more often at him with a sort of
interest, and on several occasions had put questions to him through her
brother. Her range of ideas was apparently not extensive, as her
questions always turned upon the same topic--namely, what the women were
like in his country; so that he soon came to know by heart all the
Spanish terms which related to that subject.

They were out on the veranda together that evening, and as she went past
his back while he was leaning over in his seat, she drew her hand as if
by accident lightly through his hair. If it had had the electricity of a
cat's, it would have given out a perfect shower of sparks, so enraged
was he at the advance.

When Federigo came home he flung his hat away angrily on to a chair, and
drank down at a gulp a glass of rum that was standing on the table. He
no longer wore the smart cloak he had on when he went out.

"I have gambled away all your money!" he cried, in English, to Salve, as
if careless of further reticence, and made some remark then with an
unpleasant laugh to his sister, who had evidently by her expression
perceived at once how matters stood.

"There's my last piastre for you," said Salve, throwing it over to him.
"Try your luck with it."

"He is successful in love," said Paolina, tearfully, and with a _naive_
affectation of superstition--"he is engaged."

When her brother, who was balancing the piastre on his forefinger,
laughingly translated what she had said, Salve replied snappishly, with
an impatient glance at the senorita--

"I am not engaged, and never shall be."

"Unsuccessful in love!" she broke out, gleefully; "and the last piastre!
To-morrow we shall win a hundred, two hundred, Federigo!"

It was clearly the conviction of her heart; and she seized a mandolin
and began to dance to her own accompaniment, her eyes resting as she did
so upon Salve with a peculiar expression.

"Quick, Federigo!--why not this evening?" she cried, breaking off
suddenly with a laugh, and throwing the mandolin from her on to the
sofa. "To-morrow his luck may be gone."

She seized her brother's hat, crushed it down upon his head, and pushed
him eagerly out of the door, going with him herself to open the wicket.

She came back then to Salve, and as they sat _tete-a-tete_ in the
lamplit room with doors and windows thrown wide open, the moonlight
gleaming on the dark trees outside, and the night air perfumed with the
scent of flowers, she endeavoured to ingratiate h