talking about?" he said, convinced at last that the
Cuban had really something to say, and that their usual tactics would
not do this time. He had understood not a word of the long Spanish
sentences, for Garda's name, which might have thrown some light upon
them, had been scrupulously left unspoken by this punctilious suitor,
who had used the third person throughout, alluding to her solely as the
descendant of her ancestors, and, as such, a "consort" who would be
accepted by his own.

Torres watched while the Doctor walked about the room, trying to think
of something which should act as interpreter; he paused at pen and paper
on the writing-table; but written Spanish was no clearer to him than
spoken. At last, with a sudden inspiration, he took down a dictionary.
"Here," he said, "find the words you want." And he thrust the Spanish
half upon the grave young man.

But Torres recoiled; he could not possibly make a "school exercise," he
declared, of his most sacred aspirations.

The Doctor, exasperated, pried the words out of him one by one, and then
himself, with spectacles on, looked them out, or tried to, in the
dictionary. But progress was slow; Torres' sentences contained much
circumlocution, and he would not give the infinitives of his verbs when
the Doctor asked for them, considering it beneath his dignity to lend
himself in any way to such a childish performance. At length, after much
effort, suddenly the Doctor got at his meaning. "You ridiculous idiot!"
he said, throwing the dictionary down with a slam (for he had had to
work hard, and the print was fine), "you make 'an Alliance,' indeed!
Alliance! Why, you're two years under age yourself, and haven't done
growing yet, not to speak of your having nothing in the world to offer a
wife that I know of--except your impudence, which is colossal, I grant!
Go home and play with your top. When you're a man, you can come back and
talk of it--if you like; at present face about, go home and play with
your top!"

Torres, of course, could not comprehend these injunctions. But he could
comprehend the Doctor's opening the door for him; and, with respect
unbroken, he formally took leave. He walked down the side street, and
looked mechanically at the sign again; but he could not translate it any
more than he could the Doctor's last sentence, whose words he carried
carefully in his memory. He went back to his boat, and was rowed in
state again down the shining water.

"My au