第35章

"He had returned from his morning walk to the Brunnen, and was sitting idly in his room, when there was a knock at the door. It opened to a servant bearing a salver with a card. Paul lifted it with a slight tremor, not at the engraved name of "Maria Concepcion de Arguellos de la Yerba Buena," but at the remembered school-girl hand that had penciled underneath the words, "wishes the favor of an audience with his Excellency the Lord Lieutenant-Governor of the Californias."Paul looked inquiringly at the servant. "The gnadige Fraulein was in her own salon. Would EXCELLENCY walk that way? It was but a step; in effect, the next apartment."Paul followed him into the hall with wondering steps. The door of the next room was open, and disclosed a handsomely furnished salon.

A tall graceful figure rose quickly from behind a writing-table, and advanced with outstretched hands and a frank yet mischievous smile. It was Yerba.

Standing there in a grayish hat, mantle, and traveling dress, all of one subdued yet alluring tone, she looked as beautiful as when he had last seen her--and yet--unlike. For a brief bitter moment his instincts revolted at this familiar yielding up in his fair countrywomen of all that was distinctively original in them to alien tastes and habits, and he resented the plastic yet characterless mobility which made Yerba's Parisian dress and European manner fit her so charmingly and yet express so little.

For a brief critical moment he remembered the placid, unchanging simplicity of German, and the inflexible and ingrained reserve of English, girlhood, in opposition to this indistinctive cosmopolitan grace. But only for a moment. As soon as she spoke, a certain flavor of individuality seemed to return to her speech.

"Confess," she said, "it was a courageous thing for me to do. You might have been somebody else--a real Excellency--or heaven knows what! Or, what is worse in your new magnificence, you might have forgotten one of your oldest, most humble, but faithful subjects."She drew back and made him a mock ceremonious curtsy, that even in its charming exaggeration suggested to Paul, however, that she had already made it somewhere seriously.

"But what does it all mean?" he asked, smiling, feeling not only his doubts and uneasiness vanish, but even the years of separation melt away in her presence. "I know I went to bed last night a very humble individual, and yet I seem to awaken this morning a very exalted personage. Am I really Commander of the Faithful, or am Idreaming? Might I trouble you, as my predecessor Abou Hassan did Sweetlips, to bite my little finger?""Do you mean to say you have not seen the 'Auzeiger?'" she returned, taking a small German printed sheet from the table and pointing to a paragraph. Paul took the paper. Certainly there was the plain announcement among the arrivals of "His Excellency Paul Hathaway, Lord Lieutenant-Governor of the Californias." A light flashed upon him.

"This is George's work. He and Colonel Pendleton were here with me last night.""Then you have seen the colonel already?" she said, with a scarcely perceptible alteration of expression, which, however, struck Paul.

"Yes. I met him at the theatre last evening." He was about to plunge into an animated description of the colonel's indignation, but checked himself, he knew not why. But he was thankful the next moment that he had.

"That accounts for everything," she said, lifting her pretty shoulders with a slight shrug of weariness. "I had to put a step to George's talking about ME three months ago,--his extravagance is something TOO awful. And the colonel, who is completely in his hands,--trusting him for everything, even the language,--doesn't see it.""But he is extravagant in the praise of his friends only, and you certainly justify all he can say."She was taking off her hat, and stopped for a moment to look at him thoughtfully, with the soft tendrils of her hair clinging to her forehead. "Did the colonel talk much about me?""A great deal. In fact, I think we talked of nothing else. He has told me of your triumphs and your victims; of your various campaigns and your conquests. And yet I dare say he has not told me all--and I am dying to hear more."She had laid down her hat and unloosed a large bow of her mantle, but stopped suddenly in the midst of it and sat down again.

"I wish you'd do something for me."

"You have only to name it."

"Well, drop all this kind of talk! Try to think of me as if I had just come from California--or, better, as if you had never known anything of me at all--and we met for the first time. You could, Idare say, make yourself very agreeable to such a young lady who was willing to be pleased--why not to me? I venture to say you have not ever troubled yourself about me since we last met. No--hear me through--why, then, should you wish to talk over what didn't concern you at the time? Promise me you will stop this reminiscent gossip, and I promise you I will not only not bore you with it, but take care that it is not intruded upon you by others. Make yourself pleasant to me by talking about yourself and your prospects--anything but ME--and I will throw over those princes and barons that the colonel has raved about and devote myself to you while you are here. Does that suit your Excellency?" She had crossed her knees, and, with her hands clasped over them, and the toe of her small boot advanced beyond her skirt, leaned forward in the attitude he remembered to have seen her take in the summer-house at Rosario.

"Perfectly," he said.

"How long will you be here?"

"About three weeks: that, I believe, is the time allotted for my cure.""Are you really ill," she said quietly, "or imagine yourself so?""It amounts to about the same thing. But my cure may not take so long," he added, fixing his bright eyes upon her.

She returned his gaze thoughtfully, and they remained looking at each other silently.