owed, and the blood mounted higher in his
wrinkled cheek: but his nephew laid a restraining hand upon his arm,
and, with another laughing speech and a profound bow to Mr. Rivers,
pointed toward the door.

I saw the three of them depart through the passageway that led to the
street entrance. I heard the creak of the hinges, and the clang of the
bars as they fell back into place. Then a strong, sweet odour of crushed
blossoms turned me faint. I loosed my hold of the screening vines and
stepped backward with a sudden struggle for breath.

The woman beside me caught my arm a second time and drew me still
farther away down the moonlit path.

"Is he aught of a swordsman, this fine cavalier of thine?" she demanded,
grasping my shoulder tightly and scanning my face with her scornful
eyes.

Then my senses came to me: I knew what had happened--what was bound to
follow; and I began to speak wildly and to pray her to prevent bloodshed
between them.

I scarce know what I said; but the words poured from my lips, and for
very despair I checked them not. I told her of my orphan state--of that
lone grave in Barbadoes, and the sad young mother who had died of a
broken heart; I spoke of the long, long journey over seas, the love that
had come into my life, and the dreams and the hopes that had filled our
thoughts when we reached the fair, strange shores of this new country;
and I prayed her, as she was a woman and a wife, to let no harm come to
my dear love.

"Ah! madame," I cried, "a face so fair as yours needs not the
championship of one English stranger, who holds already a preference for
blue eyes and yellow hair. I grant you that he has a sorry taste; but
oh! I pray you, stop this duel!"

She loosed her hand from the clasp of mine, and looked at me a moment in
silence; then she laughed bitterly.

"Thou little fool! Thou little blue-eyed fool! What do men see in that
face of thine to move them so? A painter might love thee for the gold of
thy hair, thy white brow, and thy blue eyes,--they would grace a
pictured saint above a shrine,--but for a man's kisses, and such love
as might tempt him to risk his very life for thee,--_cielos_! it is more
than passing strange." Then, as I stood dumb before her, she tapped me
lightly on the cheek. "Go to! Art such a fool as to think that _either_
sword will be drawn for _my_ beauty's sake?"

CHAPTER VIII.

That night I had but little sleep.

About an hour after midnight there