ter would be one hundred dollars a year each, and
that he would pay no bills. Ah Kee, who had lived with him for twenty
years, would attend to the domestic supplies. Then he ordered his meals
brought to the office, and shut himself up.

On the third day Mrs. Polk said to Magdalena,--

"Si I stay in this house one day more, I go mad, no less. Is like the
dungeons in the Mission. _Madre de Dios!_ and you living like this for
years, perhaps; for Roberto grow more crank all the time. Come with me.
I no think he know."

"You may be sure that he knows everything. And I cannot leave them.
Shall you go back to Santa Barbara? Don't you want to travel?"

"_Dios de mi alma_; no! I think I go to die on that treep from Santa
Barbara--so jolt. I am too old to travel. Once I think I like see Spain;
but now I only want be comfortable. Well, si you change the mind and
come sometime, I am delight. But I go now: feel like I am old flower
wither up, without the sun."

XXVI

Mrs. Polk's large white face and throat had seemed to shed a measure of
light in the dark house; when she left, the gloom seemed to get down and
sit on one. Helena refused to enter by the front door, and lamenting
that she was too big to climb the pillar, paid her visits by way of the
kitchen and back stairs.

After the calls of condolence visitors came more and more rarely to the
Yorba house. They said it depressed them for days after, and that while
there they sat in mortal terror of hearing Don Roberto burst out of his
den with the yell of a maniac. And as for dear Mrs. Yorba and Magdalena,
they never had had much to say, but now they had nothing. They would not
drop off altogether, for the old don was bound to follow his
brother-in-law in course of time, and then his widow would once more be
a useful member of society. Mrs. Montgomery, Mrs. Geary, and Mrs.
Cartright were more faithful than the others, but the affections Mrs.
Yorba had inspired during her long and distinguished sojourn in San
Francisco were not very deep and warm.

The girls were sorry for Magdalena, and called frequently, conquering
their horror of the gloomy echoing house; but they had less to endure
than their elders, for they were received in Magdalena's own
sitting-room, which, although sparsely and tastelessly furnished, was
always as cheerful as the weather would permit. They brought her all the
gossip of the outside world, discussed the new novels with her, and
occasionally