n grove while Fergus,
disfiguring himself with an ugly frown, was waltzing with the
claybank girl. Before we returned I had permission to come to her
window in the _patio_ the next evening at midnight and talk some
more.

"Oh, it was easy enough. In two weeks Anabela was engaged to me, and
Fergus was out. He took it calm, for a handsome man, and told me he
wasn't going to give in.

"'Talk may be all right in its place, Judson,' he says to me,
'although I've never thought it worth cultivating. But,' says he,
'to expect mere words to back up successfully a face like yours in a
lady's good graces is like expecting a man to make a square meal on
the ringing of a dinner-bell.'

"But I haven't begun on the story I was going to tell you yet.

"One day I took a long ride in the hot sunshine, and then took a
bath in the cold waters of a lagoon on the edge of the town before
I'd cooled off.

"That evening after dark I called at the alcalde's to see Anabela. I
was calling regular every evening then, and we were to be married in
a month. She was looking like a bulbul, a gazelle, and a tea-rose,
and her eyes were as soft and bright as two quarts of cream skimmed
off from the Milky Way. She looked at my rugged features without
any expression of fear or repugnance. Indeed, I fancied that I saw
a look of deep admiration and affection, such as she had cast at
Fergus on the plaza.

"I sat down, and opened my mouth to tell Anabela what she loved
to hear--that she was a trust, monopolizing all the loveliness of
earth. I opened my mouth, and instead of the usual vibrating words
of love and compliment, there came forth a faint wheeze such as
a baby with croup might emit. Not a word--not a syllable--not an
intelligible sound. I had caught cold in my laryngeal regions when
I took my injudicious bath.

"For two hours I sat trying to entertain Anabela. She talked a
certain amount, but it was perfunctory and diluted. The nearest
approach I made to speech was to formulate a sound like a clam
trying to sing 'A Life on the Ocean Wave' at low tide. It seemed
that Anabela's eyes did not rest upon me as often as usual. I had
nothing with which to charm her ears. We looked at pictures and she
played the guitar occasionally, very badly. When I left, her parting
manner seemed cool--or at least thoughtful.

"This happened for five evenings consecutively.

"On the sixth day she ran away with Fergus McMahan.

"It was known that they fled in a