case he has escaped 
 the highway robbers farther back. But there is often 
 a ' cordial intent' between guards and smugglers, and 
 the contrabaudista steps proudly and fearlessly about 
 his native streets. Look out for him, Polly; no doubt 
 we shall see him this morning smoking his cigarette 
 in a doorway leading into one of those tempting 
 patios hung inside with last year's apples and grapes 
 and pears." 
 
 As they talked, he was watching his opportunity to 
 introduce the subject of his grievance ; but, whether 
 Polly divined this or not, she was in a provokingly 
 elusive mood. So long as he treated topics of the 
 moment, topics of general interest, she was all anima- 
 tion and sisterly interest. As soon as he drew near 
 to discussion of themselves, she would prove to be 
 Polly at her worst.
 
 168 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " You are more than I can endure ! " he exclaimed 
 at last, angrily. 
 
 "Thank you, Roger! Now I feel better, as that 
 Frenchwoman said in the play, after she had boxed 
 her husband's ear. A real quarrel is what I 've been 
 longing for. Let us leave behind us in Eonda the 
 record of a fight fiercer than anything ever known 
 between Christian and Saracen. You may be Chris- 
 tian 5 I prefer the Paynims, as far as I 've made their 
 acquaintance in Spanish history." 
 
 "Paulina, you can be so absurd!" he retorted, 
 laughing despite himself. " Will you never learn 
 that between people who are to spend their lives 
 together, as we are, this sparring is not only dan- 
 gerous but undignified ? " 
 
 " Thank you for reminding me of that," she said, 
 blood rushing into her face. " If you curb my tongue 
 it will be worse inside worse than it is now j and 
 God knows, that 's bad ! " 
 
 " Polly, why should it be bad inside now ? Did n't 
 you take me of your own free will ? Have I pushed 
 myself on you? Is Aunt Rose all wrong in telling 
 me that this engagement of ours is making every- 
 body happy who has to do with it? Don't you be- 
 lieve that I am honestly and heartily intending to 
 devote my whole life to making you not repent your 
 bargain?" 
 
 " Indeed, indeed, I do ! " 
 
 " Don't you believe, if I thought there were any one 
 you loved better than me, I would give you up to 
 him at the risk of sacrificing no matter what our 
 grandfather intends for me in the future?"
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 169 
 
 " Yes," she said faintly. 
 
 " But I 've known your whole life, dear ; I 've read 
 it like a fair, open page. You have walked alone 
 have never dropped into flirtations, never encouraged 
 fellows like other girls. Who could there possibly be 
 to come between you and me ? " 
 
 " Who ? n she repeated, hardly audible. 
 
 " If there were a man I suspected of loving you, 
 some one kept at his distance by our affair, I 'd 
 have thought that was troubling you. Much as it 
 would have cost me, I should have stepped out of 
 the way " 
 
 "But there is no such man, is there?" she inter- 
 rupted, turning away to gaze over the wide plain 
 surrounding the town. "As you say, there was never 
 such a man. I 'm a bad bargain left on your hands. 
 Some day, Roger, away in the dim future, you will 
 have another Paulina a meek Paulina, 'all duty, 
 all observance.' She will walk by your side, and you 
 will wonder what became of the creature that made 
 your youth a burden. Now I want to go back to the 
 fonderia" she concluded, springing to her feet. 
 
 " There was such a dreadfully sad cadence in your 
 voice just now," he persisted, though he felt that his 
 audience was at an end. 
 
 "Sad! No," she returned. "I am ready to echo 
 the town boast that there is but one Ronda, and its 
 air makes me want to fly." 
 
 As they passed, going back to their inn, a certain 
 door upon a street near the rift between the old town 
 and the new, a couple of urchins who followed them 
 made show of the liveliest pantomime of anxiety that
 
 170 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 they should knock at it, at the same time urging the 
 matter in voluble speech. 
 
 "What do they say, Roger?" asked Polly, bowing 
 to his superior knowledge of the language. 
 
 " I can, as usual, understand all but the vital part. 
 However, it is plain that something of interest lurks 
 behind that unassuming portal; so, if you say so, 
 we '11 investigate." 
 
 "If we were decoyed and made prisoners in a 
 Moorish dungeon!" 
 
 " I think, if they had you against your will, they 
 would soon let you out," he answered. 
 
 " For shame, Roger ! What encouragement have 
 I to be so good ? " she replied, three parts in earnest. 
 " Can it be that my late acquiescence, propriety, gen- 
 eral amiability, have made no impression on you ? " 
 
 "They have been as remarkable as the fact that 
 my grandfather, who does nothing by halves, put on 
 his new gloves this morning to sally forth to the 
 Alameda. Indeed, for a week past you have how 
 long did we stay in Tangier after the Gilchrists left?" 
 
 " Roger, you measure everything by the Gilchrists' 
 comings and goings. What are they to us? We 
 shall see them no more, except, perhaps, in a crowd 
 at Seville." 
 
 "I should feel disappointed if I did not have an 
 opportunity of continuing my very jolly talks with 
 Miss Gilchrist," said the young man, ingenuously. 
 " When you flout me, Polly, it is good to have that 
 calm, tranquil sort of refuge." 
 
 " But I don't flout you now, Roger. At least not 
 since I 've worn this ring. Yes, little boys; ring,
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 171 
 
 knock, batter down the door as you please. I 'm dy- 
 ing to get in there. I Ve a presentiment I am going 
 to meet my fate." 
 
 The boys, thus encouraged, pounded and rang so 
 lustily that the old dame who appeared at the open- 
 ing of the portal scolded them fiercely, and, while 
 letting in the strangers, shut out the offenders. 
 
 "They will be waiting to get your coppers when 
 we come out," observed Polly. " Why, this is not at 
 all creepy, this pleasant patio, with the garden be- 
 yond, and the birds and plants." 
 
 "I say, Polly," said Roger, to whom the old wo- 
 man had addressed herself; "this is the house of 
 Rey Moro. She says the gentleman who built it had 
 the pleasant habit of drinking his wine out of the 
 skulls of the captives whose heads he had cut off, 
 though he made amends to them by having the skulls 
 set in gold and studded with pearls and rubies. Gill- 
 son told me of the place, and he will never get over 
 our having found it for ourselves." 
 
 The house was built upon the verge of the chasm 
 that separates the towns, and, behind it, from a tiny 
 terrace full of snowdrops and wallflowers, fell away 
 stairs hewn in the rock, descending to the bottom 
 of the Tajo in zigzags, and intersected by gardens 
 with balustrades similar to the one above. 
 
 "She says there is a grotto about four hundred 
 feet below there," went on Roger, elated with his 
 own success in understanding a native ; " and it was 
 dug by Spanish prisoners, who also cut the staircase 
 in the rock. They used to carry jars of water up to 
 serve the house and garden, and if they lagged on
 
 172 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 the way were walloped by the scimitars of the Moors. 
 ' Walloped' is a free translation, understand." 
 
 "Roger, don't say another word!" cried Polly, 
 dancing about in delight. " I never was in the mid- 
 dle ages till this minute. I want to stay alone and 
 be part of a Spanish ballad, while you are to go on 
 down to the grotto, to the very bottom, see every- 
 thing there is to see, and come back, having solved 
 its mystery. Whatever you meet down there, whe- 
 ther dragon or serpent, or jar of gold, or fairy prin- 
 cess, you must conquer it, and make it yours. As 
 for me good-by, America! I 'in now a Moorish 
 lady, named Xarif a, whose Spanish lover is forced by 
 her cruel father to work in that pit, while she sits 
 embroidering a golden cushion, and plotting and 
 planning how she shall deliver him. And the very 
 next time he comes toiling up these steps carrying 
 on his head a jar of water to help to fill a well or 
 fountain, I shall slip into his hand a golden key that 
 will unlock the postern-gate. I don't know exactly 
 where that is, but I '11 be outside it, waiting on the 
 croup of a fleet Spanish barb, with my jewels tied in 
 a white scarf. No, Roger; don't say I 'm a goose. 
 I know, I feel, that my only love and yours are down 
 at the bottom of the ravine. I think, on the whole, 
 I will throw the key to mine." 
 
 She had taken from the old dame's hand a tuft of 
 wallflower streaked with purple and gold, and now, 
 leaning over, threw it into the abyss, while Roger, 
 laughing, ran down the rocky steps. He was hardly 
 out of sight when she heard voices in the direction 
 he had taken, and, at once, coming to meet her with
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 173 
 
 great strides, Gilchrist, carrying the bit of wall- 
 flower, appeared on the terrace below. 
 
 " I think we must admit we are driven together by 
 destiny," he said, when he reached her ; but to the re- 
 lief of Paulina, who was covered with blushes, in a 
 manner unsuggestive of sentiment. 
 
 They shook hands, and he extended to her the 
 flower. 
 
 " Is this yours, and may 1 keep it ? " 
 
 "It was mine. I lost I threw it over; but I want 
 it again very much," she replied, grasping it nervously. 
 
 " It fell on my head," he said, smiling ; " and May, 
 who has remained below to show the grotto to your 
 cousin, said I was like Chicken Little, who thought 
 the world was falling. This is astonishing. Your 
 plan, when I left Tangier, was to go first to Granada, 
 then to Seville." 
 
 " So you came to Ronda to avoid me," was on her 
 tongue, but she desisted. Polly knew that in the 
 present condition of affairs nothing could be more 
 dangerous to her own security than one of the ana- 
 lytical discussions of the origin of actions, so dear to 
 persons still under the aureole of undeclared attach- 
 ment. Besides, the suddenness of seeing him had had 
 the unusual effect of depriving her of speech. She 
 strove to utter one of her airy, dashing phrases, but 
 no words came ; she was only ridiculously, insanely 
 happy to breathe the same air with him, in the shadow 
 of the old Moorish house, where everything suggested 
 romance. 
 
 " We came last night from Granada," he said. " I 
 had promised May that she should see an ideal old
 
 174 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 town, and it seemed a good time to select. And we 
 are just about resigning ourselves not to go to Seville 
 till the turmoil of Passion Week is past. There are 
 feasts a few weeks later, equally well worth seeing. I 
 shall regret to miss being there with you and your 
 cousin and your mother, and that excellent old gentle- 
 man your grandfather." 
 
 " Why don't you add, ' and the courier and the valet 
 and the maid?'" she asked, seeing him blundering 
 along, as evidently under the weight of repressed 
 emotion as was she. " Of course I understand why 
 you came here when you thought I was going to be in 
 Granada of course ! " and then the " Moorish lady " 
 stopped, and disposed of something very like a sob, 
 while the " Spanish captive " wondered what he had 
 done to be so dealt with by mischievous opportunity. 
 
 Not daring to face her, he turned, and walked to 
 the edge of the terrace, and called down to May. 
 There was a delay in May's answer, and a longer 
 delay in her appearance, followed by Roger, looking, 
 as his cousin scanned him with the frolic humor she 
 could never keep long in abeyance, a little foolish. 
 
 They walked away together from the Mina de 
 Ronda, on the whole rather resigned to the new deal- 
 ing of the cards. Even the faithful Roger found an 
 agreeable zest in May's unfeigned welcome of his so- 
 ciety. There was something reposeful in her pres- 
 ence; he had no fear of being jerked by her hither 
 and thither by the bit. Their conversations gave him 
 occasion to say so many things he thought of and 
 dwelt upon, which to Polly seemed twice-told tales. 
 As modest as man can be, he yet had a little of the
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 175 
 
 natural aspiration of his sex toward being Sir Oracle 
 to her he loved. And Polly, the lawless one, knew 
 no Sir Oracle. There was never any telling at what 
 minute she would whip around and blow cold upon 
 his finest feelings, his tenderest hopes. May, on the 
 contrary, was always the same, earnest, simple, 
 wholesome, her eyes like blue, clear lakes, into 
 which he might gaze and be refreshed; her mind, 
 slower to work than his cousin's, but fine and well 
 balanced, never disappointing him when its workings 
 appeared upon the surface. And, to tell the full truth, 
 Roger found May the most beautiful creature he had 
 ever seen. Loyal at heart to his Paulina, he was lay- 
 ing up images of May in her different aspects that 
 would serve as food for memory all his life thereafter. 
 As an old man he felt sure he would shut his eyes 
 and conjure up this English maiden's face and figure, 
 whenever he should want to bring back the chief glory 
 of things seen in his youth. 
 
 After the meeting at Eey Moro's house, there seemed 
 to be no question of further avoidance of their party 
 in Grilchrist's mind. The four walked through the 
 streets, peeping into courtyards and barred windows, 
 behind which pretty women were talking to caballeros 
 a-tiptoe on the sidewalk; went to the Casa Man- 
 dragon ; and were finally brought up by the discovery 
 of Mrs. Standish, attended by her maid, in distress 
 over some purchases she had undertaken to make 
 alone in a little shop. 
 
 " Oh, Roger ! Oh, Sir Piers ! how do you do ? How 
 do you do, Miss Gilchrist ? We had no idea of seeing 
 you in Ronda. I am so glad you have all come, for you
 
 176 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 will drive 'away the dreadful little boys who are fol- 
 lowing us, and that idiot who has frightened Justiua 
 so. Polly, help me to choose. I am planning to take 
 Toodles something characteristic from each place we 
 stop at, and of course he won't want fans ; so here is 
 an Andalusian peasant's suit, and a mule-harness." 
 
 "What will he do with it, Aunt Rose ? " said Roger. 
 
 " There might be a fancy-dress ball, Roger, and it 
 would become Toodles so well." 
 
 " What ! the mule-harness ? " 
 
 "No, Roger; don't take me up. He could hang 
 that in his room when he goes to college. At any 
 rate, it is very cheap." 
 
 "Allow me," put in Gilchrist, interrupting. In a 
 trice the sum asked for the purchase fell one half, 
 and laden with trophies the party walked out of the 
 shop, the posse of youngsters, who had been so an- 
 noying, taking care to keep a good distance from the 
 sticks of the new arrivals. 
 
 " IF you will be my guests this evening," said Gil- 
 christ, coming in on the Americans at their luncheon, 
 " I have taken a box for the ' Fantoches de Narbon/ 
 a puppet-show just now attracting the gentry and 
 public of Ronda." 
 
 "Delightful!" cried Paulina. "But why did you 
 take a box ? I should like to sit with the crowd." 
 
 " As I thought you would be more comfortable to 
 yourselves, I committed the extravagance of paying 
 twelve shillings for the only box in the theater. I 
 think it would hold a small army. You must not 
 go if you mind tobacco-smoke, Mrs. Stan dish ; for
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 177 
 
 every man and boy puffs his cigarette throughout the 
 performance though, I will say for them, the thea- 
 ter is well ventilated. It is a capital way to see the 
 people of the place, and the whole affair will be de- 
 cent and orderly." 
 
 " We '11 accept," said Polly. " Grandpapa, you said 
 just now you feel better in this air than at any time 
 for fifty years past, so you '11 be there ; and mama is 
 intolerant of tobacco only when Toodles asks her 
 when he may begin smoking." 
 
 She had crossed the room, and was standing by 
 Gilchrist. By some strange process of a woman's 
 mind, her recent objection to trusting herself in his 
 society had been temporarily set aside. It seemed 
 quite natural that when he came into a room she 
 should absorb him. 
 
 "What is May going to do this afternoon?" she 
 asked. 
 
 " We are just off for a ride to the Cueva del Gato, 
 a cavern all stalactites, rather a risky place for a rash 
 traveler to venture. If we are not heard of more, put 
 up a tinsel trinket for me in Santa Maria, won't 
 you?" And, without a hint of wanting her company 
 on the expedition, he took leave. 
 
 It is safe to hazard the supposition that Polly, at 
 that moment, would rather have been asked to visit 
 the Cueva del Gato than any spot known to explorers. 
 But she would on no account have let Roger see the 
 blankness of her face. It was as it should be, she 
 admitted when she went out on horseback on her 
 own account, accompanied by Roger. No one could 
 have behaved more sensibly, with more consideration,
 
 178 AN ERE ANT WOOING 
 
 than Gilchrist in the unforeseen emergency of their 
 meeting here. Had he not won every right to go off 
 with May, and ride to dangerous caverns Paulina 
 would have given her eyes to see? So also had 
 Eoger and Polly the right to ride to the Cueva del 
 Gato, but naturally she said nothing would induce 
 her to turn in that direction. A little later, she did 
 think Gilchrist might have given her a chance to go 
 there, either before or after him. As strangers, Polly 
 and Roger wished to see all the interesting places. 
 But now, how could they go, if they were to risk 
 meeting the Gilchrists, who had plainly shown a de- 
 sire not to meet Miss Standish and Mr. Woodbury ? 
 And so at last Polly worked herself to the point of 
 thinking Sir Piers might have been a little kinder. 
 
 Eoger, who, wondering at her long silence, ad- 
 dressed a remark to her about the scenery on the 
 bridge-path they had selected, was told that if he did 
 not know there were times when she had rather die 
 than talk, he had better find it out before it should 
 be too late. For the remainder of the afternoon she 
 did not smile j the environs of Eonda were scanned 
 without praise, and Polly's companion returned with 
 her to the inn, feeling both flat and indignant. 
 
 Her face brightened when they took possession of 
 the promised box at the theater, even though Sir 
 Piers, after placing her in her chair, presenting her 
 with a bull-fight fan and a tiny box of chocolates like 
 those he offered to the other ladies, and asking if 
 she had a good view of the stage, went over and 
 dutifully took a seat behind Mrs. Standish and Mr. 
 "Woodbury.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 179 
 
 Observation of her grandparent here developed to 
 Paulina the fact that the old gentleman was rather 
 doubtfully eying his own hands in a new pair of 
 pearl-colored gloves with black stitching. He had 
 looked at Roger's bare hands, then at Gilchrist's, and 
 was fumbling with his buttons, when he espied the 
 courier and Wilcox, occupying gallery seats near by, 
 wearing gloves exactly like his own. No one pre- 
 sumed to be aware of Mr. Woodbury's impatient tear- 
 ing off of his hand-coverings, which, crumpled in a 
 ball, were tossed upon the floor of the box. 
 
 The audience, assembling promptly, consisted of 
 the leading families of the town who filled the best 
 seats below, and two front rows of the gallery and 
 the general public, elsewhere bestowed, including ba- 
 bies in arms, carried by their fathers, who smoked 
 over their heads. 
 
 Grave senors, retaining during the evening the 
 universal sombrero, stalked in, draped in cloaks with 
 many capes, faced with blue or crimson plush. Their 
 sefioras, fat and sleek-haired, with fans and mantillas, 
 were generally of a serious cast of countenance, and 
 not unfrequently wore mustaches. The senoritas, in 
 the bloom of Andalusian maidenhood, were bewitch- 
 ing, with dark eyes, milk-white complexions, dark 
 hair elaborately dressed and tipped with a rosebud, 
 tuberose, or carnation ; bodices pink or white, gloves 
 of white kid, white fans, and opera-glasses; talking 
 together, discreetly cognizant of chaperons. 
 
 During the performance all was sober, comme il 
 faut. The chief sound heard from the audience was 
 the striking of a fusee upon a match-box when a new
 
 180 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 cigarette was required. In the entr'actes, glasses of a 
 pink fluid and little sweet cakes were indulged in; 
 and the senors moved about, talking without a waste 
 of animation to their acquaintances. 
 
 For the stage, it may be said that the " magnificent 
 function," advertised on handbills of all colors scat- 
 tered in the streets, was surprisingly good of its 
 kind. 
 
 The " Fantoches de Narbon " (large-sized marion- 
 ettes), " distinguished notably from all others so 
 called," owed so the public was assured by the bills 
 their scenic attraction to the "inspiration" of the 
 Barcelonese painters Morages and Urgelles, whose 
 masterpieces, having " received the eulogies of the 
 critics and the general applause of the world, were 
 now presented to the notice of the citizens of Ronda." 
 
 The program, beginning with a " sinf onia " from a 
 limited orchestra, proceeded with the 
 
 Comedy of Magic, written in verse for this spectacle by 
 D. Jos6 Mazo, entitled 
 
 MAETA, 
 
 The Beneficent Fairy! 
 
 Developed in twelve magnificent scenes distributed as follows : 
 Act I. A mountainous country! The Enchanted Cave! The 
 regal bower of the Fairy ! 
 
 Act n. Snow-fields ! A Garden ! A market-place in Turkey ! 
 A hall ! A vestibule in the palace of the Grand Bashaw of 
 Persia ! 
 
 Act HI. Interior of a castle ! The Shrine of Love ! 
 Act IV. An arbor in a garden ! The Temple of Felicity! 
 With many tricks of transformation. The prices of seats to 
 be announced by handbills. 
 
 General admission, 50 centimes.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 181 
 
 In the box of state, a merry party followed the ad- 
 ventures of the wooden peasant who, let down on a 
 wire from above, jerked and dangled with his com- 
 rades through the four acts of the " Comedy of 
 Magic." This hero, to whom the seeress granted his 
 wild wish to go to Persia and marry the daughter of 
 the Grand Basha, sustained his part gallantly, and was 
 interpreted by a sonorous and well-trained voice from 
 behind the scenes. The costumes were rich in stage 
 trumpery, especially the apparel of the Basha's 
 daughter. The tricks of transformation were well 
 done, and the scenes justified (to a degree) the world's 
 eulogy of Morages and Urgelles of Barcelona. 
 
 Polly, who with Roger and May had been laughing 
 over the rigidity of the hero at his supreme moment 
 of success in love, suddenly became aware that her 
 grandfather and her mother were urging Sir Piers to 
 accompany them to Seville. 
 
 " That 's what he gets for making himself agree- 
 able to them," she thought. 
 
 "Why, my dear sir, you are a boon to us a 
 boon," her grandfather was saying. "And if you 
 have not engaged your rooms, don't give yourself any 
 concern. My courier has taken two more than we 
 shall absolutely need, and they are quite at your ser- 
 vice. In the Hotel de Madrid, I believe. The best 
 place to go, they tell me. And we have a large box 
 for the processions larger than we '11 require. 
 Pray give us the pleasure of sharing it with you." 
 
 " I am sure, Sir Piers," put in Mrs. Standish, in her 
 soft voice, " it would be a thousand pities to separate 
 our young people just when they have taken such a
 
 182 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 fancy to each other. You and I know one can be 
 young but once. So soon my daughter will be mar- 
 rying and settling, and no doubt yours will follow 
 ought n't you to make a little effort to amuse her ? " 
 
 " Not go to Seville ? Oh, pshaw ! " said Roger, 
 catching the drift of the conversation. ""Why, man, 
 you must ! Miss Gilchrist has just confessed to us 
 that she longs to be there, and is hoping you '11 
 change your mind." 
 
 Polly, her eyes upon the puppets of the stage, felt 
 that here was a human comedy in which the wires 
 forcing the actors to dance were pulled by hands 
 invisible. She refused to look around, to join in 
 the talk, to say a word either way to influence the 
 decision. 
 
 And by and by she heard the voice that was the 
 charm of her life say slowly : " Of course I can't hold 
 out against such kindness. We shall go."
 
 XI 
 
 EMANA SANTA," in Seville ! By 
 the middle of the week Paulina 
 felt that her repertory of impres- 
 sions of the gay little Andalusian 
 city was already full, and yet the 
 best were still to come. 
 Her family the Gilchrists accompanying had 
 put in the time intervening between their visit to 
 Ronda and the beginning of Holy "Week, at Cordova. 
 Of the great mosque she had brought away a dream 
 of elaborated art never to be displaced ; and of drives 
 and walks, and excursions in the foothills of the 
 sierra near the town, there were memories that each, 
 day but made more precious. Paulina did not admit 
 to herself that she might have had most of this 
 "preciousness" without a setting of Spanish hills. 
 
 In the Court of Oranges, just outside the entrance 
 of the mosque, at the moment when their hands 
 were upon the leathern curtain that hangs at the 
 temple door, they had come upon two familiar fig- 
 ures Judge Galusha W. Treat and his "lady" 
 arm in arm, making the rounds with a haughty cou- 
 rier who was evidently administering information 
 as Mrs. Squeers's brimstone and treacle was admin- 
 istered by main force. 
 
 183
 
 184 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 "Hello, judge," said Roger, cheerily; "I was think- 
 ing of you but a moment since. Here are a lot of 
 Western newspapers that have followed me from 
 home, that I thought you would like to see among 
 them a copy of the ' Sledge ville Advertiser.'" 
 
 The judge stopped short. A beatified look over- 
 spread his face, as he stretched out his hand to receive 
 the coveted journal. 
 
 "You can go on inside, Malvina," he observed 
 gently to his spouse. " I '11 just sit down here on 
 the edge of this fountain, and see what the ' Adver- 
 tiser' 's got to say." 
 
 And, with that, the late American lawmaker, who 
 had arrived in Cordova the night before, and was to 
 leave it that afternoon, seated himself with his back 
 to the peerless mosque, and plunged with instant 
 absorption into the columns that were to reveal to 
 his homesick spirit details of more interest than the 
 world's wonder could afford ! 
 
 At Seville they had found every room in the hotels 
 and annexes filled, at double the ordinary prices for 
 the week. Vehicles of all sorts were ordered from 
 the streets until after the passing of the last of the 
 processions on Good Friday night. The squares, 
 with their rows of orange-trees like torches of golden 
 flame, were encircled with booths for the sale of petty 
 merchandise and cooling drinks. In the streets con- 
 gregated peasants, soldiers, townspeople, tourists, and 
 visitors, among whom none trod more gladsomely 
 than our little group, drifted together by the happy 
 chance of travel and reinforced by the welcome addi- 
 tion of their friends, the Blounts.
 
 INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE AT CORDOVA.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 185 
 
 The days had sped by on golden wings when, on 
 the evening of Holy Thursday, Paulina sat on a chair 
 in their box in the open portico of the town hall, 
 looking below her into the paved square, around 
 which arose tall cream- and blue- and pink-washed 
 houses, their balconies, to the top stories, crowded 
 with citizens in gala costume. 
 
 These boxes, of temporary construction, were filled 
 with the best of Sevillian society, who, arriving about 
 four o'clock, had spent the afternoon chatting and 
 visiting each other, in the intervals of the passing 
 of the holy images. 
 
 Of the gray facade behind them, draped with gold 
 and scarlet, the doors and windows were filled with 
 spectators. The street beneath was a continually 
 shifting mass of people, all animation and cigar- 
 smoke, till far down one of the narrow dark streets 
 debouching into the square was espied the glimmer 
 of lantern or taper, or the gleam of a gold-worked 
 banner. Then silence fell, cigars were put away, hats 
 were removed, and necks were craned toward the 
 coming show. 
 
 The processions, which had been passing intermit- 
 tently during the past two days, were best to be seen 
 at twilight, when the electric lights had just begun to 
 scatter their white radiance upon the dusk, and the 
 senoras in the balconies were becoming mere blots 
 of black against the light backgrounds of the houses. 
 Paulina, who had hitherto refused to be impressed 
 by it, was possessed by a new and strange emotion. 
 The spectacle was for her now invested with true 
 religious mystery. She wanted to hear no jarring
 
 186 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 sound as out of the dusk of the narrow street emerged 
 the ivory-white figure of Christ, Virgin, angel, or 
 patron saint, shrined in glittering tapers, robed in 
 royal magnificence, wearing jewels worth a king's 
 ransom. 
 
 Preceding the figures, or following them, came Ro- 
 man guards on horseback, Nazarenes bearing golden 
 crosses and trumpets, a choir of angels afoot, another 
 of sibyls, seminarians, minor clergy, Roman foot- 
 soldiers, guards with arms reversed. And all the air 
 seemed filled with the sweet, pathetic wailing of the 
 bands. 
 
 As they passed into the thronged square, there was 
 no sound or stir in the assemblage standing bare- 
 headed to receive them, unless a peasant woman cried 
 out in ecstasy, or a man lifted up his voice in nasal 
 chant of homage. "When the glittering army had 
 filed by, and was again lost in the gloom of a neigh- 
 boring street, Sir Piers turned to ask Paulina how 
 she had liked it, and saw that tears were in her eyes. 
 
 "It is not their religion it is their music that 
 affects me," she said. "You were right. You knew 
 me better than I knew myself." 
 
 Throughout the night she was again and again 
 aroused by the thrilling strain of the dirge of the 
 Passion. Once, as it swelled in the street below, she 
 ran barefooted into her balcony and knelt there in 
 the darkness until it died away. In her overstrained 
 state of sensibility, this act was a sort of desperate 
 relief. For, ah ! what mischief had been wrought, by 
 the days just passed, upon poor Paulina's capacity to 
 resist tender experience !
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 187 
 
 BEFORE ten o'clock on the morning of Easter Eve, 
 Paulina, taking the maid for protection, went alone 
 to the Church of San Salvador, for the final religious 
 ceremony, the " Rending of the Veil." 
 
 It was her thought thus to escape the others, to hie 
 her away in solitude, and in the gloom of the great 
 church to ponder over her sin to Roger and to herself. 
 For now there was no illusion : where Gilchrist was 
 not, for Paulina there was no light. She loved him 
 with a girl's fervor ; and although he had given her 
 no further sign of response, a look, a word, the con- 
 sciousness that he had her continually in mind, kept 
 her in a delicious treinblement whenever he was near. 
 
 Under the rose-window above the altarpiece veiled 
 from sight by a purple curtain, some priests were 
 droning. Around her the Spanish women in black 
 mantillas came in with prayer-chairs and books and 
 beads, and fell upon their knees. Polly, too, wanted 
 to pray, but she found no words. Her heart said 
 only, " How can I give him up ? " and the blushes 
 burned upon her cheeks. With such thoughts of the 
 creature, how could she go upon her knees to the 
 Creator? She felt forlorn, ashamed. At last she 
 knelt, and, murmuring a little prayer, made new reso- 
 lutions to be strong and true to Roger. The tears 
 ran down her cheeks, but she felt comforted. 
 
 Happening to glance across the church, she saw, to 
 her surprise, May and Roger standing behind a pillar, 
 evidently unable to secure seats. They were close 
 together. Something in the expression of May's face 
 when she looked at him, answering some whispered 
 comment, sent a little dart of joy into Paulina's
 
 188 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 armor. She had shut her eyes not to look at them 
 all in the church was hushed in mysterious silence 
 when suddenly there was a mad jangling of bells, a 
 burst of music, the full force of the organ made the 
 dull, incense-laden air tremble in every nook of the 
 great interior cannon-rockets burst in the gallery, 
 sending out clouds of smoke! 
 
 And then the purple curtain was rent asunder, 
 showing the light and glory hidden behind it. Lent 
 was past and gone! Easter was proclaimed! The 
 world was called on to rejoice. For every burdened 
 soul there was new hope, and Paulina took fresh 
 courage. 
 
 While waiting for the church to clear, she knew, 
 without looking, that May and Roger had disappeared 
 unaware of her presence. Coming out, she brushed 
 against Gilchrist, standing under one of the canopied 
 Pasios exhibited in the procession the day before, and 
 looking inscrutable. She had no idea whether or not 
 he had seen her until that moment. 
 
 " I fancied you would be here," he said, joining 
 her. " I came to ask if I may n't take you to see 
 some Murillos. 
 
 " But May ? " asked Paulina, hesitating. 
 
 "She did n't you see her? has gone off with 
 your cousin, who is really immensely kind to my re- 
 cent school-girl. They are bound for the Alcazar, 
 which May likes especially." 
 
 " I think I had better go to my mother," she said, 
 after a pause. 
 
 " No. Please don't. She has Lady Edmund, May 
 has Woodbury, and I 've got no one. Don't you 
 compassionate me?"
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 189 
 
 " Yes," said Polly, as lightly as she could. " But 
 you will excuse me now. I must really take Justina 
 back to the hotel." 
 
 LATER that day, Paulina drove with Lucy Blount 
 through Las Delicias, literally, in the dulcet after- 
 noon, a garden of delights, with Guadalquivir flow- 
 ing alongside, the walks on its river-bank shaded 
 with olive and orange, palm and Japanese medlar, 
 and with rose and jasmine in its bosquets ! 
 
 In the broad roadway open vehicles, four lines 
 abreast, displayed the fair Andalusian (three of them 
 on a seat, in general), now attired in the white man- 
 tilla, carrying the pink parasol laid away for forty 
 days; flowers at her breast, in her lap ; smiles on her 
 lip, in her eye ; nodding, exchanging greetings and 
 kisses of the hand with the inmates of other car- 
 riages ; coquettishly pretending not to have seen the 
 admirer who had left the bridle-path in chase of her, 
 until, when his horse grazed her wheel, she cried out 
 in astonishment ! 
 
 Beauty, fashion, rank, the lights of local govern- 
 ment, foreign visitors, all to-day were pressing in one 
 direction. The world was on its way to the Tablada, 
 to see the bulls destined for to-morrow's sacrifice. 
 
 Some few miles distant from the town, in a field 
 surrounded by a deep trench, inclosed in turn by a 
 rail fence, were gathered a group of six fighting 
 bulls, black, or black-and-white, with the twenty 
 tame belled cattle who served as their custodians. 
 
 Upon the fence, having scrambled up a clay bank 
 to lean over it, were seen grave officials, soldiers, fine 
 ladies, men and boys ; every one excitedly discussing
 
 190 AN ERKANT WOOING 
 
 the points and chances of the heroes of the morrow's 
 fray. Bets were laid and booked; a premonitory 
 thrill made itself felt even by the uninitiated. Of 
 those to the manner born, gentle and simple seemed 
 to be equally under the spell of an hereditary vendetta, 
 thirsting for the blood of the poor brutes ! 
 
 Shoulder to shoulder with the aristocracy crowded 
 as many of the lower orders as had been able to walk, 
 or to pile into donkey-carts to drive, thither. With 
 the hostility of their fathers to the bull surging in 
 their veins, they called out to him derisively, " Ole, 
 toro ! Bravo, toro ! Buen toro ! " and taunted him with 
 his approaching fate ; every bull looking back at his 
 in suiters in sullen majesty. 
 
 While, with the rest, Lady Edmund and Paulina 
 hung over the fence, a caballero in the national cos- 
 tume of black and silver rode at a gallop down upon 
 the assembled carriages, then pulled up his noble 
 black steed, which stood scattering foam on his own 
 shining coat. The handsome rider, sitting his peaked 
 saddle like a centaur, in silver buttons, with a jacket 
 cut short behind knew well the theatrical value of 
 this arrival. He was evidently some young swell of the 
 sporting world, and the women fluttered and whispered 
 at sight of him. Upon the Americans, however, he 
 chose to bestow his most bewitching glances. 
 
 " Saucy creature ! " said Lucy, observing this. " I 
 am sorry we came alone, dear. But what can he do 
 but look at us ? " 
 
 " Let us go back to the carriage," said Paulina. " I 
 have had enough of these poor doomed creatures, at 
 any rate."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 191 
 
 " I fully expected to find Ted and Gilchrist here/' 
 answered her little ladyship, gathering up her dainty 
 petticoats to avoid the mire, as she sprang down the 
 bank. " They said they were coming. I thought it 
 would be such fun to surprise them!" 
 
 "Shall we wait awhile in the carriage until they 
 come ? " she added ; and Paulina acquiesced. The two 
 young women, chatting together, had no idea of the 
 attention they excited. Slim, sallow young fellows 
 with black, sparkling eyes drew near and formed into 
 a ring around them, exchanging free comments upon 
 the strangers. The caballero in black and silver, 
 more bold than the rest, sprang from his horse, and, 
 leading the fiery but submissive creature by the rein, 
 came to the side of the carriage, where, putting one 
 foot upon the step, he addressed the ladies in a speech 
 that brought delight to their less audacious admirers. 
 
 "Polly!" cried Lucy, awake to the impertinence, 
 "he is daring to speak to us. My dear, look in 
 another direction, and he will go away. That is 
 what we get for coming alone, I suppose ; and won't 
 Ted give me a wigging for it ! " 
 
 But the caballero, now put upon his mettle by the 
 encouragement of his audience, did not go away. He 
 persisted in his attentions, presuming so far as to 
 take a rosebud from his jacket and offer it to Pau- 
 lina, who was nearer him, with a smile of seductive 
 assurance. 
 
 " Drive on this instant, cochero ! " cried Lady Ed- 
 mund, imperiously. But the cabman, turning on his 
 box to take in the liveliness of the situation, was in 
 no hurry to disturb it. He replied, but what he said
 
 192 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 the women did not understand, and the moment 
 seemed to both of them a long one before a car- 
 riage, arriving on a line with theirs at a little dis- 
 tance, revealed to their delighted eyes their expected 
 protectors. 
 
 Paulina saw Lucy's clear cry to her husband an- 
 swered by a sudden angry lighting up of Blount's 
 face as he turned and became aware of the cause 
 of the appeal. But that was in passing only. The 
 place seemed full to her of Gilchrist's fierce wrath 
 when he, too, perceived their embarrassment. What 
 became of the ring of onlookers nobody thought to 
 notice. At sight of the two big Britons advancing 
 upon them, the " gentlemen of Spain " melted into 
 thin air; and the gay caballero, with his hand on 
 their carriage door, seized in the grip of a Titan, was 
 dashed by Gilchrist into the mire beneath the feet of 
 his own horse, who nobler creature stood eying 
 his fallen master in silent sympathy, without offering 
 to stir. 
 
 It was over in a twinkling, and Lucy was being 
 scolded roundly by her husband for her temerity in 
 venturing there alone with Paulina. 
 
 "But, Ted, Polly and I were not really afraid of 
 those men. What could they do to us? And I 
 thought it would be so pleasant for you to come on 
 us unexpectedly." 
 
 " My dear, in married life the unexpected is always 
 dangerous," answered Blount, laughing against his 
 will. " And, if you were not frightened, what did 
 that look mean upon both your faces ? How on earth 
 came you to be here by yourselves ? "
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 193 
 
 " We were driving in Las Delicias, and the coach- 
 man proposed it, and we thought it would be a lark. 
 Ted, this is a horrid man. Just now he refused to 
 drive away, and answered us most insolently." 
 
 "I noticed him," said Gilchrist; "and I am reserv- 
 ing for his jacket such a dusting as he is not likely to 
 get again for his deserts. But, as we must all go back 
 to town, and each carriage holds only two, we will let 
 him wait for his punishment. Are you ladies ready 
 to return ? " 
 
 ""When you and Ted have done looking at the 
 bulls," said Lucy. "Then, if you don't mind, I '11 
 drive in with you, Sir Piers. The best of husbands 
 is not good company when he thinks it his duty to 
 scold his wife. And I 'd like to know what I married 
 for, if it was n't to be able to chaperon girls." 
 
 " Try to grow up first yourself, and then you may 
 be able to chaperon girls," observed her husband. 
 
 " Oh ! my dear Polly, did ever you see such a rage 
 as Gilchrist was in ? " whispered Lucy, as, having left 
 the carriage, they stood near the fence in the wake 
 of their champions, from whom the crowd now kept 
 a respectful distance. " The vein in his forehead 
 has n't gone down yet, and his eyes have blue sparks 
 in them. I wonder if Lady Gilchrist ever offended 
 him before she ran away. One such glance would 
 make me shrivel like Semele. I am glad Ted's fore- 
 head is smooth again. What I like is easy going; 
 not living harnessed to Jupiter, and all that; don't 
 you? You will have an easy husband, too. Roger 
 is as plucky as any man living, Billy says ; but he is 
 slow to wrath. You 'd have thought just now that 
 
 13
 
 194 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 Gilchrist was the offended husband, and Ted the 
 friend who had driven out with him and happened in 
 on the offense. Look, Polly ; there goes our enemy, 
 off at a gallop as he came. He never thought of re- 
 senting Sir Piers, did he? But at night, in some 
 dusky corner of the street, he would improve the op- 
 portunity to plunge a knife into him from behind. 
 Polly, what 's the matter? you are white as wax." 
 
 " I am thinking that I don't want to go to the bull- 
 fight to-morrow," said Polly, mendaciously. 
 
 "But you must; you ; ve promised. Ah! they 
 have seen enough; we may go now. By the way, 
 Polly, do you envy our cabby the thrashing that is in 
 store for him ? " 
 
 Paulina had a word with Sir Piers when he helped 
 her into the carriage. 
 
 " I wish you would let that driver off," she said. 
 " He is such a poor apology for a man, I think he is 
 beneath your pains." 
 
 " Not even to please you," he answered briefly ; and 
 that the offender came into his own was reasonably 
 to be believed, although neither Lucy nor Paulina 
 ventured again to touch upon the subject. 
 
 DINNER was over at the Hotel de Madrid. The 
 people, crowded at the tables in the great diuing-hall, 
 had lingered in their seats to watch the gyrations of 
 a band of student-musicians clad in black, with black 
 cloaks, and three-cornered hats decked each with an 
 ivory spoon. 
 
 Singing, playing, and dancing, they had marched 
 the length of the room and back, when, suddenly,
 
 AN ERE ANT WOOING 195 
 
 one of their number burst away from the rest and 
 indulged in a series of somersaults around the tables, 
 striking the tambourine with his head, elbow, knee, 
 and toe alternately. 
 
 When the collection to reward this feat of musical 
 agility had been taken up, the guests sauntered out 
 into the patio of the hotel, which at that time of 
 the year contained the most cosmopolitan crowd in 
 Spain. 
 
 Under the cool plash of a fountain in the center 
 grew a bed of large-leaved ivy, trained close to the 
 ground ; and above it were festooned vines, making a 
 tent-shaped roof. The scent of the orange-flowers 
 that is the scent of Spain mingled with odors of 
 less fragrant incense-bearing plants. All this lighted 
 by electricity beneath the deep blue vault of the 
 Sevillian night ! 
 
 On the inner walls of the corridor running around 
 the court were placarded the large red-and-blue pos- 
 ters headed by the familiar figure of the " toro," and 
 setting forth the attractions of the coming bull-fight 
 of Easter Sunday the greatest of the year. Alter- 
 nating with these were announcements in French and 
 Spanish of national dances, gipsy dances, operas, 
 theaters, balls, all that Seville could devise for the 
 entertainment of Messieurs les voyageurs etrangers. 
 The suave manager at his desk in a corner was kept 
 busy answering questions, and giving advice as to 
 what form of amusement Messieurs les voyageurs 
 should choose. 
 
 In the crowd, strolling, or sitting at little tables 
 over after-dinner coffee, many nations were repre-
 
 196 AN EKE ANT WOOING 
 
 sented, of whom America was, for once, in the mi- 
 nority in numbers. A Russian grand duke, having 
 dined democratically in the neighborhood of some 
 opera-singers and a famous picador, walked to and 
 fro, smoking and staring at the women. Taller by a 
 head than any man in the throng, blond and distin- 
 guished, his heavy eyes looked wearily upon the 
 world; his half-open mouth suggested vacuity and 
 cruelty. His attendant prince, a good-looking young 
 man with sly eyes and a hard mouth, talked with an 
 ex-minister of France to America. Some English- 
 women of title, wearing " the last cry " in French 
 costumes and bonnets, were sipping coffee and 
 liqueurs in company with their husbands and half a 
 dozen diplomats. A " rare pale " Polish princess, in 
 black gauze and jet, held her little court while smok- 
 ing her cigarette. Flower-sellers, carrying trays of 
 roses and the big Sevillian carnations that are a 
 wonder of size and tint and spicery, penetrated every- 
 where. The air was soft and cool, the scene gay and 
 changeful. Old Mr. "Woodbury, who had for many 
 years spent his evenings in his library at home, like 
 any other respectable citizen of New York napping 
 behind " The Evening Post," here sat bolt upright, 
 wide awake, puffing at a good cigar (which, we may 
 observe, he had brought with him to Spain), and 
 entirely in the spirit of the occasion. 
 
 " My dear papa," said Mrs. Standish, who sat near 
 him, " I wish you would listen to me. I really must 
 speak to you seriously; --and we are so rarely to 
 ourselves." 
 
 Mr. Woodbury withdrew his eyes, heaving a sigh.
 
 AN EEEANT WOOING 197 
 
 He had a recollection of the days when the mother 
 of Mrs. Standish had prefaced her talks much in the 
 same fashion, and it had never turned out well. 
 
 " Well, Rose, I 'm listening. By George ! she 's a 
 deuced fine woman, that princess what 's-her-name, 
 that 's smoking the cigarette." 
 
 " Papa, at home you would think a woman quite 
 improper who was smoking a cigarette." 
 
 " Just wait, Rose, till I order an absinthe gommee. 
 I don't know why, but it seems to make me digest 
 my dinner." 
 
 " I am sure it is bad for you, papa. But there, now 
 you have ordered it, pray listen to me." 
 
 " Very well. Keep to the point ; don't wander ; and 
 out with it." 
 
 "I am beginning to be very anxious about Roger 
 and May Gilchrist. Since Ronda, when they have 
 been together almost constantly, he is evidently much 
 absorbed in her." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " 
 
 " Really and truly, papa." 
 
 "She 's a stunner in looks, though I prefer 'em 
 livelier, myself, like Lucy Blount 
 
 " I can't tell what 's come over you. At home, it 
 would have made you angry even to suggest this. 
 And another matter, papa. Do you think it was 
 quite the thing, before all those people and your own 
 grandchildren, when that brazen cachucha dancer 
 threw her handkerchief into your lap, for you to tie 
 up a piece of gold in it, and throw it back to her ? " 
 
 " Is this what you wanted to say ? " 
 
 " Oh, no. But I thought I would mention it."
 
 198 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "Rose! Please understand that if I tie my head 
 up in a pocket-handkerchief and throw it at a dancer, 
 it 's my own affair. Did n't you see everybody doing 
 what I did"? It 's the custom of the country. There ! 
 Now, as to these children, can't Polly hold on to her 
 own sweetheart, I 'd like to know ? " 
 
 " The trouble with Polly is, she 's Polly, I suppose. 
 She has been always capricious with Roger; and 
 lately she 's taken a new turn of being quiet, not like 
 herself moping, and going off alone." 
 
 "No doubt indigestion. Tell Wilcox to give you 
 some of those pellets I always take." 
 
 " No, it 's not indigestion. Once or twice, to try 
 her, I 've hinted that Roger was too much taken up 
 with May; but then, instead of being cast down, she 
 has asked, l Do you really think so do you, mama, 
 do you 1 ?' and has kissed me, and jumped all over 
 the room. She must be hysterical. And it also 
 troubles me what poor Sir Piers will think if Roger 
 gets his daughter interested in him, and he naturally 
 can't speak to him, and he " 
 
 " Rose, you drive me distracted with your he's and 
 him's. Thank God, here comes Lucy Blount to break 
 up this doleful conference. I don't know why mem- 
 bers of a family, whenever they are left alone, should 
 settle down to talking about dismal family topics. 
 You are a good woman, my dear, but you are getting 
 more like your mother every day you live'." 
 
 " Here you are ! " said Lady Edmund to Mrs. Stan- 
 dish. " I have left the rest of them in my sitting-room 
 to come to ask if you will let Paulina go with me to 
 the bull-fight."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 199 
 
 " My dear Lucy ! " said Mrs. Standish ; then was 
 speechless. 
 
 " I know what you would say. But Ted has taken 
 a box, and he says we must go to see the crowd and 
 the parade, and we can leave if we don't like it. 
 Roger and May will go, and Sir Piers if we can get 
 him out of that vortex of his swell countrywomen 
 that pounced upon him directly they came." 
 
 " My child, how can a vortex pounce ? " asked Mr. 
 "Woodbury, mildly. 
 
 " I don't know ; but I 'm too excited to care for 
 mixed metaphors. I hope, dear Mr. Woodbury, you 
 don't think me a bloodthirsty wretch for wanting to 
 see the show that is Spain in miniature." 
 
 4< I mean to go myself," said the valiant elder. 
 "Now, Rose, I know you want to confer with Jus- 
 tiua you always do at this hour ; so leave me here 
 with my little friend Lucy. Sit here, Lucy, by me. 
 It seems only the other day since I gave you a wax 
 doll, and now you have a live doll of your own." 
 
 "Dear angel!" cried Lucy; "and here I am rollick- 
 ing in foreign parts, and he is no doubt lying awake 
 in his little crib in Biarritz, and longing for his 
 mama." 
 
 "Let us hope he is more wholesomely employed. 
 Lucy, that daughter of mine has been telling me all 
 is not as it should be between my boy and girl. You 
 know, my dear, how my old heart is bound up in the 
 idea of their match. You are a sensible as well as a 
 good woman the combination, in my experience, 
 has proved rare. Tell me if you think I have any- 
 thing to be seriously anxious about?"
 
 200 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 " Polly ? " began Lucy, who had been taking a 
 few notes on her own account. 
 
 " Roger/' interrupted Mr. Woodbury. " He has 
 allowed himself to be drawn off by a pair of blue 
 eyes and a figure like a young Amazon. He might 
 as well want to domesticate Bartholdi's Statue of 
 Liberty. They would need at least an island to 
 themselves. All I can say is that, if it be true, I 
 shall take the earliest opportunity to express my 
 opinion of it by a codicil to my will." 
 
 " Roger ? " repeated Lucy, wondering. " I had not 
 thought of that." 
 
 "Then, my dear, you are not as keen as I sup- 
 posed. That is what Rose tells me is taking place ; 
 and, though 1 '11 be hanged if I give her the satisfac- 
 tion of knowing it, the idea drives me mad. My 
 little Polly shaVt be played fast-and-loose with, and 
 made to suffer for Roger's capers. If we ever get to 
 a place where I can do business, I '11 right her, and 
 put her where any man will be proud to ask for her. 
 That young jackanapes ! Why, Lucy, he was the 
 apple of my eye ! This very night I '11 make a mem- 
 orandum, and have Wilcox and Grillson witness it ! " 
 
 Lucy, aware of the old gentleman's fashion of 
 quick climbing from good nature to wrath, knew also 
 that the habit of the family was to let the access wear 
 itself away. The valet, passing just then, was bid by 
 his master to escort him to his room, whence Mr. 
 Woodbury issued no more that night. 
 
 At the same moment Lady Edmund observed Gil- 
 christ leave the group of ladies at a little marble 
 table opposite, and make his way in her direction.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 201 
 
 " I hope Mr. Woodbury is not ailing. But I can't 
 regret his departure, as it gives me an opportunity I 
 wanted." 
 
 " More developments ! " said Lucy to herself, as she 
 made place for him on an iron bench; and they 
 affected to listen to the guitars of the Spanish stu- 
 dents, who, after a brief intermission, had begun 
 their concert over again. 
 
 "I hardly know how to broach it; but I need 
 advice a woman's advice your advice." 
 
 " You are good to choose me," she said heartily. 
 
 " Since your sympathy with my poor May for she 
 told me how tenderly you met my request to show 
 her her mother's portrait at Wooton Magna I have 
 cherished an idea that you, better than any one, 
 would understand my present predicament." 
 
 "I think," Lucy said, with much sweetness, "you 
 need hardly tell me more." 
 
 " Then, with your keen intuition, you have divined?" 
 
 "If you mean that your child needs comfort and 
 sympathy now " 
 
 " May ? " he said in surprise. " She is happier than 
 she ever was in her life. Why should she not be ? 
 With such a companion of her own sex, near her own 
 age ; with new amusements, pleasures, scenes oh, I 
 think there is nothing to ask for May." 
 
 " It has not occurred to you," said Lucy, hesitating 
 visibly, " that it would be- well not to expose her to 
 so much of the society of a very attractive young 
 man ? " 
 
 "I give you my word," he replied unaffectedly, 
 " the idea never entered my head. May is a child,
 
 202 AN EERANT WOOING 
 
 a mere child, not like the girls of your country at 
 her age." 
 
 "Nevertheless, it is to think of," said Lady Ed- 
 mund, who was now in her element as a confidante. 
 " The risk involves so many others, too. Take Roger 
 himself, to begin with " 
 
 "Woodbury care for May Woodbury ! When 
 he has the glorious privilege of loving Paulina 
 Standish ? Never ! " 
 
 "Oh, my dear friend, so that is your point of 
 view ! " Lucy wanted to cry out. But she read that 
 in his face which silenced levity. It was what she 
 had never beheld in any man's face before. She saw 
 that with him this was like a matter of life and death. 
 
 " I don't mean to trouble you," he went on, " with 
 hearing anything more than that I love Miss Stan- 
 dish that I have no right to tell her so that I 
 thought myself stronger than I am, and must there- 
 fore break away from this party for good and all. 
 You know Mr. "Woodbury intends to go from here to 
 Granada?" 
 
 " Yes. We go with them." 
 
 " I think the old gentleman has rather counted on 
 my being on hand to take him about the place, and 
 so on ; at least we had made a tryst to meet there. If 
 I am absent, it will seem like poor hospitality, and I 
 want you to help me out of the difficulty." 
 
 " And May ? " 
 
 " I meant to let her go back to our little domicile. 
 Dame Josefa, my housekeeper, will take every care of 
 her ; and I would not punish May for my own folly 
 by separating her too soon from those who have 
 made her life so bright."
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 203 
 
 "I am woefully disappointed," said Lucy, half 
 pouting. " I had thought of the transfer of our de- 
 lightful party to Granada with real pleasure. But 
 of course I shall help you. Let May go and stay at 
 the hotel, there, with me as my guest my child 
 till you return. Thus I can look out for all con- 
 tingencies." 
 
 "This is the best kindness," he said, lifting her 
 hand in foreign fashion to his lips. " I shall remain 
 here over to-morrow, and on Monday shall vanish at 
 cockcrow. When you are ready to leave Granada, I 
 shall know it, never fear ; and May can then go back 
 to the care of old Josefa, whose only fault is over- 
 strictness, till I rejoin her. You will interpose your 
 tact between me and the dear old man and Mrs. 
 Standish. I should not like them to think ill of me. 
 As for Miss Standish, I must see her once more 
 alone ; and then " 
 
 " Is that safe ? " 
 
 " One may say good-by to the dying," he answered. 
 " For her, after this, I must be dead." 
 
 " You make me shiver," said poor little sympathetic 
 Lucy, running away to her bedroom for a good cry.
 
 XII 
 
 T was a brilliant Easter dav, clear 
 
 - 7 
 
 and cool, when, punctually at three 
 o'clock in the afternoon, for the 
 bull-fight is the one thing on time 
 in Spain, our friends from the 
 Hotel de Madrid joined the throng 
 pouring from all parts of the town into the streets 
 leading to the Plaza de Toros. 
 
 The crowd did not suggest a Parisian multitude 
 swarming into the Bois for the Grand Prix or the 
 Bataille de Fleurs ; or yet an English throng in Hyde 
 Park on Derby day; or an Italian populace in the 
 Via Nazionale on a holiday in Rome. Underneath 
 all their jollity and civility lay hidden the Goth and 
 Vandal, with a touch of Arab, -that make up the An- 
 dalusian of to-day ; and in their gay humor was the 
 suggestion of a savage zest for blood. 
 
 Of the gentlefolks in the carriages, the men wore 
 ceremonial black, the women light dresses and white 
 gloves, with lorgnons and bouquets. The poor peo- 
 ple, hurrying on foot, with their shirts and bodices 
 and sashes and head-kerchiefs of blue, orange, and 
 cardinal, some of them having pinched in food 
 and economized in tobacco for weeks to scrape to- 
 
 204
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 205 
 
 gether money enough to buy a ticket, filled the 
 pavements and surged into the streets. The murmur 
 of their combined voices swelled into an animated 
 chorus as they came near the goal of all their hopes. 
 
 Our party entered the vast cream-colored building 
 of the Plaza by one of its many doorways ; there was 
 no confusion, all being kept in order by civic guards. 
 On the stairs of stone leading to their box more than 
 one heart among them quailed and repented itself of 
 coming, yet yearned with a mightier curiosity to see 
 what was inside. 
 
 The boxes into which the middle tiers of the amphi- 
 theater are divided, proved to be, at any rate, com- 
 fortably remote from the field of conflict yonder 
 big ring of golden sand, half in sun, half in shadow, 
 surrounded by palpitating thousands assembled to 
 see man's skill matched against a brute's strength 
 and cunning. 
 
 The scene was an extraordinary realization of the 
 old classic picture dreamed of by every scholar of 
 Roman history the wide ellipse, the empty arena, 
 the row upon row of expectant faces, the blue sky 
 above. Away to the left, the lovely old Arab tower 
 of the Giralda, with its filigree belfry and the circling 
 hawks and pigeons, soared to heaven, the echo of 
 its chimes, rung at three o'clock, having but just died 
 upon the ear. The odor of flowers worn or carried 
 by the women breathed of the south. 
 
 Water-sellers, crying "Agua, agua, limpia y fria!" 
 venders of sweets and oranges; newsboys with ex- 
 tras containing the latest news of the performers; 
 sellers of programs divided by lines, within which
 
 206 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 were to be registered the thrusts of swords, the blows 
 of spears, the wounds, the falls, lifted their voices 
 above the din of the crowd. 
 
 Around the outskirts of the arena from which 
 spectators were shut off by a double barrier, with 
 blind screens inside, where the toreador flies for ref- 
 uge from the bull some of the minor actors were 
 unfolding cloaks, trying spears, allowing the audi- 
 ence to admire them to its heart's content. 
 
 And at last the thrilling moment had arrived when, 
 the chief municipal officer having taken his seat 
 where the king sits when there is one, the doors op- 
 posite him opened. The procession came into the 
 ring. It was led by a battalion of soldiers preceded 
 by a band of music. Following, came the pica- 
 dores, mounted spearmen who wore broad felt hats 
 and leather jackets and trousers; their legs with a 
 precaution handed down from classic times being 
 bandaged over iron greaves; their spears, sixteen 
 feet in length, wrapped in tow till but an inch of 
 the point was left visible! 
 
 The chulos next. These were the light skirmishers 
 of the ring, youngsters in training for higher feats. 
 Glittering with gold and colors, their mission was to 
 fly everywhere at once to draw off the bull from an 
 endangered toreador. Trailing their gay cloaks, or 
 flaunting them before the bull's horns, or making 
 springs of marvelous agility into the air, they were 
 the most picturesque adjunct of the show. 
 
 After the chulos walked the darlings of the popu- 
 lace, the three espadas, or killers of the bull, 
 whose appearance was the signal for shouts and
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 207 
 
 cries of applause, encouragement, individual remark. 
 The hitherto quiet audience took fire at sight of 
 them ! And lastly, el tiro, the mule-team, three 
 abreast, covered with bells, embroidery, and tassels, 
 trailing behind them the iron hook to be used in 
 dragging off the slain bulls and horses. 
 
 Dazzling in finery, they passed proudly around the 
 ring, and under the president's box stopped to salute. 
 A trumpet sounded. The alguacil, a little policeman 
 smothered beneath his hat and feathers and black 
 velvet cloak, who brought up the procession and was 
 a butt with the crowd, caught the key of the bull's 
 pen, thrown down to him by the president. This was 
 an official permission for the sport to begin. The pro- 
 cession went out again, leaving in the ring the pica- 
 dores and a few chulos. There was a halt, when every 
 heart beat fast. The doors leading to the bull's 
 quarters flew open. Another pause, more exciting 
 than the first. A little jet-black fellow with sharp 
 horns, astonished rather than resentful, trotted from 
 his dark cell into the ring, wondering why the sun- 
 shine was so bright! 
 
 Perhaps this desert of hot golden sand, with the 
 palpitating multitude around it, made him long for 
 his own green pasture, his own cool rivulet, in Utrera, 
 where he was bred. But at once every instinct was 
 merged in a fury of self-defense ; for he was set upon 
 by the spear of a picador, spurring a wretched horse 
 blindfolded to his fate. 
 
 Upon the first act of the national drama of Spain, 
 as now seen at the headquarters of bull-fighting, 
 it were best to let fall a curtain thick and dark.
 
 208 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 It is hideous, unforgivable, unforgetable. No Anglo- 
 Saxon who loves the horse can look on it with- 
 out a fierce impulse of championship for helpless 
 creatures, followed by one of shame for himself for 
 being there. The women present, including as a rule 
 the better grade of Spaniards, hid their eyes behind 
 fans, and sat in sick silence till the cries of the 
 audience and the new sound of the trumpet an- 
 nounced the carnage at an end. The horrors they 
 might have seen during the ten opening minutes of 
 the fight were being dragged away by the jangling 
 mule-team, leaving blood-tracks behind them. Men 
 sprinkled fresh sand, and the second act was called. 
 
 " Is it over ? " gasped Paulina behind her fan. 
 
 "Look now j you will see nothing but the chnlos 
 teasing the bull," spoke Blount, who stood behind 
 her. " This is the ladies' part of the show. Hand- 
 some fellows, are n't they, and extraordinarily light- 
 footed. Ha ! that was a close one ! The bull had him, 
 almost ! But he 's off over the paling, and the bull 
 goes for the other fellow, who waved his cloak just 
 in time. There are the banderilleros. Bueno! bueno! 
 Well done, banderillero ! Neatly planted, by Jove ! 
 I saw a man at Madrid sit in his chair till the boll's 
 horns dipped, and then he drove the darts into the 
 creature's neck and escaped, leaving the chair on the 
 bull's horns. Bravo ! bravo ! Capital, is n't it, Miss 
 Standish ! 
 
 " It makes my heart ache, if this is the best," an- 
 swered Polly, shutting her eyes, and again retiring 
 behind her fan a gay fan presented by Blount for 
 the occasion.
 
 AN EKRANT WOOING 209 
 
 "I can't say you are getting much of the specta- 
 cle," he said ; and then he found himself too much 
 interested in the ring to complete the work of con- 
 soling a nervous girl. 
 
 And, at last, play was finished ; the bull, gashed, 
 panting, desperate, had done his best to make a Sevil- 
 lian holiday. His death-trumpet was sounded. 
 
 Paulina looked, as they urged her to do, at the 
 introduction to the final act. The espada, the man of 
 doom, walked into the ring, stopped under the presi- 
 dent's box, and, holding his sword upright, dashed 
 his three-cornered plush cap upon the ground, and 
 swore the bull-fighter's oath to do his duty or die. 
 
 Then, with magnificent aplomb, smiling amid the 
 frantic applause of the audience, he advanced to meet 
 his victim, his band of chulos keeping back that he 
 might win glory single-handed. Again and again he 
 escaped death by a hair's breadth. Alone, blade aloft, 
 he tempted the now raging bull to charge, striving to 
 get him in the right attitude to receive the death- 
 stroke. 
 
 There was an interval of strained silence in the 
 multitude, broken now and then by a gasp of relief 
 or a cry of encouragement. They were not going to 
 waste themselves in expression, those Spaniards, while 
 such good work as that was going on in the arena. 
 
 Face to face, man and brute stood eying each 
 other. It seemed impossible that the espada could 
 get away. He was at the mercy of his foe. In vain 
 the chulos rushed forward and tried to divert the 
 bull. The bull's eyes were glazing, -he was dying by 
 inches, but he knew what he was about, and meant to 
 u
 
 210 AN EKRANT WOOING 
 
 avenge himself. His horns were lowered ; the crowd 
 uttered a deep, long groan ; they were about to lose 
 their pride, their darling, when suddenly the es- 
 pada's right arm made a quick movement 5 his true 
 sword plunged to its hilt behind the bull's shoulder- 
 blade; the bull staggered, fell on his knees, rolled 
 on his side dead! 
 
 Then, mad rejoicing ! The crowd sprang upon its 
 feet, roared and roared again. The band played, the 
 women waved handkerchiefs ; the espada, standing 
 beside the carcass of the bull, wiped his sword, and 
 with a spring in his foot and a proud light in his eye 
 made the circuit of the arena, bowing and smiling. 
 On this final round, the men threw their hats into the 
 ring at his feet as he passed, a compliment acknow- 
 ledged by the espada by throwing them back again. 
 Purses, jewels, flowers, palms, fans, handkerchiefs, 
 "blessings, caressing epithets, were showered on him. 
 And, while this went on, the other valiant fighter, 
 who lay already forgotten on the sand in a pool of 
 his own blood, was hauled out, his carcass to be dis- 
 posed of in a neighboring market-place. 
 
 Three times these scenes were repeated. At the 
 close of the third corrida, or course, a mishap befell 
 the espada, no less a personage than " El Gallo " him- 
 self, the favorite of the day. Failing to kill the bull 
 in the time allotted, the great espada refused to obey 
 the trumpet commanding him to desist. A scene 
 of extraordinary confusion ensued. Gomez, reckless 
 at the threatened loss of honor, of disgrace in his 
 high position, kept lunging savagely at the bull, 
 which refused to die. The chulos, eager to save the
 
 AN ERRANT WOOINO 211 
 
 good name of their chief, closed around him and 
 abetted his work of slaughter. At once the cry arose 
 from the angry audience : " To prison with them ! 
 To prison!" The belled oxen, summoned to decoy 
 the dying victim out of the arena, were not allowed 
 by the toreadors to approach the bull. "With stabs 
 and thrusts Gomez succeeded in putting an end to 
 the miserable wretch ; but, as he crashed over amid 
 the groans and curses of the crowd, a file of soldiers 
 marched into the ring and took the offending espada 
 and his followers into custody. 
 
 As they crossed the arena under arrest, no hand 
 was raised in sympathy. With bent heads and 
 frowning brows, their gold and frippery serving to 
 accentuate their changed position, the little proces- 
 sion disappeared from view. 
 
 Then arose a tumult of opposing opinions from 
 the audience. Shouts, cries, disputes were heard ; 
 the proceedings stopped. Men, leaving their seats, 
 swarmed in the passageways. The gallery gods 
 above showed their interest by casting into the ring 
 the benches on which they had been seated. 
 
 At this crisis, Paulina, whose head ached with her 
 long-repressed emotion, whispered to her grandfa- 
 ther, who sat next to her, that she meant to take the 
 courier and go back to the hotel. Their place being 
 near an exit, Mr. Woodbury acquiesced, and, unno- 
 ticed by the others, Polly effected her retreat. 
 
 On the stairs she was overtaken by Gilchrist, who, 
 bidding the man return to tell Mr. "Woodbury in 
 whose hands his young lady had been left, took her 
 arm within his own.
 
 212 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 " I saw you were suffering/' he said. 
 
 "But you had left our box." 
 
 "Only to stand near by where I could look at 
 but, now we are in the air, you will be all right 
 again. Ha! here come the prisoners we '11 stand 
 back till they have passed." 
 
 " What will be done to them ? " she asked, as the 
 melancholy file went by. 
 
 "Nothing very serious, I fancy. Gomez will be 
 released on parole, no doubt. But they will have to 
 hurry on another bull to quell the riot that 's brew- 
 ing inside. Here comes a rather jolly little trap. 
 Shall we take it?" 
 
 Polly, in whom there was no speech, acquiesced, 
 and they got into a smart open carriage, with a horse 
 belled and ribboned in honor of the day, and a driver 
 with red sash and pointed hat. 
 
 " Need you go back to the hotel ? " he asked, yield- 
 ing to a sudden impulse. " It is a lovely day. Why 
 not come for a drive ? Surely, your mother will not 
 expect you." 
 
 " She had settled down to write letters to ' all the 
 family,'" Paulina answered, smiling. "And as mama 
 1 describes ' a good deal, it will take some time. Do 
 you really think we might go for a turn somewhere 
 in the fresh air?" 
 
 " Why not ? English and Americans do here what 
 natives may not. I think we may defy the Sevillian 
 Mrs. Grundy on this last day that we have together." 
 And, leaning forward, he gave orders to the driver, 
 who cracked his whip with sufficient vehemence to 
 serve for a four-in-hand.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 213 
 
 "I honor Queen Isabella more than ever for re- 
 fusing to preside over bull-fights," Polly said by and 
 by. " Where are we going, may I ask ? " 
 
 " To Italica. Do you not remember I pledged you 
 in Tangier to let me be your guide there? It is a 
 four-mile drive, only." 
 
 " Italica was is " 
 
 "An ancient Iberian town, called the old Seville, 
 the birthplace of Trajan and Adrian and Theodosius. 
 The Romans filled it with great buildings and beau- 
 tiful works of art ; but, when the river got up out of 
 its bed and devastated it, the Moors took Seville as 
 a safer site for a capital, and Italica has been long 
 in ruins. Don't you remember they told you at the 
 Casa de Pilatos how Trajan's ashes were brought 
 back in an urn from Italy by a Spanish viceroy, who 
 set them on a shelf, intending to remove them to 
 Italica ; but a servant by mistake emptied the great 
 Trajan into the courtyard, 'not to be gathered up 
 again ' ? " 
 
 " I remember. I think Trajan must have reap- 
 peared in that sumptuous vine of red roses in the 
 inner courtyard of 'Pilate's house.' And what are 
 we to see at Italica?" 
 
 " Simply one of the most exquisite, pathetic ruins 
 of old Rome in existence, an amphitheater so lovely 
 in decay, one could not wish it otherwise. If you 
 knew Spanish, I should give you a copy of Rioja's 
 ode, 'The Ruins of Italica,' to read. To my own 
 taste, neither of the other Roman amphitheaters at 
 Aries, Nimes, Verona, or those in Sicily, not even 
 the Colosseum is as affecting as the spot we are
 
 214 AN EEKANT WOOING 
 
 going to see. At the Colosseum there are always 
 the personal conductor, the tourists, the peddlers to 
 break the spell. At Italica an gitano lurks in the ruins 
 to ask for alms ; a bird or a lizard disappears as you 
 advance. Manuela, as she stands amid waving grass 
 and flowers in the green ellipse, is the one token of 
 modern life." 
 
 " Manuela ! Who is she ? " 
 
 "You will see," he said, laughing; and they talked 
 of things outside their own personality as the car- 
 riage passed between fields of poppies and iris, groves 
 of olive and hedges of prickly pear, keeping the 
 grape-bloom of the Sierra Morena to their right. 
 
 They left their vehicle in a lane beyond the old 
 convent, where a little maid of ten came tripping out 
 of a small house to receive them, assisting both with 
 tremendous importance to descend, and then setting 
 to rout a half-dozen children who had run in the dust 
 of the wheels, for more than a mile, offering nosegays 
 for sale. 
 
 Such a competent small person was Manuela 
 Fuentes Manfredi (so confessed), one might have 
 supposed her the sole occupant of the small house and 
 sole guardian of the ruins. She was attended by a fat 
 mongrel of a cur she called Fortune, and, after 
 escorting the visitors to the heights whence they 
 could obtain the best view of the amphitheater, she 
 stood beside them, sighing, and exclaiming for 
 what reason they could not understand "Ave 
 Maria" after every sigh. When they had begun to 
 discover that her sighs were apparently mere physi- 
 cal efforts and without emotion, Manuela caught sight
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 215 
 
 of her father, a swarthy peasant, his head bound in a 
 red handkerchief, coming over the hill, and ran to 
 meet him. 
 
 " I shall tip Senor Manfredi to keep his distance," 
 said Gilchrist. " I don't mind Manuela ; she is a pic- 
 ture in herself. How could that little witch know 
 the artistic value of a poppy stuck in her black hair, 
 and the buttercups in her brown bodice ? " 
 
 They climbed to the last step visible on the far side 
 of the ruins, "rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun," 
 the grass overgrowing them thick with flowers and 
 sweet herbaceous plants. Then Manuela led the 
 way into the subterranean galleries, chambers for 
 wounded gladiators, and beasts' dens, brought to 
 light in the latest excavations ; and when they sat to 
 rest she seated herself patiently at a little distance, 
 Fortune falling asleep from very fatness as he leaned 
 against her knee, her lap full of the blossoms she was 
 making into a bouquet for Polly. 
 
 " What peace what solitude ! " said Paulina, fol- 
 lowing a silence. " After what we have just seen at 
 the Plaza de Toros may I soon forget it ! this is 
 heavenly." 
 
 " How it adds to a scene to visit it with the one you 
 would you would choose of all others to asso- 
 ciate with it " he said, hesitating in his selection of 
 words. " That is the reason why I never go back to 
 Italy. 
 
 "The whole country is like a Golgotha of bitter 
 memories," he resumed, after a pause. " When May 
 asked me if I would not take her to Italy, I said i No.' 
 God help me ! I could not tell her why."
 
 216 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 "Ave Maria," sighed Manuela to her dog; but 
 Polly said not a word. 
 
 "Why should I tell you this now? Perhaps be- 
 cause I think of you as a sail at sea that by morning 
 will have sunk below the verge. I have often wished 
 I might presume on your constant kindness to talk 
 a little to you about myself," he resumed presently ; 
 " and then the idea of the difference between us has 
 arisen to depress my would-be confidence. You are 
 a child, believing and ardent, the world before you a 
 primrose path in which I can have no share." 
 
 " And yet it was your ' primrose path ' I walked in 
 first," she said, with a half-wistful, half-playful smile. 
 
 " You remember, still ; you liked the little drawing 
 I sent you by old Clichett, when I wanted nothing so 
 much as to carry it myself and see if I could win 
 that same smile you have just given me ! " 
 
 "It hangs it did hang," she corrected herself, 
 "on my wall at home." 
 
 "And where, pray, have you put the poor thing 
 while you are off conquering new old worlds?" 
 
 "It is I have it with me," she said steadily, 
 although with a little blush. 
 
 " That is more than I dared hope. It is doing an 
 inferior artist honor beyond his merits. The only part 
 of it I valued was a little motif repeated again and 
 again in my sketch-books till I make it now mechani- 
 cally when my pencil falls upon paper." 
 
 " When you are racking your brains for ' mere vers 
 de societe' ! When you are a 'jessamy kind of a 
 man,' seeking diversion where you can find it!" she 
 retorted quickly.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 217 
 
 " That 's like you. When a fellow 's at your mercy, 
 you go at him horse, foot, and dragoons. With you 
 I never feel stagnant ! " 
 
 "What a word to express a healthy-minded 
 person ! " 
 
 " I pray God I am healthy-minded now. But there 
 were years when I wandered outcast, solitary, dwell- 
 ing on dead joys and ruined hopes. Those were not 
 years I care to remember or speak of, least of all to 
 you. They are lived down, if not forgotten. They 
 can never come back to me again. But they, if there 
 were nothing else, would put a barrier between me 
 and such as you." 
 
 " I know of your trouble," said Paulina, with wo- 
 manly simplicity. " I often wondered if it had led 
 you to mistrust others." 
 
 "If I do not, I am saved by temperament. I 
 have n't a morbid spot in me, I hope and believe. 
 But at first I used to fancy myself like that bull in 
 the arena to-day keeping on my feet after I got the 
 death- wound. Since then it 's been hard to have en- 
 tire confidence in a toreador coming toward one wav- 
 ing a red muleta that conceals a sword." 
 
 "What a bitter comparison!" she said, feeling a 
 little chill around the heart. 
 
 " There was a long time when I could n't bear to 
 think of May, or look at her, poor child ! I hated 
 my home, with the eternal shadow of shame upon its 
 threshold." He paused, while a black look settled 
 upon his open countenance, and again she saw what 
 his auger could be. 
 
 "When I conquered my shuddering distaste and
 
 218 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 went back to Wooton, what rewarded me? A vision 
 of youth and innocence that seemed to dispense a 
 healing influence. It was like passing out of the fogs 
 of London into clear sunshine on green fields. You 
 began my cure ; May has helped to complete it. I am 
 another man since; but it is only fair you should 
 know what must always be behind me know that 
 my life is lived, while yours is but happily begun. 
 In your bright youth there can be no cloud likely to 
 linger." 
 
 " Yet you knew your worst suffering at my present 
 time of life ! " she replied impatiently. 
 
 "Yes; it is the time of keenest and, in most na- 
 tures, most ephemeral feeling. But, I repeat, you can 
 have no cause for lasting sorrow ; your happiness is 
 in safe hands. Your future is mapped out in rose- 
 color. And yet, when I saw you crying alone in San 
 Salvador, yesterday, during the ' Rending of the Veil,' 
 I was smitten with the contrast of this young face 
 working in distress and the one I watched in King's 
 College Chapel a year ago, first amused, then touched, 
 by its look of joyful devotion." 
 
 " You have no right to spy on me to notice me ! " 
 she cried, driven to bay. "It is unkind cruel." 
 Her words were choked by a sob. 
 
 She turned away her head, and tried to gather 
 some blossoms in the grass. In their brief talk, Gil- 
 christ seemed to have receded from her into infinite 
 distance. Sitting without movement beside her, he 
 did not speak, but let her come unaided out of the 
 access of feeling he had created. Was he blind or 
 deaf or indifferent to her tumult? Polly did not
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 219 
 
 know. Just then she felt too much to attribute to 
 him the higher motive of wishing to save her from 
 herself of making the right use of his strength to 
 shield her weakness. 
 
 " But I must tell you something that is your due," 
 he said, when at last she sat quietly looking across at 
 the gray ribs of the ruins, and wondering if the so/- 
 rows they had seen, had been like unto hers. " The 
 night I went back, after long absence, to my old 
 home, and met you there, a wild fancy took hold of 
 me ; and, though common sense did her best to con- 
 vince me that it was a chimera born of overtaxed 
 feeling under unusual circumstances, I felt as if you 
 had been sent to lift the shadow from Wooton and 
 from its owner's lif e."\ For a brief time I cherished it 
 with the sentiment 01 a school-boy, and then not 
 too soon the news of your engagement put a quick 
 end to it. Don't answer me don't comment ; this is 
 a confessional, and I '11 have soon finished. It 's all 
 over long ago sunk forty fathoms deep in memory. 
 I tell you of it only that in future days, when we are 
 far apart, you may think kindly of some acts and im- 
 pulses of mine that must, at my age, have seemed fol- 
 lies in your sight. Perhaps it would have been better 
 that the accident of travel had not thrown us together 
 again ; but I think I have not proved myself unworthy 
 of the generous trust your family has shown me, and 
 that out of the abundance showered upon another's 
 pathway, Fortune and Woodbury won't begrudge 
 me this." 
 
 Another silence, which Paulina could not have 
 broken. She was staring at a great black bar that
 
 220 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 had fallen between her and the sun ; but through it 
 came a single ray of light. She thought she now 
 understood that he was doing this thing for her. 
 Therefore, her faith in him being justified, she could 
 feel glad even in her keen pain. 
 
 And he, divining much of this, took from it com- 
 fort. 
 
 So the things left unspoken between them brought 
 them more truly together than at any time before. 
 
 " Come," she said, rising ; "it is time to go." 
 
 " Yes. It is the very end of our meetings by the 
 way; for to-morrow morning I shall be gone; and, 
 unless something not to be foreseen by me occurs, 
 this time it will be long before I again cross your 
 path. This is good-by, Paulina. Will you give me 
 your hand and let me say it here ?" 
 
 They looked into each other's eyes, and she laid her 
 cold hand in his. 
 
 " Ave Maria ! " sighed Mauuela, heaping the poppies 
 in her lap.
 
 XIII 
 
 AULINA sat alone on a step below 
 the Mirador, two weeks later, look- 
 ing down into the gardens of the 
 Generalife. 
 
 Those who find it not altogether 
 convenient to repair to Granada to 
 identify the surroundings of our heroine may be told 
 that the Mirador is a lookout built long ago by her 
 lord for the delectation of a Moorish sultana, at her 
 summer palace half-way up a hill facing the Al- 
 hainbra. 
 
 To reach it Polly and her comrades had crossed a 
 bridge over the river Darro, famed in song and story; 
 then following a cypress walk, beside which a stream 
 played a thousand pranks in the way of waterfalls, 
 they were admitted into the villa by a smiling peas- 
 ant woman with a baby at her knee and were 
 mercifully abandoned to their fate. 
 
 For, once behind those gates, what a privilege to 
 roam at will ! The young people had hurried through 
 a few rooms with fine carvings and arabesques and 
 dreary portraits of dead kings, to issue, without loss of 
 time, into the evergreen arcades of the garden. Here 
 the clever old Moors, having taken the little river 
 
 221
 
 222 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 Darro bodily from its bed, and carried it through 
 aqueducts of indestructible solidity to this point, had 
 turned it, leaping and bubbling, into canals and 
 tanks and fountains, to make the barren hillside 
 blossom like the rose. Everywhere the ear caught 
 the murmur and tinkle of its waters, sometimes run- 
 ning away to seek the valley, sometimes ascending, 
 at the bidding of a stop-cock worked by the gardener, 
 through perforations in the walks, in slender jets of 
 crystal meeting above the pedestrian's head. 
 
 Now Polly stopped to rest under the cypress, 
 standing yet, after centuries of growth, where frail 
 Queen Zoraya kept her tryst with the Abencerrage 
 that led to a direful massacre. Then she coursed 
 along a tiled walk to inhale the odors of a bed of 
 mignonette, or to peep down some leafy vista at a 
 view. And, at last, up the steps of an ascending 
 garden, between box-borders, and pagodas of clipped 
 yew, and beds of fragrant flowers, she sped with light 
 foot to the highest terrace, and ascended to the sum- 
 mit of the Mirador. Thence she looked over at the 
 Alhambra, like a red fortress on a red crag; at 
 Granada, with its pink and white and blue houses 
 embowered in verdure, suggesting to the Oriental 
 poet who sang of it " a silver vase of hyacinths and 
 emeralds n ; at the wide champaign of the Vega, scat- 
 tered with hamlets and churches ; at the snow-capped 
 Sierra Nevada crowning all. 
 
 A fortnight had passed since her visit to Italica. 
 The days that had bid fair to crush her with their 
 weight had progressed evenly, as days will when the 
 irresistible has assumed sway of our actions. On this
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 223 
 
 bright morning in the garden Paulina had even felt 
 moments of health} 7 happiness in living. 
 
 But when, on coming out of the tower, she was 
 invited by her comrades to climb with them to the 
 summit of the hill above the Mirador, she had de- 
 clined. She had a letter to write a letter of con- 
 gratulation to her cousin Miss Low, the announce- 
 ment of whose engagement to marry had come out to 
 them by the last mail. And Roger and May, while 
 regretting Polly's determination, had left her with- 
 out showing themselves altogether disconsolate. Tak- 
 ing out a pad of paper, and a fountain-pen of de- 
 praved character, the disappointing companion of 
 her foreign rambles, Polly, after much shaking and 
 coaxing, induced it to inscribe what here follows : 
 
 I need not tell you, my dearest Fanny, how truly we rejoice 
 and sympathize in your new-found happiness. 
 
 "That much is true," she said, upon re-reading it; 
 "I am glad she is satisfied, and that she thinks ' Jim- 
 mie' Winslow is nice enough to marry. For my 
 part, rather than take such a solemn, weak-kneed 
 member of ' the smart set ' in New York, I 'd apply 
 to be assistant caretaker of the Generalife, and 
 spend the rest of my days here." 
 
 Mama wishes me to say, with hei % love, that she is sure the 
 marriage is, in every way, one your father and mother must 
 think most suitable. Roger is sending a line by this post. And 
 we want you frankly to say whether we shall get your presents 
 in Paris, or London, or in New York on our return. We all 
 know the best things find their way to our dealers, though 
 there 's a wider choice abroad. We are much surprised to hear 
 that Amaranth Clyde has concluded to take old Nil Admirari
 
 224 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 Johnson, as we girls used to call him. What lias become of all 
 her lords? And so Mabel Kirby has gone home to her people 
 in New York, carrying her two little girls, and the husband has 
 pranced off, nobody knows where ! 
 
 " This is very cold-blooded," she said, dropping the 
 pad, and looking about her. " Why is it such up-hill 
 work to sympathize with things at home to-day?" 
 Then, resuming: 
 
 I am sitting now in the cool shadow of a Moorish Mirador, on 
 a terrace edged by a white balustrade, where they keep pots of 
 gillyflowers and geraniums. Outside my feet are in it is 
 a blaze of sunshine. I never saw so many white butterflies. 
 They feast in a bed of red and yellow velvet wallflowers, and 
 flit up here to digest their reckless meal, and then, finding this 
 too cool, flit out again. Not being a butterfly, it is warm 
 enough for me. I wish I were a butterfly, that I might for- 
 get everything except the wallflowers in the garden of the 
 Generalif e ! 
 
 " It is well the fountain-pen struck at that point, 
 and refused to do another stroke," she said, throwing 
 it down. " I am the most selfish creature alive. I 
 can't be interested in Fanny or in anything but my 
 own affairs. But come ! Who dares be wretched in 
 face of such a prospect on such a day ? I must be 
 brave, and possess my soul in patience. Why could 
 n't I have had all this when my heart was as light as 
 that bit of down floating in the air ? There is abso- 
 lutely no use trying to write to Fanny. I will do it 
 when I return to the hotel respectably, on a table 
 with a hotel inkstand and a sheet of paper headed by 
 a picture of the hotel. By that time I may have 
 thought of something decent to say about Jimmie
 
 AN EEBANT WOOING 225 
 
 Winslow. There is no harm in my future cousin ; 
 but when he asked me the same question, last year, 
 he has recently asked Fauny, I knew it was grand- 
 papa's granddaughter he wanted, not Polly Standish. 
 I had just come back from England, and I remember 
 comparing him with Piers ! (No one can hear me 
 think Piers !) I love the name ; it smacks of honest 
 English soil. But what have I to do with English 
 soil I, who a year ago said everything foolish and 
 spiteful against it and its people? No matter! In 
 the garden of the Geueralife one can afford to be in- 
 consistent. Hum! Put Jimmie Winslow that im- 
 portant little man who leads cotillions at Sherry's, 
 and believes so consumedly in New York fashion 
 beside Piers Gilchrist, who looks like an old rover of 
 the Scandinavian seas re-incarnate, who is strong in 
 mind and body, whose brain is free of cobwebs and 
 pretense, who thinks nothing of his family's past, of 
 his right place in society, who is simple and kind, 
 who suits me in every fiber of my being ! Ah, me 
 Roger ! " she cried, as two people came through the 
 door of the Mirador opening on the hillside behind 
 her, " why did you make me jump ? And what is the 
 matter with May ? " 
 
 " So tiresome ! " said May, showing an object in her 
 hand. "The heel of my shoe came off, and I can't 
 walk without it. Mr. Woodbury is good enough to 
 go to our house, and ask old Josefa for another shoe. 
 I will stop with you, with your leave." 
 
 For the first time Polly thought she saw in May's 
 ingenuous eyes a desire to avoid hers. She made place 
 for her, however, and when Roger, doffing his hat, 
 
 15
 
 226 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 and promising to be quick in returning, ran off down 
 the steps, reappearing in their sight from time to 
 time through the bowery groves below, the girls 
 talked of La Silla del Moro, of the climb thither, the 
 view, the weather, and the provokingness of shoes. 
 
 But as May talked, her eyes, no longer avoiding 
 Polly's, became deep with wistfulness. The child's 
 heart was weighed down under the thought that in a 
 few days, at most, the friends who had created for 
 her a new world of feeling and enjoyment were to 
 pass out of her life forever. It was not in the na- 
 ture of things to be supposed they would meet often 
 again, when an ocean should once divide them. That 
 morning May had heard Mrs. Standish speak to Lady 
 Edmund about Polly's and Roger's marriage as a thing 
 of no distant date, and the announcement had made 
 her turn cold. The recent attitude of the cousins to 
 each other, so matter-of-fact, so unemotional, had in- 
 deed struck her as strange; but here, all the same, 
 the marriage was going on ! 
 
 A week later, and May would be gone into her shell 
 again. There would be no merry Polly to entertain 
 her with bright sayings; no kind Mrs. Standish to 
 look out for her health and make suggestions about 
 her toilet ; no old Mr. Woodbury to bestow on her his 
 quaint compliments (which, by the way, had been 
 fewer of late, she knew not why); no Roger! 
 Roger, the first man she had ever known well who 
 was not a father, a music-teacher, or a lecturer in 
 ladies' schools; Roger, whom she had liked in Lon- 
 don, liked better at Wooton Magna, welcomed joyfully 
 in Morocco.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 227 
 
 Now, after their intimate companionship in knock- 
 ing about Andalusian cities in the time of the night- 
 ingale and rose, May had no words for the strange 
 new feeling that possessed her at thought of parting 
 with him. 
 
 It was right that Polly should carry off the prize 
 Polly, the brilliant little being who ruled every one 
 about her, whom every one admired, indulged ; who 
 had never known what it was to give up, or not 
 to have, what she wanted ; Polly, the little American 
 princess, wrapped in cottonwool, cradled in rose- 
 leaves, a great heiress, so Lady Edmund said, who 
 had had lovers and offers in plenty, and would hear 
 of none of them. 
 
 Also, that morning, when Lady Edmund had 
 seemed to wish to make May understand the inevita- 
 bleuess of Polly's and Roger's match, she had told 
 her how long it had been arranged, how it was to 
 keep intact a splendid fortune, how really fond of 
 each other the young people were ; and had ended by 
 saying the wedding would take place at Mr. Wood- 
 bury's country-house in Massachusetts in September. 
 
 And there was something else paining May; while 
 Polly made her a place at her side, and talked to her 
 so pleasantly, the younger girl was conscious of a 
 certain disloyalty of recent action. 
 
 When she and Roger had started to leave the 
 Moor's Chair, her foot had struck upon a stone, 
 and, the heel of her shoe forsaking it, she had lost 
 her balance, and had fallen into Roger's arms. They 
 were alone, with no one to behold them but a passing 
 bird, and a shepherd on a far-away slope. As Roger
 
 228 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 restored her to her balance, a lock of May's hair of 
 dazzling gold had been blown by the summer breeze 
 across the young man's lips. 
 
 What occurred then is not known to the chronicler. 
 It will never be told by May or Roger. As the little 
 bird lighting on an orange-bough above them trilled 
 and twittered madly during the girls' talk, it may be 
 rightly conjectured to have been telling tales. But 
 it twittered in Spanish, and May was safe. 
 
 Something, however, had happened that, as their 
 colloquy progressed, made May feel more and more 
 grieved and guilty. 
 
 "Yes, it is sad," Paulina said, to think of giving 
 up this, and going back to live the life of every day ; 
 and my life will be the kind that suits me least one 
 of over-conventionality. But I suppose Spain is not 
 always green in the valleys." 
 
 " No ; in summer, Piers says, we must flee to the 
 Basque hills for refuge. If I can only persuade him 
 not to banish me to England ! " 
 
 " That were a pleasant exile," said Paulina, dreamily. 
 
 "My England is not pleasant. I was brought up 
 among people who don't let me think of them ! My 
 one dream of sentiment was to go to Wooton Magna, 
 and see my birthplace, and my mother's picture. My 
 mother died when I was very young, I believe. I 
 have never had any one speak of her to me. I think 
 she must have quarreled with my great-aunt. When 
 I saw her portrait, it was as if some castle of soap- 
 bubbles I had been making all those years had burst. 
 I can't tell you why, but she did not seem to want me. 
 That was my only feeling she did not want me."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 229 
 
 "It was a very distressing one," said Paulina, 
 softly. " From my babyhood I have always loved to 
 think my mother's arms were open to me. I have 
 continued to take all my troubles, little and big, to 
 her. Her tenderness never fails. Indeed, I believe I 
 have never kept anything from her but one thing," 
 she added, stopping short. 
 
 "I envy you. There are so many things I can't 
 speak of to Piers. He is dear and kind, but I can't tell 
 him all. And it is the greatest relief to speak, is it 
 not, when one is sure of sympathy ? " 
 
 " I think so ; but then I am a spoiled child. A kiss, 
 a warm pressure of the hand, will to this day make 
 me smile when I am crying." 
 
 "Ah! there is no one for me to take my trouble 
 to no one! "cried May, bursting into tears. 
 
 "May, tell me," said Paulina, her face grave, her 
 brows meeting. 
 
 " I have not been true to you ! I have let some one 
 who belongs to you see that I care for him. There, 
 I have told you ! I could not endure to keep it." 
 
 " You do care for him, my poor child ? " said Polly, 
 her frown vanished, her voice ineffably tender. " May, 
 let me put my arm around you. Lean your head on 
 my shoulder. Ah, what a great child I have to pet 
 and pardon ! That is what mama always does to me 
 when I 'in feeling at my worst. She says nothing, 
 but just strokes me ; and soon a little warmth steals 
 into my heart, and melts it, and then all I want is to 
 rest there and be loved as I love you, May I" 
 
 There were no more words upon the subject upper- 
 most in both hearts. They sat side by side, watching
 
 230 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 the cloud-prints on the sierra; a lizard ran out on 
 the paved walk to play ; a harmless snake glided by 
 them, and disappeared in a bed of pansies. The 
 world seemed glad and brilliant to both the girls 
 once more, and from May a great weight was lifted. 
 When Roger returned, the young man, looking 
 from one to the other, felt a tremendous twinge of 
 conscience ; but, unlike May, it did not occur to him 
 to desire to confide his emotion to any one least of 
 all to Polly. 
 
 " GRANDPAPA," said Paulina, linking her arm in 
 Mr. Woodbury's as they went out that same day from 
 luncheon, " I want you to come with me now for a 
 little stroll in the Alhambra gardens." 
 
 " Eh I Yes," said Mr. Woodbury, looking to see if 
 they might elude the courier. 
 
 Gillson was on hand, in unusual splendor, smoking 
 in the vestibule, in company \vith a guide like a ban- 
 dit in appearance, in reality a sentimentalist who, 
 while quoting Theophile Gautier within the precincts 
 of the palace, did not disdain, under a stress of new 
 arrivals at the hotel, to aid the domestic staff by 
 handing potatoes at table d'hote. 
 
 " Gillson," said Mr. Woodbury, " you have nothing 
 laid out for me just now, have you ? " 
 
 "There his the Cartuja, sir, with hits world-re- 
 nowned marbles, hits haltars hinlaid with mother o' 
 pearl and daughter o' shell," admitted the grand 
 duke, condescendingly. 
 
 "Does he mean tortoise-shell?" whispered Polly. 
 u Now, grandpapa, stand to your guns, and say you 
 won't go there to-day ; and I '11 back you up."
 
 AN EREANT WOOING 231 
 
 " I sha'n't want you this little while, Gillson," said 
 his employer, temporizing. 
 
 " Just as you like, sir. Then I shall 'ave the plea- 
 sure of hescorting Miss Mills to see some of the 
 points of hinterest she 'as neglected," said the su- 
 perb Gillson, bowing himself off. 
 
 " And who is Miss Mills, Polly ? " 
 
 " Oh, grandpapa, it is Justina. Do you know, Wil- 
 cox, who was quite indifferent to her at home, has 
 become very jealous of Gillson's attentions. I don't 
 doubt he will end by marrying her." 
 
 "Who? Wilcox? Ridiculous! Why, the crea- 
 ture 's twice his age ! " 
 
 " I know," said Polly, dropping her eyes ; " but it 
 is all Gillson's fault. And every time he thinks he 
 is detected in being too attentive to her maid, he calls 
 mama ' my lady.' He fancies it flatters her." 
 
 " I don't know but Gillson is right," said the old 
 gentleman, chuckling. " These titles, like black- 
 berries, and worth about as much, humph ! are 
 turning our republican heads." 
 
 "You know you like Lord Edmund. How good 
 he is to Lucy, and how happy she is ! And you once 
 seemed to like Sir Piers Gilchrist." 
 
 "They are accidents. I do like Gilchrist, con- 
 foundedly well, too ; and I never was so put out in 
 my life as when he was called to Gib by his banker 
 just while we are here. No signs of his coming back, 
 Polly, eh?" 
 
 " None that I know of, grandpapa. Am I walking 
 too fast for you up the hill? Don't you love this 
 elm-wood and its everlasting trickling of waters? 
 See ; there, under the Gate of Judgment, is the vain
 
 232 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 old gipsy posing as usual, and offering his photo- 
 graphs for sale. How I am growing to love it all ! 
 How can I ever leave it ! " 
 
 " Yet we must get off on Monday. We 've a good 
 deal of Spain to do yet ; and we Ve promised to stop 
 at Biarritz with Lucy to see the baby." 
 
 " On Monday ? " said Paulina, growing pale. 
 
 Her animation fled. Not until they were inside 
 the little garden called Adarves, built on the rocky 
 bastion under the Vela tower, and she had found 
 for the old man a comfortable bench, did she again 
 speak. 
 
 " That is three days, grandpapa." 
 
 " What is three days, child ? Egad, Polly, this is 
 fine, this view. It takes one's breath away. I don't 
 know but I 'd be satisfied to camp out here for the 
 rest of my life." 
 
 " Then stay, dear, stay. We are all so well ; it 's 
 cool and enchanting ; we 're just beginning to know 
 the Alhambra. Don't take us away yet." 
 
 " It will be the same everywhere we go in Spain, 
 little girl. No, I 've decided; and you very well 
 know the one thing I don't do is to change my 
 mind." 
 
 Another silence. The tiny garden that Fortuny 
 put into the background of a famous picture was 
 overflowing with flowers and haunted with booming 
 bees. Upon the ivy-covered wall of the tower behind 
 it were growing Bengal roses of deep velvety red, 
 and under them gleamed the gold of oranges and 
 the blue stars of celestine. The fine, strong coun- 
 tenance of the old man, as he sat bareheaded to let
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 233 
 
 the breeze play with his streaming silver hair, might 
 have daunted another than Polly. But after a brief 
 time of thought she had resolved to play for high 
 stakes to lose, or win. 
 
 " Grandpapa," she said, while putting a flower in 
 his coat, "you have often told mama, and she has 
 told me, nothing would give you greater pleasure 
 than to see Roger and me married." 
 
 "Yes, child; yes, dear," answered he aloud, shifting 
 uncomfortably. "Devil take that fellow! Has he 
 let her know he 's been after another girl, and is 
 that the reason she 's found out she wants him 
 back?" was what the inner man was saying. 
 
 "I would like to make you happy. I want to 
 make every one about me happy. And, if Roger and 
 you want it so very, very much, I won't any longer 
 ask to have it put off." 
 
 "Life is n't certain, my dear. I found that out 
 this winter, when I made such a narrow shave of it. 
 I should rejoice to see your wedding, as you know, 
 and you are a darling child to offer it." 
 
 " Oh, yes ; I offer it," said Polly, her heart beating, 
 her temples throbbing, a light mist seeming to come 
 before her eyes. " I will marry Roger to-morrow, if 
 he wants me." 
 
 " That would be the best plan, by George ! That 
 would rid us of all hem! entanglements," cried 
 the old man, exultingly. " Not to-morrow, of course ; 
 but soon. There 's no one absent but Toodles, dear 
 lad, and your aunt and cousins. And let me tell 
 you, Paulina, since I have heard that Sophy Low 
 means deliberately to allow her daughter to marry
 
 234 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 such a popinjay as that Winslow, I 'm not, so to 
 speak, over-anxious to see any of the lot. Why, I 
 could n't keep a civil tongue in my head if I met 
 Winslow. A dancing, dawdling creature, neither 
 American nor English, an imitation of he knows 
 not what ; Iwith no vices, simply because he has n't 
 , strength fo* 'em ! " 
 
 "Don't talk about Jimmie Winslow now, grand- 
 papa. Talk about Roger and me." 
 
 " I '11 do more ; I '11 have Eoger in my room to- 
 night, and settle the whole thing. But when it 's 
 settled, Miss Weathercock, no changing back again, 
 mind that." 
 
 " No, grandpapa," said Polly, submissively. Then, 
 frightened at her own temerity, she awaited its result.
 
 XIV 
 
 Y darling, Wilcox has just come 
 from your grandpapa to say that 
 Roger is with him, and that he 
 wishes to see you at once. I 
 asked Wilcox if grandpapa said 
 anything about me, but he an- 
 swered no it was Miss Staudish. And, my dear, all 
 your hair is tumbling down, and I can't imagine what 
 grandpapa can have to say at this late hour 11:30, 
 and time you were in bed. But there! there! run 
 along, and come back as quickly as you can, and tell 
 me all about it." 
 
 Paulina walked down the corridor with a brave 
 front, like poor Marie Antoinette on her way to exe- 
 cution. Now was the failure, or success of her des- 
 perate venture to be proved. If Roger should be so 
 blind, so base, as to take her up, what then ? 
 
 She tapped at the door, and, entering, found the 
 old gentleman on one side of the round table in his 
 sitting-room, Roger on the other, a candelabrum with 
 six candles burning between them, the room other- 
 wise in darkness, but for a handful of fire on the 
 hearth, made desirable by the cool night air of the 
 mountains. 
 
 235
 
 236 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 For the first time Polly could not look a crisis in 
 the face. She sank into the chair placed for her by 
 Roger, and, covering her eyes with her hands, bent 
 her head down upon the table. 
 
 For a moment there was no sound but that one 
 never failing in Granada the murmur of a stream- 
 let rushing down the hill. Then a nightingale in the 
 courtyard surpassed himself in one long trill of be- 
 seeching to the rose. 
 
 "What shall I say to you, my child? How shall 
 I tell you what he has answered me?" she heard in 
 her grandfather's voice. Nay ; was this indeed her 
 grandfather's voice, so low, so fraught with compas- 
 sionate tenderness ? 
 
 Polly took courage to lift her head. She saw her 
 grandfather's face, pearly white in the dusk of the 
 room, his silver hair floating about it, all spirit gone 
 out of it, sorrowful, broken the face of an old, old 
 man. 
 
 Then she looked at Roger. She had never thought 
 him so handsome. He held his head aloft ; his eyes 
 shone with a strange, new expression, half pride, half 
 timidity. 
 
 "Roger! Then you refuse me?" cried Polly, a 
 tremble of rapture in her tones. 
 
 "I have long known that you do not love me, 
 dear," he said tranquilly. 
 
 "Paulina, is this true?" asked her grandfather, 
 angrily. 
 
 " Grandpapa, don't look at me don't speak to me 
 like that. It is not my fault. It is not his fault. 
 We have fought for two long years, and failed. To
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 237 
 
 please you, we would have done anything but live a 
 lie. Your grandchildren could never live a lie ! " 
 
 " Then you made me do this thing " 
 
 " To prove to you, grandfather, to convince you, as 
 no words could convince you, that we shall be hap- 
 pier apart. Do what you like with the money; give 
 it every bit to Roger." 
 
 " You know that is impossible, sir," interposed the 
 young man. 
 
 " That is a matter, young people, I have, up to the 
 present, thank God ! been able to manage for myself," 
 dryly remarked Mr. Woodbury. " Perhaps you will 
 let me ask how long this has been going on t " 
 
 " Polly has always alarmed me, sir. I felt uncer- 
 tain of her since the first. Not of her keeping faith, 
 mind you, but of " 
 
 " Don't ask Roger ; ask me," put in Paulina. " He 
 has really been a sufferer for years. He deserves a 
 pillar and a niche. You ought to be doubly indul- 
 gent to him, grandpapa, to make up for all he has 
 borne for you." 
 
 " So I am the bugbear to both of you, eh ? " 
 
 " You are not in earnest ; you know we love you 
 dearly," cried the girl, running to throw two warm 
 arms around his neck. " Roger, come and take one 
 hand, while I take the other. Let us swear that there 
 never was such a duck of an old grandfather, whose 
 bark is worse than his bite who has spent his life 
 doing noble and generous things whom we are 
 proud of, and will be till we die ! " 
 
 " Paulina, what is there you and Lucy Blount do 
 not commit in the way of offense against the English
 
 238 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 speech ! Did y,ou ever hear, pray, of a duck that 
 barked! There, go to bed, and let Roger stay and 
 settle me down, while I take a night-cap of hot Scotch." 
 
 " One minute ! Roger, come with me into the cor- 
 ridor," said Paulina, trying to subdue the dancing of 
 her heart. "Here, my dear boy, is your ring. I want 
 you to promise me that you will give it to some one 
 to whom it will mean a thousand times more than it 
 ever did to me or than I tried to fancy it did. We 
 made a great, great mistake ; it came near being a ter- 
 rible one and we are saved ! Don't you make an- 
 other mistake, and through false shame let go what I 
 know you are longing to grasp." 
 
 " I do long for it, Polly. I never knew how much 
 till now," he said simply. " And I meant to speak to 
 you and to my grandfather at once." 
 
 " To-morrow ! " said Polly, thrusting the ring upon 
 him. 
 
 "THERE! it is settled. I Ve won! I am free; 
 Roger is happy; grandpapa is placated, I can see; 
 and mama will think as he does. But what will be- 
 come of poor me? If I were not afraid of running 
 upon her Ted, I 'd go to Lucy this minute, while she 
 is having her hair brushed, and send away the maid, 
 and tell her the whole thing. But no no one before 
 mama ! " and opening her mother's door, she carried 
 her surprise in with her. 
 
 " I HAVE turned it over in my mind in every way," 
 said Lady Edmund Blount to her husband, as they
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 239 
 
 walked together up and down the terrace before Gil- 
 christ's villa, waiting for their young charge to come 
 out to them. For, after her talk with Roger, May 
 had decided to return to the companionship of old 
 Josefa, and await her father's return. 
 
 It was the day preceding that upon which Mr. 
 Woodbury still held to his determination to leave 
 Granada. Lucy, to whom had been referred the 
 question of May and Roger, had decided that in the 
 absence of Sir Piers the intending suitor had better 
 abandon the casket that contained his gem less 
 poetically speaking, that Roger should go to Gib- 
 raltar, look up Sir Piers, tell him the whole story, and 
 ask for his daughter's hand. 
 
 But to Lucy the rub was that by that time the 
 others would be far on their way out of Spain. Re- 
 membering Gilchrist's confidences to her at Seville, 
 she longed with all womanly desire to straighten out 
 his complication, too. She did not dare to sound 
 Paulina, who had requested to be left altogether out 
 of discussions regarding May and Roger. Nor could 
 she put it into the already overtaxed brain of Mrs. 
 Standish who, believing herself heart-broken, was 
 still able to talk by the hour with Lucy over Roger's 
 new affair that her daughter Polly was in love 
 with Roger's prospective father-in-law. 
 
 "They ought to meet; they ought to have a 
 chance," had ruminated Lucy. "Everybody in this 
 world ought to have a chance. And the question is 
 whether Polly will eat me up if I communicate with 
 Gilchrist. Polly can be rather an awful little person,
 
 240 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 especially if she thinks her maidenly dignity is in- 
 volved. I know. I '11 ask Ted if I may no ! I '11 
 do it, and then tell Ted ! " 
 
 May, during these perturbing meditations of her 
 chaperon, had been of little help. With her foot on 
 the first round of the golden ladder to a lover's para- 
 dise, she had nothing to wish. Her one stipulation, 
 that she should leave the hotel and return to the 
 shelter of her own modest home, touched Lucy into 
 prompt acquiescence with the scheme. At the door 
 of his lady's bower Roger had not yet ventured to 
 present himself. 
 
 " It grieves me to leave May here to-morrow, Ted," 
 Lucy now said to her liege, as she hung on his arm, 
 and poured variations of one theme into his ear. 
 "Just think, when we are crawling away in one 
 of those slow trains from Bobadilla, going north, and 
 Roger is in another train, going south, what her 
 feelings will be, left alone, wondering whether her 
 father will say yea or nay." 
 
 "You women are queer creatures," Blount re- 
 marked, knocking the ashes from his cigar into 
 the heart of a rose. "Just now May Gilchrist is 
 the center of interest. Until her love-affair is set- 
 tled, I don't believe any of you will get a good night's 
 rest. It is all May May. Ny little friend Paulina 
 is of secondary importance. No one talks of her, 
 thinks of her, plans for her coming out all right." 
 
 "Ted, what can one do?" cried Lucy, guiltily aware 
 of something already done. "Who knows whether 
 Gilchrist cares for Polly ? Do you ? " 
 
 " There is no doubt of it in my mind. He is as far
 
 AN EKRANT WOOING 2-il 
 
 gone as any fellow I ever saw, and the marriage 
 would be a deuced good one for him. It 's a shame 
 to let the Wootou Magna property run down as it 
 is doing. A good round sum out of old Woodbury's 
 pocket would fetch up its value to equal any in 
 the county." 
 
 " You sordid boy ! As if it were only a question of 
 money ! " 
 
 " No, I don't say that ; but money makes love last 
 longer and its flame burn brighter, in my opinion. 
 Gilchrist ought to be a somebody, not a nomad ; and 
 he shall be, if I can help him." 
 
 "Why, Ted, you look as if you mean something. 
 You have been meddling. What can you have done ? " 
 
 "Wired Gilchrist last night to meet me here on 
 important business before I leave to-morrow." I 
 
 "Ted, you did n't? Yes, you did! You are the/ 
 cleverest, sweetest old thing I ever saw ! If baby 
 grows up like you, what a blessing he will be to some 
 woman one of these days ! Darling baby ! When I 
 am happy I always want to see him. Let us fly 
 to-morrow as fast as Spanish steam can carry us to 
 Biarritz. Now I am going to tell you a secret. I 
 wired too." 
 
 "You! To Gilchrist ? 
 
 " Yes ; I am his confidante, you must know. But 
 it was a most diplomatic message, committing nobody. 
 Polly could n't find anything to object to in it. I 
 think he will believe you have suddenly gone mad, or 
 that we can't afford to pay our hotel bill. But he 
 must come, must he not ? Oh, Ted, I see it all ! Unless 
 Gilchrist and Polly are too idiotic for anything, they 
 
 16
 
 242 AN EEEANT WOOING 
 
 will soon be married. And old Mr. Woodbury will 
 give Polly lots of money. But he will insist on their 
 living in England on their own property part of the 
 time. And so we '11 lose "Wooton Magna; for of 
 course we would n't be so mean as to hold on to the 
 lease." 
 
 " Easy methods of doing business, yours," said her 
 husband, much amused. 
 
 " Listen ! But we must go back to Wooton Magna 
 for May's wedding. They can have the house for the 
 affair, and we '11 be guests in it. May must be mar- 
 ried in the little church, and the children will strew 
 primroses j and Roger will take her to the ranch for 
 a wedding-journey. What fun she will have with my 
 dear old brother and Paddy ! This will work around 
 for your benefit, Ted; for Roger will have to live 
 near his grandfather, and Billy will take Patrick for 
 a partner on the ranch, and they '11 make loads of 
 money, and relieve you of always paying up for 
 Paddy don't you see? Mr. Woodbury will end by 
 adoring May, and she is so young and unformed, she 
 will blend with things over there nicely. I don't 
 doubt Lady Watson-Jones will disinherit May for 
 marrying an American, and leave her money to 
 found a hospital for cats, with an effigy of Tom over 
 the front door. But dear! that little paltry sum 
 beside the great Woodbury estate " 
 
 " I say, Lucy, how you are clipping along ! " 
 
 " But, Ted, I always do when I am excited ; and I 
 want you to remember every word I say now, and see 
 if it does n't come true. As to Polly, I am dying to 
 have her Lady Gilchrist, if it were only to be even
 
 AN ERKANT WOOING 243 
 
 with her for the horrid things she said when I was 
 first engaged to you. Do you believe, she pretended 
 to think all Englishmen of title ill-treat their wives 
 and squander their substance in riotous living. Oh, 
 yes j that is the common opinion about your class in 
 America, and I often wanted to shake Polly, to per- 
 suade her otherwise. I 've bided my time, but I '11 
 throw that back at her or die ! " 
 
 "It will be Greek meeting Greek, and may I be 
 there to see. But how will Mrs. Standish submit to 
 having her daughter taken away from her ? " 
 
 " Dear Mrs. Standish ! Her sun rises and sets in 
 Toodles. But Gilchrist and Polly will be chasing 
 back to America every year. He is the kind to pick 
 his wife up like a traveling-bag, and carry her, at a 
 moment's notice, to the land's end." 
 
 "Tell me, Lucy, how it is May never suspected 
 Paulina's fancy for her papa?" 
 
 " Because, stupid, she thought when Polly had 
 Roger she could want no one else. Anyhow, a fair 
 exchange is no robbery." 
 
 " You have settled it admirably, my dear. I hope 
 you won't kick over your own basket of glass, and 
 find all your fine dreams shattered." 
 
 " Ted ! " she exclaimed, a trifle sobered. " You don't 
 think it possible Gilchrist could refuse to come ? " 
 
 " I don't know. He may consider it folly to expose 
 himself to her attractions." 
 
 " Don't talk so loud there comes May. May, we 
 are just praising your arcade of roses, and the view 
 of the snow hills one gets through it. And what a 
 dear little house ! I envy you it ; but I suppose we
 
 244 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 must n't be cuckoos, and want to rent all your father's 
 homes." 
 
 " I wish old Woodbury could hear you on the sub- 
 ject of cuckoos renting homes," observed Blount, 
 dispassionately. 
 
 THAT afternoon our friends decided to make a fare- 
 well excursion. A drive through the suburbs, out 
 into the powdered dust of the glaring highway, 
 brought them to a halt under a series of caves bur- 
 rowed one above the other in the hillside, their black 
 mouths half screened from observation by tufts of 
 ragged cactus. 
 
 " They are like the dugouts of our Western fron- 
 tier," said Roger, " only more picturesque." 
 
 In a trice the two carriages were surrounded by a 
 swarm of swart men and women and children, who 
 vociferated prayers for alms. The hill brought forth 
 what seemed myriads of them ; the supply appeared 
 to be inexhaustible. Sitting smoking at the cave 
 doors were here and there men in the smart costume 
 of their tribe head-kerchief, jacket and breeches 
 with silver buttons, massive earrings of gold and 
 silver. 
 
 Chief among the importunate were three little 
 girls they had been accustomed to see begging in 
 the Alhambra garden, one of them, of exceeding 
 grace, having the fascination of the " Serpent of old 
 Nile." This Vivien in embryo had been wont daily 
 to plead with them for money, to coax, to dance, to 
 pose, to run beside their carriage, with a vivacity 
 in tone and gesture altogether seductive. If money
 
 AX ERRANT WOOIXG 245 
 
 were given her, she would expand with a fervor of 
 blessing ; if refused, she would spit and curse after 
 them with viperish resentment. Now, on her own 
 ground, she was all suavity. Beckoning, beseeching, 
 she conveyed to the "Ingles" an invitation to visit 
 one of the caverns. They acquiesced, and, trans- 
 formed into a guide efficient and businesslike, she led 
 the way. 
 
 In the gipsy home they found three chambers hewn 
 in the rock, the smallest a kitchen with a barred win- 
 dow blackened by escaping smoke, the whole other- 
 wise as neat as a new pin. On the whitewashed 
 wall hung pictures of the saints over a cup of holy 
 water ; a shelf held gay crockery, a tambourine, and 
 castanets ; there was also a looking-glass, before 
 which a dark woman was engaged in putting a 
 smack of pomatum on her hair. 
 
 In the rear chamber were three tidily made beds, 
 to accommodate husband and wife, grandmother, 
 and three children. A table, with rush-bottomed 
 chairs and cooking-utensils, completed the furnish- 
 ings. 
 
 The visitors, received by a bright little woman 
 from whom they had often bought violets at the 
 hotel, were greeted as old acquaintances. Bustling 
 to the door, she beckoned to her husband, who sat 
 outside, giving the air to a baby like a doll of yellow 
 wax. 
 
 The baby, reclaimed from the arms of his father, 
 was handed around for inspection with every token 
 of lively hospitality. With her red petticoat, orange 
 spencer, and a carnation in her hair, the little mo- 
 
 17
 
 246 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 ther darted like a dragon-fly about her establishment, 
 showing all her possessions with housewifely pride. 
 She brought in and introduced the crone grand- 
 mother, a brother, a sister, some cousins and aunts, 
 till the cave was crowded, and the space outside 
 ringed with dark, merry, greedy faces, against a strip 
 of sky over the red battlements of the Alhambra 
 across the valley. 
 
 One of the gipsy wives, identifying May Grilchrist, 
 kissed her hand, and, showing her own white teeth in 
 smiles, poured upon the fair stranger lavish assur- 
 ances of which puzzled May understood not a word. 
 
 " Beg pardon, miss," observed Gillson, who was 
 standing near the cavern's mouth ; " she says Sir 
 Piers gave her help when her man was ill; and she 
 can never think enough of him." 
 
 " I remember his telling me of some pet gipsy of 
 his," said May. "He knows and likes many of them ; 
 but all the same, he does n't think it safe for strangers 
 to come here after dark, or alone and unprotected." 
 
 "I hope we may get off with the loss of nothing 
 more than the contents of our pockets," said Roger. 
 "They say a Spanish gipsy can steal the stockings 
 off your feet without touching your shoes." 
 
 "She wishes to tell your fortune, miss, through 
 gratitude to your papa," said Gillson. 
 
 " Of course, of course, she must do it, May," said 
 Lucy. "I wish we could manage to pass somebody 
 else off for Ted's wife, and let her tell my fortune." 
 
 "It does n't require gipsy lore to find out that 
 Lord Edmund belongs to you, my Lucy," said Pau- 
 lina, with satire.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 247 
 
 " Oh, Polly, am I so bad? Wait, wait; you will be 
 worse with the husband she '11 give you, for a peseta," 
 retorted Lucy, gaily. 
 
 To May, from whom the woman refused to receive 
 payment, was allotted as fair a presentment of Roger 
 as could have been expected from the artist offhand 
 a description punctuated by the laughter and com- 
 ments of lookers-on, until both young people thought 
 they were ready for the mountain to open and swal- 
 low them, as it had been wont to do to visitors in 
 legendary days. But in spite of their embarrass- 
 ment, each wore an expression of conscious bliss 
 there was no mistaking. Roger, under the new con- 
 dition of affairs, was especially transfigured. 
 
 Polly, with a pang, decided it was not in her to 
 confer happiness like May May, the guileless, the 
 shy maiden, whom she had at first been rather dis- 
 posed to patronize from the height of her wider 
 knowledge of mankind. 
 
 Already Roger was forgetting her presence in 
 May's. Little unintended words and actions left no 
 doubt as to that. 
 
 "Now tell her she may read my hand, Gillson," 
 ventured Lucy, hardily. 
 
 " She says, my lady, as how your fortune is made ; 
 but she would like the hand of the young lady who 
 is looking at the picture in the corner," interpreted 
 the courier. 
 
 "Yes, Polly; it 's no fun where one backs out; 
 and, whatever you may say, I really think a great 
 deal of this odd creature's wit in divining that I be- 
 long to Ted," cried Lucy. " Must n't Polly have her
 
 248 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 fortune told, Mr. Woodbury ? There, Polly, hold out 
 your haud ; she will have to be clever to find a lad 
 for you in the present company." 
 
 Paulina, her back to the light, showed her hand 
 carelessly. The gipsy, sitting, scanned its lines with 
 apparently deep consideration, then dropped it with 
 annoyance, and took it up again. 
 
 " You are always a problem to the occult, not to be 
 quickly solved/' whispered gleeful Lucy. At that 
 juncture a new figure was added to the group around 
 the cavern door, and Sir Piers Gilchrist, who, arriving 
 in Granada unknown to any of the party, had walked 
 out in pursuit of his friends, pushed his way quietly 
 to the front, to stand there looking on. 
 
 Before any one else had observed him, the fortune- 
 teller, who claimed him as her benefactor, uttered a 
 quick exclamation of delight. Paulina, following in- 
 voluntarily the direction of the woman's eyes, saw 
 Gilchrist, and a tremble of joy ran through her. As 
 the others became simultaneously aware of his pres- 
 ence, May sprang to meet him fondly, Lucy greeted 
 him with cordiality, Mr. Woodbury gave him hearty 
 welcome. Roger and Lord Edmund, who had their 
 own reasons for hesitating as to the manner of open- 
 ing conversation with the newcomer, separately 
 strolled to the mouth of the cave, and met out- 
 side, in evident perturbation. 
 
 " What an astonishing little person is that wife of 
 mine ! " Blount was saying to his inner self. " Here 
 we have brought this fellow to Granada upon the im- 
 pulse of the moment, and have put ourselves into the 
 biggest kind of a box, and I don't in the least know
 
 AN EERANT WOOING 249 
 
 how I 'm going to get out of it. But she equally 
 at fault with me she 's as cool and composed as if 
 in her own drawing-room ! Whatever her situation, 
 she has it well in hand. She '11 set the business 
 before him better than I could. By Jove ! I believe 
 I '11 just leave the whole thing to Lucy, and not open 
 my jaw." 
 
 In the breaking up of the party to go away, Pau- 
 liua stopped behind to give a present to the woman 
 who had failed to tell her fortune. Gillson, at her 
 elbow to warn her against displaying silver, inter- 
 posed again to interpret. 
 
 " I 'm asked to tell you, miss," he said, with some 
 show of embarrassment, " that when the young lady's 
 fortune was on its way to her the gipsy could not 
 see it." 
 
 " That will do, Gillson," said Miss Standish, haught- 
 ily, as she walked over and joined her grandfather, 
 slipping her arm in his. It was past a jest when 
 people like these took up her relations to Sir Piers. 
 
 At sight of tips, the earth had opened to yield more 
 gitanos, who, resuming their interrupted escort of the 
 strangers, clamored with begging. The little Vivien, 
 liberally recompensed with a peseta, pretended to cry 
 because it was no more, then burst into elfish laughter, 
 and hurled after them vituperations thick and fast. 
 The tumult increased. Men, women, and children 
 started to run with the carriages, according to custom, 
 intending to make a pandemonium to the very out- 
 skirts of the town. 
 
 " Will nothing stop this din ? " cried Lucy, putting 
 her hands over her ears.
 
 250 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 Gilchrist smiled, and, after assisting to place the 
 ladies in their vehicles, turned back, and addressed a 
 few words in their own tongue to the rabble, who, 
 also smiling, held off, making no further effort to 
 accompany the visitors. 
 
 This self-denial on the part of the gitanos was 
 promptly rewarded by the arrival of more carriages, 
 among them one containing the newly arrived ex- 
 Senator and Mrs. Treat their courier, half turned 
 upon the box beside the driver, as ever, in the act of 
 oratorical explanation. But for once the judge did 
 not look depressed by the privileges of foreign travel. 
 He held his head erect; animation was in every line 
 of his keen countenance. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Woodbury," he cried as he came within 
 earshot of that gentleman, "I have news for you. 
 
 Senator from my State is dead, and my friends 
 
 over there have cabled me to come right home in time 
 for the caucus which will occur when the legislature 
 meets for the election of his successor. Yes, sir ; we 
 expect to take the steamer that touches at Gibraltar 
 Wednesday of this week." 
 
 " I am sure the country will be the gainer by it, 
 judge," said Mr. Woodbury, politely. " But it 's a 
 pity to cut short your Spanish trip, even for such 
 a patriotic purpose." 
 
 " Well, sir, I guess I 've about had the best of it," 
 was the radiant response. " If they could patch up 
 that old palace of Charles V. a bit, the Alhambra, 
 though it 's considerably damaged in spots, might 
 be better worth the journey in those slow cars from 
 Seville. I was glad of an opportunity to inspect the
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 251 
 
 tombs of Ferdinand and Isabella, though. "Well, good 
 day to yon. See you at dinner, at the Washington 
 Irving, I expect," and the judge, with a gipsy girl 
 hanging on each arm and coaxing sweetly, was last 
 seen cheerfully entering the exhibition cave. 
 
 "Sir Piers, you must not walk home. You must 
 come in the carriage with Ted and May and me," said 
 Lucy. " I have something to say to you ; and if Ted 
 and May don't object, they can drop us at the Ala- 
 meda, and we can talk there." 
 
 " My little woman is a Trojan," Blount kept think- 
 ing, with renewed admiration of her. He had served 
 his Queen as a diplomatist, but as yet had seen no 
 exit from the difficulty still perplexing his brain. And 
 here was Lucy already dominating the affair with 
 charming ease. Here was Gilchrist obeying her, with 
 just a shadow of wonder in his face, which could not 
 keep entirely unrevealed a sort of longing after the 
 carriage that swept Paulina away from him. 
 
 And there was Paulina driving off, vaguely aware 
 that a climax was at hand, her one wish and prayer, 
 now that it had come, to escape from Gilchrist, and 
 to keep the others from seeing that this was so. 
 
 SIB PIERS and Lucy had been talking for half an 
 hour on a secluded bench in the Alameda, and Lady 
 Edmund's expressive face could not conceal a certain 
 blaukness of disappointment. 
 
 " After what you told me at Seville ! " she said, with 
 rebellious intonation. 
 
 " I told you, dear lady, that I love her " 
 
 " Then " cried Lucy, interrupting.
 
 252 AN EREANT WOOING 
 
 "And that I had no right to say so to her. . Two 
 weeks have not altered this." 
 
 " But I don't understand," said Lucy, pitifully. 
 
 " What has passed, although it changes the case 
 immensely for Woodbury, whom I have promised to 
 see on my return to the villa " 
 
 "Roger ought to be grateful to me for opening 
 this door for him. But he won't. They never are," 
 interpolated she. " They think so at the time ; but 
 if the match turns out well, they wonder what you 
 could have supposed you ever had to do with it. If 
 they quarrel, they lay it all at your door, and hate 
 you cordially. I wash my hands of lovers ! " 
 
 "Not all," pursued he, with a smile at her change 
 of tactics. " Don't quite give us up, Lady Edmund." 
 
 "You can jest at it! And you persist that, while 
 you may try to accept the very surprising idea of 
 Roger (who was never loved by Paulina) having 
 fallen in love with your beautiful daughter, you 
 have no intention of following up that circumstance 
 to your own advantage ! " 
 
 " Put sentiment aside, and listen to reason from a 
 man of middle age " 
 
 "Oh, don't!" she exclaimed; "you disappoint me 
 horribly. I liked you far better when you were so sad 
 at Seville, and I went to my room and cried over you." 
 
 "I hope my recording angel took note of those 
 tears I need them," he said. " Listen, then, if you 
 like it better, to the voice of a man who, having 
 wrecked his own youth through impulse, does not 
 presume to wreck that of the young girl he loves
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 253 
 
 against his better judgment. What would you say 
 if I won her to be my wife ? " 
 
 "That you that she why, what do you care 
 what the world says about your marriage ? You, an 
 Englishman ! " said Lucy, unable to resist this thrust. 
 
 "What would Blount say, for example? He 's a 
 clear-headed fellow, a man of the world what has 
 he said when you talked over this with him!" 
 
 Lucy was silent. Too well she recalled that her 
 husband had said that a good round sum out of old 
 Woodbury's pocket would bring the Wooton Magna 
 property up to be as good as any in the county. 
 
 " One can never discuss with men," she said, gen- 
 eralizing. " They wander from the point, and, when 
 you advance a good argument, knock it down, and 
 jump on it." 
 
 "Am I wrong in supposing my friend Blount had 
 an eye to my worldly advancement when he sent 
 that telegram? No, Lady Edmund; you are too 
 frauk a woman not to admit that nine persons out 
 of ten of our acquaintance would say I was marry- 
 ing this girl for her money was using her to pull 
 me out of vagabondage into respectability ; that she 
 was throwing herself away on a moody wanderer 
 twice her age, who had taken advantage of her 
 youth. Her own people what face could I have 
 before her grandfather?" 
 
 "It would surprise Mr. Woodbury, of course. I 
 don't think he has a glimmering suspicion of it; but 
 new experiences and shocks, and so on, seem to be 
 having the best effect on him. Already he looks fa-
 
 2*4 AN ERKANT WOOING 
 
 vorably upon Roger's hopes of getting you to give 
 him May. And if that had been proposed to him at 
 home well!" 
 
 "Paulina's mother has from the first stabbed me 
 with innocent suggestions of our disparity in years." 
 
 " Mrs. Standish is at heart a dove/' cried Lucy. 
 "She would be bewildered for a while; but let me 
 tell you a secret I think she would soon be recon- 
 ciled to Lady Gilehrist." 
 
 "You are the most astute of tempters but no, 
 no ! At Italica I fought my fight with myself, and 
 won. I showed her, without glossing, what I am. I 
 made her distrust me. After that, how can I in de- 
 cency do anything but hear what "Woodbury and 
 May have to say for themselves, and then go back 
 into my solitude and try to forget Paulina ? " 
 
 "You will have ample opportunity," she said, her 
 voice trembling a little with vexation. " To-morrow 
 we leave for good. Be sure I shall do my best to 
 make Paulina forget you. She is not one to be, as 
 it were, offered by her friends " 
 
 "That she is not!" he exclaimed emphatically. 
 "She is lovely, beloved, choice one can't find the 
 right epithets for her! She has great wealth, un- 
 limited opportunities. She will soon make a mar- 
 riage worthy of her." 
 
 " It is time enough for you to talk of her marriage 
 to another when your conscience acquits you of hav- 
 ing tried to make her care for you," said Lucy, ris- 
 ing, and facing him dauntlessly. "Now you will 
 call a carriage, please. Poor Eoger will be all im- 
 patience awaiting you."
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 255 
 
 " But you will let me say " 
 
 "Nothing! I speak for Paulina also. Nothing! 
 I think already we have said too much." 
 
 lie bowed, and they walked together in silence to 
 the pavement, where, placing her in an open cab, lie 
 let her go alone, saying he preferred to walk. 
 
 "Have we quarreled? I don't know," meditated 
 Polly's champion, as she drove over stony streets. 
 ' I only know that, if this fails, I can do no more." 
 
 Gilchrist, picking his way over the short cut up- 
 ward to his home, asked himself could it be that, in 
 spite of his best intention, he had erred toward the 
 young girl he held more than ever sacred in his 
 heart. Had he, on the occasion of their talk to- 
 gether at Italica, betrayed to her too much of his 
 overmastering passion ? Was he, a man of sensitive 
 honor, to be placed in the strange position of profit- 
 ing by what he had meant to be an act of renuncia- 
 tion? In the tumult of these doubts, even at the 
 moment when, as it were, he now seemed almost to 
 touch the goal, he felt a new pain a new tempta- 
 tion to go from her forever. 
 
 SUNSET in the Alhambra ! It filled halls and courts 
 with splendor, bringing out the old tints of the ara- 
 besques, making the azulejos glow like jewels, and 
 warming to rose-color the ivory of arch and fret- 
 work. 
 
 He had sought for her under the citron-trees in 
 the garden of Lindaraxa, but she was not there. He 
 had come into the Court of Lions, and stood alone in 
 that temple of fairy filigree roofed by the blue sky,
 
 256 AN ERKANT WOOING 
 
 while looking about him into the chambers opening 
 out of it. If he should not see her in one of these, 
 he had determined to seek no more. 
 
 The snuffy old guardian, who had directed him, 
 now came up to say that, in admitting the senorita 
 (a beautiful child !), she had coaxed him (with a smile 
 like his daughter's, who was dead) to let her visit her 
 favorite spots unattended. He had even unlocked 
 for her the door leading to the Tower of Comares, so 
 that she might go up and view the sunset. 
 
 With that, Gilchrist, who had long had the free- 
 dom of the place, put a big silver piece into the old 
 man's hand, and told him he would take care the 
 senorita should come down in safety. 
 
 Mounting with eager feet the corkscrew of stone 
 stairs where, of old, ascended kings and queens to 
 watch their hosts marshaled in the Vega, he found 
 her upon the battlement, looking toward the west, 
 her companions, the martlets, flying back and forth. 
 
 " I have been with Roger," he said, in answer to 
 the query of her look. "Your maid told me you 
 were absent from your room, where the others believe 
 you to be now, and I made sure to find you here." 
 
 "Well?" she said, scanning him with quiet eyes. 
 
 "It is settled ridiculously soon, it seemed to me; 
 but what would you have ? Woodbury and May are 
 together on the terrace, with old Josefa knitting in 
 the arbor near, to satisfy Spanish notions of pro- 
 priety. I am to lose my ewe lamb." 
 
 "We will have every care of her," Paulina said, 
 with grave gentleness. "And Roger is Roger, as 
 you know."
 
 THE GALLERY OF THE COURT OP LIONS, ALHAMBRA.
 
 AN ERRANT WOOING 257 
 
 "I know. It is a most astonishing windfall, this 
 of my new son-in-law; but I don't underrate the 
 value of it. May's future is assured, her happiness 
 certain. Between us, half a globe will make little 
 difference. It will give me a fresh zeal in explora- 
 tion something to cross the sea for. But that 
 won't be yet awhile." He ended with a sigh. 
 
 Paulina said nothing. Her gaze had turned from 
 him, and was fixed on the great ball of fire sinking 
 into the snows of the sierra. 
 
 "Are you thinking that over yonder lies your 
 beautiful western continent, and that you are going 
 back to be a little uncrowned queen?" he said, with 
 an attempt at playfulness. "Where, before long, 
 you will find yourself ruffling the leaves of your 
 diary to recall the names of the people you met en 
 mi/aye. That 's why I followed you up here above 
 the heads of other mortals, hoping to rise above them 
 in your recollections. If you go to-morrow, in the 
 gray dawn, as is threatened, this is my only chance 
 to be alone with you again. Twice I turned away 
 from the entrance below, and finally let myself be 
 overcome by the wish for a last word undisturbed." 
 
 " No more last words, please," she said. " I prefer 
 to melt away from people and places, as you do. 
 Surely it is time to go down. The poor old guardian, 
 who indulges me so much, must be tired of waiting 
 to lock us out." 
 
 He was surprised by her calm speech, so devoid of 
 the usual energy of her diction. 
 
 " One moment, and the sun will have sunk behind 
 the mountain," he cried, yearning to win back the
 
 258 AN ERRANT WOOING 
 
 old manner that had enthralled him. "Out of a 
 whole lifetime, don't begrudge me one moment more. 
 JSmile on me as you used. Mock at me if you like. 
 Tell me I 7 m a madman for dwelling a thousand 
 times more fondly on the thought of you since I so 
 sternly put you away from me at Italica. Show me 
 anything that is human, that is Paulina not that 
 unnatural calm!" 
 
 " When it was from you I acquired it at Italica?" 
 she said, a gleam of her frolic humor coming into 
 her eyes. 
 
 " There ! There is my will o' the wisp ! " he cried 
 exultingly. " The one I Ve danced after all these 
 months that came unsought into my life, to rob 
 me of hard-earned peace that made me feel the 
 black past would be nothing if I could bring you to 
 nestle in my heart! Fight as I may, you conquer. 
 I love you, Paulina, you, you I love you do you 
 hear ? " 
 
 THE Tower of Com ares was forsaken by the sun. 
 The martlets, after consultation among themselves, 
 made bold to hint to the invaders it was full time to 
 go. A deep-mouthed bell in the cathedral called the 
 evening hour, and was answered by other church 
 bells far away upon the Vega. Flowers in the Al- 
 hambra gardens folded themselves to rest.
 
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