an,
but one who had worked consistently and steadily for a cause all through
his life. He was too much in earnest to consider effect or heed danger.

"I am not on the winning side, but I am sure that I am on the right one,"
he had once said in public. And the speech went the round of Spain.

After he had finished luncheon he spoke of taking his leave, and asked if
he might be allowed to congratulate Marcos on his escape.

"It should be a warning to him," he went on, "not to ride at night. To do
so is to court mishap in these narrow mountain roads."

"Yes," said Sarrion, slowly.

"Will his nurse allow me to see him?" asked the visitor.

"His nurse is Juanita. I will go and ask her," replied Sarrion, looking
round him quite openly to make sure that there were no letters lying
about on the tables of the terrace that Mon might be tempted to read in
his absence.

He hurried to Marcos' room. Marcos was out of bed. He was dressing, with
the help of his servant and the visitor from the mountains. With a quick
gesture, Marcos indicated the open window, through which the sound of any
exclamation might easily reach the ear of Evasio Mon.

"Juanita has gone," he said, in French. "Read that note. It is his doing,
of course."

"I know now," wrote Juanita, "why you were afraid of my growing up. But I
am grown up--and I have found out why you married me."

"I knew it would come sooner or later," said Marcos, who winced as he
drew his sleeve over his injured arm. He was very quiet and collected, as
people usually are in face of a long anticipated danger which when it
comes at last brings with it a dull sense of relief.

Sarrion made no reply. Perhaps he, too, had anticipated this moment. A
girl is a closed book. Neither knew what might be written in the hidden
pages of Juanita's heart.

A crisis usually serves to accentuate the weakness or strength of a man's
character. Marcos was intensely practical at this moment--more practical
than ever. He had only one thought--the thought that filled his
life--which was Juanita's welfare. If he could not make her happy he
could, at all events, shield her from harm. He could stand between her
and the world.

"She can only have gone down the valley," he said, continuing to speak in
French, which was a second mother tongue to him. "She must have gone to
Sor Teresa. He has induced her to go by some trick. He would not dare to
send her anywhere else."

"I heard a carriage cross the bri