e palace
windows, after which the band and its guards left briskly to the
measure of a quickstep. Charles led the way through the crowd to the
Prado and the Parque Isabel. A number of carriages were there before
them, the occupants mostly eating ices, and the cafe was being rapidly
filled. Waiting keen-eyed at the entrance, they saw the volante with
La Clavel before it drew up, and the calesero had scarcely dismounted
from his horse when the dancer was offered her choice of the available
sweets. She preferred, rather than an ice, an orchata, and sipped it
slowly with an air of complete enjoyment. Her every movement, Charles
Abbott saw, the turn of the hand holding the glass, her chin and
throat against the black film of lace, her slender body's poise, was
utterly and strongly graceful: it was, more than any other quality,
the vigor of her beauty that impressed him. It seemed as though she
must be superbly young, and dance magnificently, forever.

As Charles was considering this he was unceremoniously thrust aside
for the passage of Captain Santacilla with another cavalry officer
whose cinnamon colored face was stamped with sultry ill-humor.
Santacilla addressed the dancer aggressively with the query of why she
misspent her evening with the cursed Cuban negroes.

* * * * *

La Clavel made no reply, but tended her empty glass to Andres; then
she glanced indifferently at the captains. "Their manners," she said,
"are very pretty; and as for the negro--" she shrugged her delectable
shoulders.

"My blood is as pure, as Castilian, as your own," Tirso Labrador began
hotly; but Remigio stilled him with a hand on his arm. In an uncolored
voice he begged the dancer to excuse them; and, sweeping off their
hats, they were leaving when Santacilla's companion stepped forward in
a flash of ungoverned anger like an exposed knife:

"I've noticed you before," he addressed Tirso, "hanging and gabbling
around the cafes and theatres, and it's my opinion you are an
insurrectionist. If the truth were known, I dare say, it would be
found you are a friend to Cespedes. Anyhow, I'm tired of looking at
you; if you are not more retiring, you will find yourself in the
Cabanas."

"Good evening," Remigio repeated in an even tone. With his hand still
on Tirso's arm he tried to force him into the cafe; but the other,
dark with passion, broke away.

"You have dishonored my father and the name of a heroic patriot," h