t can conceive and actual
experience suggest; and in this way the hideous right angles were
broken with sheds, "lean-to" extensions, until a certain
picturesqueness was given to the irregularity of outline, and a
home-like security and companionship to the congregated buildings. It
typified the former life of the great capitalist, as the tall new house
illustrated the loneliness and isolation that wealth had given him.
But the real points of vantage were the years of cultivation and
habitation that had warmed and enriched the soil, and evoked the
climbing vines and roses that already hid its unpainted boards, rounded
its hard outlines, and gave projection and shadow from the pitiless
glare of a summer's long sun, or broke the steady beating of the winter
rains. It was true that pea and bean poles surrounded it on one side,
and the only access to the house was through the cabbage rows that once
were the pride and sustenance of the Mulradys. It was this fact, more
than any other, that had impelled Mrs. Mulrady to abandon its site; she
did not like to read the history of their humble origin reflected in
the faces of their visitors as they entered.

Don Caesar tied his horse to the fence, and hurriedly approached the
house. The door, however, hospitably opened when he was a few paces
from it, and when he reached the threshold he found himself
unexpectedly in the presence of two pretty girls. They were evidently
Slinn's sisters, whom he had neither thought of nor included in the
meeting he had prepared. In spite of his preoccupation, he felt
himself suddenly embarrassed, not only by the actual distinction of
their beauty, but by a kind of likeness that they seemed to bear to
Mamie.

"We saw you coming," said the elder, unaffectedly. "You are Don Caesar
Alvarado. My brother has spoken of you."

The words recalled Don Caesar to himself and a sense of courtesy. He
was not here to quarrel with these fair strangers at their first
meeting; he must seek Slinn elsewhere, and at another time. The
frankness of his reception and the allusion to their brother made it
appear impossible that they should be either a party to his
disappointment, or even aware of it. His excitement melted away before
a certain lazy ease, which the consciousness of their beauty seemed to
give them. He was able to put a few courteous inquiries, and, thanks
to the paragraph in the "Record," to congratulate them upon their
father's improvement.