THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID HIS LADY'S PLEASURE '"I've seen ye looking at her like a laddie eyeing a Hiitf^rQr.ntr.h.' he said." (Chapter II.) His Lady's Pleasure] [Frontispiece HIS LADY'S PLEASURE By HAROLD BINDLOSS Author of "The Impostor," "Hawtrey's Deputy/' etc., etc. WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO H is CONTENTS. CHAP. PA.GE I JACINTA BROWN ..... 5 II AN OVERHEATED JOURNAL ... 13 III ON THE VERANDAH .... 24 IV A BIG CONTRACT ..... 32 V THE TOMATO FINCA . . . .41 VI AUSTIN'S POINT OF VIEW ... 47 VII AT THE BULL-FlGHT . . . 56 VIII JEFFERSON FEELS THE STRAIN . . 64 IX AUSTIN MAKES A VENTURE ... 74 X JACINTA is NOT CONTENT ... 85 XI THE LAND OF THE SHADOW ... 90 XII NOCTURNAL VISITORS .... 97 XIII TOIL 104 XIV JEFFERSON'S REMONSTRANCE . . in XV STARTING THE PUMP . . . .119 XVI ELUSIVE GUM 128 XVII AUSTIN GOES DOWN RIVER . . . 134 XVIII JACINTA BECOMES INDIGNANT. .143 3 M318278 4 CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE XIX CONDEMNED UNHEARD .... 152 XX JACINTA MAKES NO EXCUSE * . .161 XXI THE PICTURES 168 XXII FUNNEL-PAINT'S PROPOSITION. . .177 XXIII FUNNEL-PAINT M OVES AGAIN. . . 185 XXIV AUSTEN FINDS A CLUE .... 192 XXV HOVE OFF ...... 199 XXVI JEFFERSON FINDS THE GUM . . . 207 XXVII AUSTIN'S TOAST . . . . .217 XXVIII IN COMMAND . . . . . 227 XXIX AUSTIN is MISSING .... 237 XXX JACINTA CAPITULATES . . . .246 HIS LADY'S PLEASURE CHAPTER I JACINTA BROWN IT was about seven o'clock in the evening when sobre- cargo Austin boarded the little mail-boat Estremedura as she lay rolling at anchor on the long, moonlit heave that worked into the roadstead of Santa Cruz, Palma. Sobrecargo means much the same thing as purser, and Austin was an Englishman, though the Estremedura was to all intents and purposes a Spanish steamer. She traded round the islands of the Canary archipelago with mules and camels, tomatoes, bananas, onions, and sea-sick English tourists, as fortune favoured her. Now, as the heavily-sealed document Austin carried in his pocket declared, she was to sail for Las Palmas, Grand Canary, with the Cuban mail, by the gracious permission of the young King of Spain. He was a young man of average stature, and there was nothing especially distinguished in his appearance, though he had good grey eyes, and a pleasant, bronzed face. He was somewhat lightly made, though he looked wiry, and held himself well, and there was a certain languidness in his smile which seemed to suggest that he was not addicted to troubling greatly about anything. Because his white uniform jacket with the resplendent buttons had been sold a day or two before by the Scotch- man who ran the Estremedura' s engines, he was just then attired somewhat incongruously in a white cap 5 6 HIS LADY'S PLEASURE with the very large and imposing badge of the Spanish mail service, a brown alpaca jacket, white duck trousers, and pipe-clayed shoes. That evening the steamer hummed with life, and the clatter of polyglot tongues. Parsee dealers in silver- thread embroideries, German commercial travellers, Madeiran Portuguese, Canario hillmen, and Peninsular Spaniards, moved amidst the straying live stock, while a little group of Anglo-Saxons naturally sat apart upon the hatch. There were, as is usual when Englishmen fore- gather in a country where wine is cheap, empty bottles scattered about the latter. The engineer from the sister ship and an athletic tourist, stripped, at least as far as was permissible, were wrestling in Cumberland fashion on the hatch, with much delicate manoeuvring of their feet and futile clutches at each other's waists. Macal- lister, who, when he felt inclined, superintended the Estremedura's machinery, alternately encouraged them sardonically and solaced himself with one of the bottles. He was a big, gaunt man, and just then extremely dirty, and when he saw Austin, looked up with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. "I have been waiting for ye anxiously," he said. " Ye may now have the pleasure of lending me five dollars." " I'm afraid not ! " said Austin decisively. " For one thing I haven't got them. I very seldom have as you ought to know." Macallister made a little gesture of resignation. " Well," he said, " ye have always your clothes, and if ye had known us better ye would not have brought so many of them on board the Estremedura. I'm half expecting yon Jackson o' Las Palmas, who gave us two dollars for the last white suit, to come round for some more o' them when we get in." Austin tried the door of his room close by, and was consoled to find it locked, as he had left it. " They cost me five, and I naturally never saw a JACINTA BROWN 7 peseta of the money. I suppose you kept the Correo buttons ? " " I did not," said Macallister, unabashed.