once a month, and you will have a
little more for your poor--one cannot have too much for them."

"I am simply petrified," murmured Pilar, "that you can take such a
thing into consideration?"

"It is the one condition on which I stay here," returned Wilhelm firmly.

"What a dreadful proud boy you are! You will not accept a thing from
me, and I told you yesterday that I would never be too proud to share
your possessions with you. And if you had married me, you would no
doubt have scorned to touch my dowry, and wanted to pay me for your
board too."

"Dear heart, I imagine the question is settled between us, and never to
be discussed again. I simply cannot live free of expense in the house
of my--"

"Your wife," she broke in hastily.

"Of my--wife."

"Very well," she said, resigning herself, "you must have your own way,
I suppose. But explain to me, my Teutonic philosopher, how comes it
that so high-bred a body and so noble a mind can contain a corner
holding such a tradesman's idea? How can one make these commonplace
calculations when one is in love? Are you Germans all like that, or is
it an inherited weakness in your family?"

"In my family," he answered simply, and without a trace of bitterness,
"as far back as I know of (though that is certainly not anything like
as far as your ancestor, the first knight of San Iago), we have always
worked for our living, and owed all to our own industry. I am the first
who found the table ready spread for him, and who knows if it has been
an advantage to me."

"Now you are making fun of my ancestors, you disagreeable man--when did
I ever say such a silly thing?"

"I never said you did, but you asked an explanation of the German
philosopher, and the German philosopher has done his best to give you
one."

She locked her pocketbook in the cabinet again, and there the matter
ended between them.

The rest of the household, which seemed to accept the establishing of
the new guest without the faintest surprise, consisted, beside Anne, of
the man-servant Auguste, a young, knowing-looking southern Frenchman,
with a clean-shaven, lackey's face, the old Spanish cook Isabel, a
colossal, unwieldly, hippopotamus-like person with a red nose, watery,
bloodshot eyes, and a strident voice, and Don Pablo, who seemed to be a
mixture of servant, major-domo, and the confidential attendant of the
old plays. Pilar esteemed him highly, and always spoke of him in terms
of respect. According