Was it a possibility that Marcia, Marcia, might be the heiress of the great Mariposa estate? The owner, or one of the owners of it? He felt overcome by the bare mental suggestion. But was it a possibility, even a dim and remote one? Accepting this as a temporary hypothesis, was it not borne out by certain facts? The butterflies, for instance. Did not those jeweled ornaments symbolize in some delicate, fanciful way, Marcia's way, her ownership of The Veiled Mariposa? And would not that ownership also account for the much-questioned source of her wealth? He stopped with a jerk up against a dead wall. The Mariposa mine had not been worked for years; the ranches were cultivated only by the Spaniard in possession. These facts were like a dash of cold water, extinguishing the flame of his hopes. And yet, and yet, the butterflies! But that, he was forced to admit, might be the merest coincidence.

On that chain of evidence he would find it necessary to regard his cousin, Kitty Hampton, Mrs. Habersham, the London actress, a score of women, as possible owners of his Golconda. Nevertheless, in spite of reason, he could not escape the conviction, unfounded but persistent, that those butterflies were in some way connected with the ownership of that distant lost mine. And this purely intuitive belief was suddenly strengthened by the remembrance of Marcia's embarrassment in the Park, an hour or two before, when she had involuntarily and inadvertently spoken of Mademoiselle Mariposa familiarly as Ydo.

"Yes, Mrs. Oldham, I quite agree with you. As you say: 'One can not be too careful.' Oh, no, I never was more interested in my life."

Ydo! Ydo! He took up the thread of his absorbing reflections again as Mrs. Oldham's voice purled on reciting with infinite detail all the data of one of her Helen-like conquests. Ydo! What bond could exist between the reserved, even haughty Marcia in spite of all her gentleness, and the capricious, wayward, challenging Ydo? A bond sufficiently strong to permit the affectionate familiarity of first names? He had from the beginning believed that Ydo had some interest in the property, although he had never been able satisfactorily to guess the nature of it. But Marcia! The mere possibility of her being interested in what Ydo merrily called his Eldorado had never struck him before, and his brain was bewildered by the thousand new trains of conjecture it started.

At this point his reflections were broken in upon by the entrance of Marcia herself. She was all in white with the big, ruby-eyed butterfly on her bosom, and the chain of butterflies about her throat. She looked more radiant than he had ever seen her as she stood before them drawing on her long gloves. Her eyes, no longer sad with all regret, were like deep blue stars, and her smile was full of a soft and girlish happiness.

"You look very well, Marcia," said her mother critically. "A new gown, of course. How differently they are cutting the skirts!"

"It's a lovely gown," affirmed Hayden, smiling down into Marcia's eyes. "After all, a simple white frock is the prettiest thing a woman can wear."

"Simple!" Mrs. Oldham's mirth was high and satiric. "Isn't that like a man? Simple is the last word to be applied to Marcia's frocks, Mr. Hayden. It's a good thing, as I often tell her, that her father left us so well provided for."

The lovely happiness vanished from Marcia's eyes. She looked quickly at her mother with an almost frightened expression, and then, with eyelashes lowered on her cheek, went silently on drawing on her gloves, two or three tense little lines showing about her mouth.

"I think Miss Oldham is very unkind," said Hayden, with some idea of bridging the situation gracefully, "never to have shown me any of her pictures. She paints, paints all day long, and yet will not give one a glimpse of the results. Kitty Hampton has been promising to show me some of the water-colors she has, but she has not yet done so."

"Have you been talking much to Mr. Hayden of your pictures, Marcia?" asked her mother suavely.

The tone was pleasant, even casual, and yet, Hayden, sensitive, intuitive, had a quick, shocked sense of having blundered egregiously; and worse, he had a further sense of Mrs. Oldham's words being fraught with some ugly and hidden meaning. In her voice there had been manifest an unsuspected quality which had revealed her for the moment as not all frivolous fool or spoiled and empty-headed doll; but a tyrant and oppressor, crueller and more menacing because infinitely weak and unstable.

Marcia did not reply at all to her mother's question, but with her lashes still downcast, continued to button her gloves; and Hayden stood, miserably uncomfortable for a moment, and then was forced to doubt the correctness of his swift, unpleasant impression; for Mrs. Oldham observed in her usual petulant, inconsequent tones:

"I don't know that I like that necklace with that frock, Marcia. Your turquoises would look better. I do get so tired of always seeing you with some kind of a butterfly ornament. You never showed the slightest interest in butterflies before your father died, and you don't, in the least, suggest a butterfly. I can not understand it."

"Don't try, mother dear," said Marcia. "Good-by." She kissed the orchid and gray lady lightly on the top of the head. "Have a good time with your Hamburg grapes and your last new novel."

She slipped her arms through the long white coat Hayden held for her and, followed by him, left the room.

"Marcia, dear, sweet Marcia," he coaxed, as they whirled through the streets in her electric brougham. "I'm sure, almost dead sure, it's going to be a nice, well-baked, plum-y cake. If it is won't you promise to eat it with me? You know you didn't definitely promise this afternoon, and I never could stand uncertainty."

"No," she said positively, drawing her hand away from his, "I will not. I will never give you a definite answer until you offer me a share in the cake, no matter how it turns out in the baking."

"How can I?" he groaned. "You do not know what sort of a life it would be, the hardships, the deprivations, the necessarily long separations when I would have to be in some place utterly impossible for you, for months at a time. It's the very abomination of desolation. And fancy your trying to adapt yourself to it! You, used to this!" rapping the electric. "And this, and this!" touching lightly the ermine on her cloak and the jewels at her throat. "No." He shook his head doggedly. "I won't. I know what it means and you do not. Lovely butterfly"—the tenderness of his voice stirred her heart-strings—"do you think that I could bear to see you beaten to earth, your bright wings torn and faded by the cruel storms? Never. But," with one of his quick, mercurial changes of mood, "it's an alternative that we do not have to face. For it's coming out all right in the baking—that cake. The most beautiful cake you ever saw, Marcia, with a rich, brown crust, and more plums than you ever dreamed of in a cake before."



CHAPTER XI

"Bobby," said Kitty Hampton one evening as they sat alone together in her drawing-room, "things are slow, deadly slow. Why do not you do something to amuse your little cousin?"

"My little cousin has far more amusement than is good for her as it is," returned Hayden. "But while you're mentioning this, let me say that I am anxious to evince some appreciation of all the hospitality you and Mrs. Habersham and one or two others have shown me; but I don't know just what to do."

Kitty sat up with a marked accession of interest in her expression and attitude. "Dear me! There are quantities of things you could do," she said. "But, Bobby, do get out of the beaten track; try to think of something original. Of course, it's all nonsense, about feeling under obligation to any one for so-called hospitality, but there is no reason why you should not provide some fun. Now, what shall it be?"

"Anything you say," remarked Hayden amiably. "To tell the truth, Kitty, I've been intending to ask you just what I should do. What can you suggest?"

"It requires thought." Kitty spoke seriously. "But be assured of this: I'm not going to suggest any of the same old things. If you want something really delightful and have a desire to have us truly enjoy ourselves you must have just a few congenial people. Better make it a dinner, I think. That is it. A dinner at your apartment," catching joyously at this idea, "with some original, clever features."

"I thought whatever it was"—Hayden had reddened perceptibly—"I'd like it to be—a—a—compliment, in a way, to Miss Oldham."

"I do not doubt it." Kitty surveyed him with amused eyes.

"I always think of her in connection with the butterflies she wears so much. Would it be a possibility to carry the butterfly idea out in some way?" he asked.

Kitty clapped her hands. She was all animation and enthusiasm now. The habitual, sulky-little-boy expression had quite vanished from her face. "Beautiful! Just the idea! You couldn't have thought of a better one. The butterfly lady has had a great fascination for you, hasn't she, Bobby?"

"Which one?" he asked quickly.

"Which one? Hear that!" His cousin apostrophized space. "Why, I was thinking of Marcia, of course."

He smiled a little and became momentarily lost in reverie, his chin in the palm of his hand, and dreaming thus, Kitty's old French drawing-room and Kitty herself, her blond prettiness accentuated and enhanced by the delicate pinks and blues of her gown, vanished, and Marcia seemed to stand before him all in black and silver as he had seen her recently at a ball, with violets, great purple violets, falling below the shining butterfly on her breast, her sweet and wistful smile curving her lips and her eyes full of light and happiness.

"Bobby, come back!" Kitty touched him petulantly on the arm. "You've been a million miles away, and you looked so selfishly happy that I feel all shivery and out in the cold."

"Kitty," he said, "I will confess, when I said, 'Which one?' I was thinking not only of Miss Oldham, but of the other butterfly lady—the Mariposa. You know Mariposa means butterfly. Well, it is really the Mariposa who fascinates me."

"Bobby! What on earth do you mean?" Kitty's expression was a mixture of Disappointment and indignation.

"Just what I say. The Mariposa fascinates me; but, Kitty," his face softening, "I love the fairy princess with all my heart. I have loved her from the first moment I saw her."

"How dear! I have thought so, hoped so, for some time." Her face was all aglow. "But you frightened me dreadfully, just now. I was afraid you had gone over to Mademoiselle Mariposa like Wilfred Ames. He is crazy about her, simply crazy. I did not know he could be crazy over anything, except the chance of tearing off to some impossible spot to shoot big game."

"Wilfred Ames! Crazy about the Mariposa!" exclaimed Hayden incredulously; and then he paused, remembering that it was but recently that he had met Ames at the door of Ydo's apartment.

"Yes." Kitty was sulky again. "It's true. And I wanted him for Marcia. But Marcia was stupid about it and always laughed at the idea. Horace Penfield says that he has completely swerved from his allegiance to Marcia. Just fancy how his mother will behave now. Good for her, I say. But, Bobby, have you told Marcia?"

"Yes. I couldn't help it, Kitty, but it wasn't fair. I had no right to say a word until I know how things are going to turn out with me and that, thank Heaven, will be settled in a day or so." He drew a long sigh.

"Bobby," Kitty was looking at him curiously, and a rather hard abruptness had crept into her tone, "has she, Marcia, told you anything about these?" She touched the butterflies clasped about her throat.

"No." He shook his head. "But I believe I have guessed their significance. And it has made me happier than I can tell you. It has made me feel that our interests are one, as if Destiny had intended us for each other."

"I'm sure I don't see why it should," she said shortly, looking at him in a bewildered, disapproving way. "I didn't know you were that kind. It sounds awfully self-seeking. I do not believe you've guessed right." Her face brightened. "That is it. You've got some idea into your head, and it's evidently far from the correct one. You wouldn't be the Bobby I know if it were."

"Then tell me what the correct one is," he coaxed. "If I am on the wrong track, set me on the right one."

"Not I," she returned firmly. "The thing for us to decide is just what sort of a dinner you are going to have. You want some really interesting features. I insist on that."

He threw wide his arms. "I give you carte blanche, here and now, Kitty. All that I insist on are the butterfly effects. Beyond that, I leave everything in your hands; but I must have them."

Kitty's eyes gleamed with pleasure. She loved to manage other people's affairs. "I'll see to them," she affirmed. "Just give me a little time to think them up. What shall we have afterward? Some music?"

"So commonplace," he objected, "and the place is too small."

"Yes-s-s," she reluctantly agreed. "And you don't want very many people. Just our own especial little group."

"It will have to be small," he warned her. "My quarters do not admit of anything very extensive."

"Whom shall we have?" Mrs. Hampton began to count on her fingers. "The Habershams, and Edith Symmes, and Horace Penfield, and Warren and myself, and Marcia, and Wilfred Ames, and yourself." She paused, a look of dismay overspreading her face. "We'll have to have another woman. Who on earth shall it be?"

"A butterfly dinner without the Mariposa would seem like Hamlet with the Prince left out, wouldn't it?" suggested Hayden.

"Oh!" Kitty gasped joyously. "Mademoiselle Mariposa! Do, do, invite her. What fun! Do you think she will come? You know Marcia knows her, but she will not talk about her ever, because, she says, Mademoiselle Mariposa has requested her not to. So she will not say where and how she met her. Mean thing! Of course, I've only seen her in her little mask and mantilla. You do not suppose she would wear them to a dinner, do you? I am dying to see her without them. Horace Penfield knows her very well and he says she is very beautiful and deliciously odd. If it enters into her head to do anything she just does it, no matter what it is. And extravagant!" Kitty lifted her eyes and hands at once. "They say that her jewels and frocks are almost unbelievable. Why, one day when she was reading my palm, I noticed that her gown was drawn up a little on one side, and showed her petticoat beneath, with ruffles of Mechlin, real Mechlin on it. Some people say that she is a Spanish princess, or something of the kind—so eccentric that she tells fortunes just for the fun of it. Oh, Bobby, do, do get her."

"When shall we have this dinner?" asked Hayden, with apparent irrelevance.

Kitty thought quickly. "Give me ten days to decide upon things and have my orders carried out."

"Very good. Ten days. Let me see, that will be Tuesday of week after next. Do you think the rest will come?"

"Of course they will come. They would break any other engagement to meet Mademoiselle Mariposa."

"Then I will find out now if she will come, if you will allow me to use your telephone."

He was lucky enough to find Ydo at home; but when he informed her that he was giving a dinner for a few friends on Tuesday, ten days away, and that he earnestly desired her presence, she demurred.

"What are you doing this evening?" he asked.

"Nothing," she answered, "and I am bored."

"Then jump into your electric and come here to my cousin's, Mrs. Warren Hampton's, as fast as you can," he said audaciously.

"How do you know she wants me? You are taking a great deal on yourself."

For answer Hayden handed the receiver to Kitty, who had followed him out and now stood at his shoulder listening breathlessly to every word. "Mademoiselle is in doubt of your eagerness to see her," he said.

"Oh, please come," urged Kitty through the telephone. "Waste no time."

"I will be with you in twenty minutes," said Ydo sweetly.

Back in the drawing-room, Kitty was too excited to remain quietly in her chair, but danced about expressing her delight at the prospect of at last seeing the Mariposa sans mask and mantilla.

"Tell me, Bobby," she insisted, "is she really so eccentric?"

"I fancy she does exactly as she pleases, always," he replied.

"And extravagant? Warren says no one could be more extravagant than I."

"She is a dreamer," he averred, "a dreamer who dreams true. Her ideas are so vivid that she insists on seeing them in tangible form. I don't believe she particularly counts the cost or the base material means by which these things must be accomplished."

"Fancy!" sighed Kitty. "Oh, I do hope she will wear one of her stunning gowns and some of those marvelous jewels they say she possesses, set in the most wonderful, quaint ways, Horace Penfield says. But surely she will."

"I think it likely," agreed Robert amiably.

"And is she very clever and interesting?" continued Kitty.

"She is herself," said Hayden. "I can not describe her any other way. She may strike you as a bit staccato and stilted sometimes; but it is natural to her. She is always herself."

There was a faint sound of a curtain before the door being pushed aside, but this, Kitty and Hayden, absorbed in their conversation, had not heard, and now, Mrs. Hampton turned with a stifled scream to see a stranger, a Gipsy, standing almost at her elbow.

"Pretty lady!" The English was more deliciously broken than ever, and so cajoling was the whisper that it would have coaxed the birds off the trees and wheedled money from the stingiest pocket. "Pretty lady, let me tell your fortune. Cross my palm with silver. 'Tis the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter who asks you."

Kitty looked from the Gipsy to Robert in bewilderment. This was not the dazzling figure in gauzes and satins and jewels she had expected, a capricious lady of a foreign and Southern nobility, whose whimsical and erratic fancy was occasionally amused by a change of role. This was a daughter of the long, brown path, who afoot and light-hearted took naturally to the open road, with the tanned cheek, white teeth, and merry eyes of her kind.

And yet, if not the glittering vision Kitty had anticipated, Ydo was a sufficiently vivid and picturesque figure. Her short corduroy skirt had faded with wear and washing to a pale fawn-tint with a velvety bloom upon it; her brown boots were high and laced, her blue blouse had faded like her skirt to a soft and lovely hue. A red sash confined her waist, a handkerchief of the same color was knotted loosely about her throat, while a yellow scarf was tied about her head and fell in long ends down her back.

Kitty immediately recovered from the shock she had experienced at the unheralded advent of the strange visitor and endeavored to make up in warmth of greeting for the surprise she had shown.

"Forgive me, instead," said Ydo, with charming penitence. "But I was the Gipsy to-night in heart and feeling. I had to put on these. Oh," throwing herself into a chair, "I have suffered to-day. It has been coming on for days. Ennui. Do you know it, pretty lady? And the longing for mine own people."

"Your people are not in this country, are they?" asked Kitty politely.

The Mariposa drew her brows together in a little puzzled frown. "My people!" she repeated. "Oh," with dawning comprehension, "you mean relatives. I," with a short laugh, "I said mine own people. You," turning to Robert, "you understand. One of the greatest, most searching questions ever asked, and which must finally be answered by each of us from the promptings of his own heart, is: 'Who is my brother and my sister?' Ah, I shall soon take to the road again. If I could only go now!"

"To find your own people," asked Kitty timidly.

"One does not seek one's own," said Ydo disdainfully. "One does not 'scour the seas nor sift mankind a poet or a friend to find.' He comes, and you know him because he is a poor Greek like yourself. Dear lady"—she broke into one of her airy rushes of laughter—"in spite of your smiles and all the self-control of a careful social training, you are the picture of bewilderment. See, you can keep no secrets from the fortune-teller. You can not place me. Why do you try? I refused to be announced and mine was the fate of the listener. Brutus there is an honorable man who admits that I am extravagant, even if he condones it. Ah, madame, money is not wealth, it is a base counterfeit, a servant whom I bid to exchange itself for beauty. These"—she stripped the petals from a red rose in a vase near her, and tossed them in the air—"these are the real wealth of the world. And Brutus says I am stilted, exaggerated in my conversation, given to metaphor and hyperbole. That is because I dare to express what I feel, and since everywhere I see parables I voice them. Why not?

"And Brutus says I am eccentric, admitting that I dare to be myself; and to dare to be one's self, dear lady, is to dare everything. We are afraid of life, of love, of sorrow and joy, of everything. This fear of life is universal."

"And you, are you never afraid?" asked Kitty.

"Of what?" laughed the Gipsy. "Let me tell you a secret; and oh, madame, wear it next your heart, guard it. 'Tis a talisman against fear. The lions are always chained. Believe me, it is so. But our conversation is of a seriousness! Mr. Hayden spoke of a dinner."

"Yes, and he's given me permission to do just as I choose," said Kitty. "So it's got to be a success—"

"And she's trying to say," interrupted Hayden, "that it couldn't possibly be a success without you."

"Of course I am," agreed Kitty, "only I should have put it less bluntly."

"Wait! I have an inspiration." Ydo thought a moment. "I will not come to the dinner. We can make it much more effective than that. Ah, listen!" waving her hands to quell their protests. "Let me appear, later in the evening, in my professional capacity and tell the past, present and future of your guests. Yes, I will come in mask and mantilla, The Veiled Mariposa," with a dramatic gesture, a quick twinkle of the eyes toward Hayden. "I assure you, it will be far more interesting so."



"There is really no doubt about that," said Kitty thoughtfully, and together they silenced Robert's eloquent plea that the dinner would fall flat unless Ydo was one of the guests.

"It is settled, and I must go." The Mariposa spoke decisively. "I shall go home and make Eunice play for me, and perhaps I shall dance off some of my restlessness."

"Oh, dance for us," begged Kitty. "I will play for you, and you see that the piano is so placed that I can watch you at the same time. What shall I play? Some Spanish dances?"

Ydo, full of the spirit of the thing, considered. "I think I will show you a pretty little dance I learned down in South America."

"South America!" Hayden started as if he had received an electric shock.

Perhaps a heightened color glowed on Mademoiselle Mariposa's cheek; but she gave no further sign of perturbation. "Yes," she answered carelessly, "I have lived there, in one place or another. Any one of those Spanish dances will do, Mrs. Hampton. Watch my steps. They are peculiar and very pretty."

As she stood there swaying like a flower in a breeze, it was, to Hayden's fancy, as if he had never seen color before. Kitty in her pinks and blues was a gay little figure; her drawing-room was a rich and sumptuously decorated apartment, but under the spell of the Mariposa's "woven paces and weaving hands," Mrs. Hampton appeared a mere Dresden statuette, the tapestried and frescoed walls became a pale and evanescent background, and Ydo alone, dancing, focused in herself all light and beauty; nay, she herself was the pride of life, the rhythm of motion, the glory of color.

On and on she danced and Hayden, watching, dreamed dreams and saw visions. She was the Mariposa floating over a field of flowers, scarlet and white poppies, opening and closing its gorgeous wings in the hot sunshine; she was a snow-flake whirled from the heart of a winter storm; she was an orchid swaying in the breeze; she was a thistledown drifting through the grasses.

Then, at the height of her spells she stopped and laughingly cast herself into a chair.

"Oh!" Kitty was breathless with admiration. "Oh, why, why, when you can dance like that, do you tell fortunes?"

"There's a reason," Ydo quoted, with a little toss of her head toward Hayden. "That is exactly the answer I made your cousin once before. And, oh, senor, apropos of that reason, I have a conference arranged for you to-morrow afternoon at four o'clock at my apartment. I almost forgot to tell you. I meant to have telephoned."

Hayden's face flushed with pleasure. "Really?" he cried. "You really have the people together. Oh," with a long sigh, "it is good news. Suspense does wear on me, senorita." He spoke half humorously, but with an underlying seriousness.

"It will soon be over," encouraged Ydo. "Then, until Tuesday night, ten days hence, au revoir, madame; and until to-morrow at four o'clock, au revoir, senor. Good luck for ever be on this house! In it I have forgotten temporarily my wanderlust. Good-by."



CHAPTER XII

With his heart high with hope, Hayden lost no time in taking his way to Ydo's apartment the next afternoon. It was Sunday, a day on which she received no clients, and the maid showed him into neither the consulting- nor reception-rooms, but in a small library beyond them which was evidently a part of her private suite.

In coloring the room suggested the soft wood tones that Ydo loved, greens and browns and russets harmoniously blended. The walls were lined with book-cases, crowded with books, a great and solacing company: Montaigne, Kipling, Emerson, Loti, Kant, Cervantes. These caught Hayden's eye as he took the chair Mademoiselle Mariposa indicated. There were roses, deep red roses in tall vases, and the breeze from the half-opened window blew their fragrance in delicious gusts about the room.

"'The rose-wind blowing from the South,'" quoted Hayden smilingly as he clasped the hand Ydo extended to him from the depths of her chair. Then, clapping his hand to his heart, he bowed exaggeratedly before her. "Senorita, I throw my heart at your feet."

"It did not touch the ground, senor. I caught and am holding it for a ransom," she answered, with the same elaborate and formal courtesy.

He shrugged his shoulders disdainfully. "It is not worthy a ransom, senorita. I beg you, if you will pardon my presumption in offering so beggarly a gift, to deign to keep it."

"Senor, you overwhelm me. It is I who am unworthy to receive so priceless a token, and only upon one condition can I do so, and that condition is, that you will in return accept mine."

They both laughed like children at play, and Hayden again threw himself in the easy chair and took one of the cigarettes Ydo pushed toward him.

"Well, gallant knight, who have found Eldorado," she said, "I have a disappointment in store for you. One of the rightful heirs has suddenly been called away on business and will not be in town for ten days or so, but he will communicate with me immediately upon his return and I shall wave my wand, in other words, take down the telephone receiver and summon you to a conference."

"He!" Hayden felt a sharp sense of disappointment. Then, after all, Marcia was not the sole owner, even if she were one at all. He wondered impatiently why he clung so tenaciously to that idea. Her father had probably never bought the property, or if he had, it had, no doubt, passed entirely out of her hands.

"Senorita," he implored, "do tell me who these owners are; how many of them are there—something, at least, about them. It is only fair to me, do you not think so? What possible reasons are there for secrecy and mystery?"

"He asks me, a professional fortune-teller, to discard secrecy and mystery!" cried the Mariposa. "Who ever heard the like? No. I have my own reasons for conducting this affair in my own particular and peculiar way, and, as far as I can see, senor, there is nothing for you to do but acquiesce. But listen! 'Tis the professional voice of Mademoiselle Mariposa which you hear now. Do not fear. You may set your house in order and do your wooing with an easy mind. It is all over. Poor brother of the road, you have found Eldorado and won Cinderella. Ah, the cruel gods!" She lifted her eyes to the ceiling.

"Won Cinderella!" He wondered sharply how much she knew, if anything, and decided she was probably speaking on the authority of recent rumor gleaned from Horace Penfield.

"You seem to imply that the gods are offering me nectar in a hemlock cup."

She nodded several times, each nod becoming more emphatic.

"Ah, happy he who gains not The love some seem to gain."

"Senorita," he protested politely, "your hyperbole is no doubt fraught with wisdom, but it is a wisdom beyond my dense understanding."

"You've forgotten," she replied. "'Twas a lesson we learned 'when you were a tadpole and I was a fish,' It is a bit of wisdom that lies deep in our hearts; but we shrink from it and refuse to heed it, clinging blindly to our illusions."

"You always moralize so unpleasantly." He looked so desperate that she laughed her silver, ringing laughter that shook the rose-petals from their calyxes.

"Well, to change the subject, when you have Cinderella and Eldorado what are you going to do with them?"

"Enjoy life!"

"Child! The rashest of statements! Life resents nothing so much as taking her for granted. When she hears her mariners cry: 'Clear sailing now,' she invariably tosses them a storm. When they exclaim with relief: 'a quiet port,' she laughs in her sleeve and presents them with quicksand. Now I will tell you something, prophesy, without crystal, your palm or any astrological charts. See, I am always the fortune-teller. Listen." Her voice sank into deep, rich tones. "On your throne in Eldorado, with Cinderella beside you in her gold crown, there will come a day, an hour, when in the twinkling of an eye, all the shimmer, the shine, the purple and gold, the pomp and pride will grow dim before your eyes, and fade quite away, and you will see instead the long, brown path with the pines on either side marching up the hillside, on and on, up and up, and beyond them the snowy tips of the mountains, and you will hear the music that has never been written, the song of the road; all of its harmonies of the wind in the trees and the beat of the surf upon the shingle. It will haunt you until you will sicken for it; and at night, no matter how soft your bed and how silken your coverlets, you will toss and turn and dream of the hemlock boughs and the fern, the smell of the deep, deep woods!"

"Don't!" he cried sharply. "Stop it! It is too realistic. Anyway, I can always go back."

"Oh, no, you can not," she said. "That will be quite impossible after you have lived in Eldorado for a while. You'll forget the way." She shook her head. "You'll never come back."

"Then, I'm willing, glad and proud "—he lifted his head, his eyes shining—"to give it up for her, if she wants Eldorado. Tell me, Ydo," boldly, "have you never loved?"

"Many times." Her eyes dreamed. "Many times have I loved and unloved and forgotten. For that very reason I quote to you:

"'Ah, happy he who gains not The love some seem to gain.'

"Oh, what an opportunity my scorned profession gives me for knowing the human heart. This woman who comes to me cries: 'If I had only married I should have known the joy of companionship, of motherhood, and children growing up around me,' And this one wails: 'I have made a mistake. If I had not married and been condemned to a humdrum life what a noise I might have made in the world with my gifts and my beauty,' There is only one good, you know, the good we haven't got. They want a life of romance, of charm, and they never seem to think that it must be within them." She struck the table lightly. "Life is only a reflection of one's self."

"And have you found your choice satisfactory?" he asked curiously.

She gave her quick little shrug. "I have lived after my own nature. It would have been impossible for me to do otherwise. Ah, life, life! There has never been a moment that good or bad, I have not loved it! It is a plant—life, a beautiful plant; and most people are in haste to cull its loveliest blossoms and strip it bare of leaves, in the effort to get all it can give, and finally, they even drag up the roots to see if they can not extract something more; but to enjoy that plant, Mr. Hayden"—she spoke with passionate emphasis—"you must love and tend it. 'To get the most out of life' is a horrible phrase. Life offers nothing to those who seek her thus; but to all who ask little of her, who stand ready and glad to give, she repays an hundredfold."

"What a preacher you are," he laughed.

Before Ydo could answer, the maid entered with a card and handed it to her. The Mariposa sat silent for a moment or two, gazing intently at the bit of pasteboard, a peculiar smile on her lips.

"Show Mrs. Ames in here," she said at last, with sudden decision.

"Mrs. Ames!" Hayden sat in dumb amazement "Mrs. Ames!" What on earth Could that old woman want with the Mariposa?

But before he could voice his astonishment, the visitor appeared. She was in her customary rusty, fringed black, jingling with chains, mummified in expression, and with the usual large showing of dusty diamonds. She surveyed Hayden through her lorgnon with both surprise and disapproval, and then acknowledging his bow with a curt nod, turned to Ydo.

But a change had come over Mademoiselle Mariposa. She was no longer the Dreaming Gipsy, but a grande dame, a lady with some subtle, exotic touch of foreign distinction, who greeted the older woman with a charming and reserved grace.

Mrs. Ames seated herself on the extreme edge of a stiff chair. "Mademoiselle Mariposa," her thin voice rang authoritatively, "I had hoped to see you alone for a few moments of private conversation."

"Just so, madame," responded Ydo suavely, "but I have no secrets from Mr. Hayden. He is an old friend, an adviser, I may call him."

"Humph!" Again the lorgnon was turned threateningly on Hayden. "Very well, since you have brought this on yourself, you may take the consequences. I will continue with what I have to say. Mademoiselle, I have had a recent and most distressing interview with my son. To put it frankly, I was reproaching him with his devotion to a most ineligible young woman, and he, in a rage, informed me that he cared nothing for her, and proclaimed, openly proclaimed, his infatuation for you."

"Wilfred!" Ydo sat upright, her languid gaze brightening. "Really!"

"Wilfred?" the mother repeated, with a rising inflection.

"Yes, Wilfred; you were speaking of him, were you not?" The Mariposa's green eyes sparkled with mirth. "Well, madame"—she spoke negligently—"what can I do for you? You know I do not receive any one professionally on Sunday."

"Would you regard it as professional if I ask you what you are going to do about my son?"

"Not at all. I think it quite natural that you should wish to know. I can quite appreciate your state of mind, maternal anxiety, and all that. To have been in terror for fear your son would marry Marcia Oldham and then discover that he is really interested in me! It illuminates that passage in Paradise Lost, does it not? It is sometimes considered obscure. You doubtless recall it. Something about 'and in the lowest depths a lower depth was found.'"

"You seem to have some appreciation of the situation," said the old woman grimly.

"Believe me, I have. Only the mask smiles Comedy at me, and Tragedy at you. Madame, why do you cluck so over your one chicken?"

"The answer to that," Mrs. Ames tartly replied, "is first Miss Oldham and then yourself."

"The declining scale! Fancy where he will end!" Ydo murmured.

"It may be a circus-rider yet," admitted his mother.

"I have been one," announced Ydo calmly, and Hayden could not tell whether she spoke the truth or fiction. "Well"—there was a touch of impatience in her tones now—"what do you wish me to do?" She lifted a fan from her lap, and rapidly furled and unfurled it, a sure sign of irritation with her. "Find him a pretty doll with a blue sash and a wreath of daisies? You must have urged many a one on him and see to what they have driven him."

"Wait," said the old lady, laying one bony, yellow hand stiff with rings, dusty diamonds in dim gold settings, on Ydo's arm. "Why do you take it for granted that I have come to you to do the tearful mother, imploring the wicked adventuress to give up her son? They do those things on the stage, and I've never regarded the stage as a mirror of life. I have heard more about you than you think, mademoiselle. Horace Penfield sits in my ingle-nook. Now, what I came to find out is what you want with Wilfred, if indeed you want him at all."

"You flatter me," said Ydo. "More, you interest me. Now, just why do you wish to know?"

"Are you going to marry him?"

"It is evidently cards on the table with us." Ydo had recovered her good spirits. "Truly, I have not decided. You see, madame, your Wilfred is a big, good-natured fellow. He is like a faithful, loyal, devoted dog. You and I being cats need neither his assistance, advice nor sympathetic companionship. I can also say truly that his ancient name and his money are nothing to me. But he has something I want." She rested her cheek on her fan, a wistful note had crept into her voice, a shadow lay in her eyes. "Ah, madame, do you not understand that we, to whom all things come easily, are often very lonely? Life's spoiled and petted darlings, we are of necessity isolated. We live at high pressure, absorbed in our enthusiasms and interests, but there come moments of weariness when we would droop on the heart that really loves us, when we would rest in that maternal and protecting love which never criticizes, never judges or condemns, never sees the ravages of time or the waste of beauty, never puts upon us the crowning indignity of forgiveness—only loves. Loves, madame, as Wilfred loves me. 'Tis the rarest thing in all the world."

"And what would you give the poor dog in exchange for this?" Mrs. Ames' voice was dry to sarcasm. But Ydo was unmoved.

"My brains, madame, my knowledge of men, women and the world. My diplomacy, my power of attack. Wouldn't it be a fair exchange?"

Mrs. Ames clasped her stiff hands together and dropped the lorgnon on the floor. "By George!" she cried. "You're a man after my own heart. Look at me! I'm a withered, haggard old woman, fierce as a cat and ugly as sin. Why? Because all my life I've been baffled. I was born as wild a bird, my dear, as yourself; but I never knew how to get out of the cage and I was always getting into new ones. I lacked—what-d'-y'-m'-call-it—initiative; and all this longing in me for freedom"—she clutched the dangling fringes on her breast—"and life and the choosing of my own path never had an outlet. It turned sour and curdled, and became malice and all uncharitableness.

"Well, when I began to realize that Wilfred would probably give me a companion in the cage I got sick. I could bear the cage myself, I'd learned to do that; but I didn't want another she-bird molting around. And then when it looked as if it would be Marcia Oldham I got sicker. It drove me wild to think of that milk-faced chit of a girl, with a fool of a mother that I've always despised! I tell you what you do, Miss Gipsy Fortune-teller!" She rapped the arm of Ydo's chair emphatically. "Marry Wilfred! Sure if you do," peering at her suspiciously, "that you won't elope with some one else?"

"I may," said Ydo coolly. "Only I have had the experience twice before, and it doesn't amuse me." Again, for the life of him, Hayden could not decide whether this were the embroidery of fiction or the truth. "The first man used scent on his handkerchief, and the second ate garlic with his fingers. I couldn't endure either of them for a week."

"You rake!" chuckled Wilfred's mother, clapping the Mariposa on the shoulder. "Marry Wilfred, do now! Make him president, at any rate a foreign ambassador." She rose. "You've given me fresh hope. I feel twenty years younger. Well, Mr. Heywood—Harden—whatever your name is, we've treated you as if you were a piece of furniture."

"Regard me instead as a wall," said Hayden pleasantly, "which has ears but no tongue. Won't you vouch for my discretion, Mademoiselle Mariposa?"

"As I would for the chairs and tables to which Mrs. Ames so amiably compares you," smiled Ydo.

When Hayden returned from putting the old lady in her carriage he showed all the elation of one who has scored heavily.

"Aha!" he cried. "Warning me one moment with serious argument against the Inevitable ennui induced by settling in Eldorado and all the time preparing to build your own castles there!"

"But not for permanent residence," she protested, "and I assure you, I have not even decided whether or not to build there at all. My real home is for ever in Arcady. Do you think, seriously think, that there is anything in Eldorado which can hold me when I see the beechwoods growing green, and hear the fifes of June in my ears and get a whiff of the wild-grape fragrance? Then I know that there's nothing for me but Arcady; and it's up and away in the wake of the clover-seeking bee. But you're a man, Bobby, who has—what is that awful phrase?—oh, yes, 'accepted responsibilities,' and you'll stay there in Eldorado, bound by white arms and ropes of gold."



CHAPTER XIII

Marcia had been causing Hayden much perturbation and unrest by keeping him very sedulously at a distance. The glimpses he had had of her recently had been few and far between, and in response to his pleadings and reproaches, he was informed that her time was tremendously occupied and that she was absorbed in a picture she was anxious to finish by a certain time. In consequence, he was inordinately delighted to hear her voice one morning over the telephone—although the reason she gave for calling him up occasioned his undisguised surprise, for she informed him that sometime during the day he would receive an informal invitation from Mrs. Ames requesting him to be present at a luncheon she was giving at the Waldersee the following day.

"Mrs. Ames! Inviting me!" Hayden uttered rapid fire exclamations. "Well, it is a foregone conclusion that I shall not accept, of course."

"Please reconsider your decision before you so hastily decline," Marcia's voice was full of amusement, "please."

A dreadful suspicion shot through Hayden's mind. Why was Marcia pleading the cause of this old woman who had so abominably used her? Had Wilfred returned to his allegiance?

Perhaps Marcia divined some of these thoughts, for she added a little hastily, "It is in reality a luncheon given for Mademoiselle Mariposa, and both she and Wilfred have begged me to be present. It is really for Wilfred's sake that I am going. We have so long been good friends, you know. When I heard you were to be invited, I suspected at once that you would refuse."

"I certainly should have done so," interrupted Hayden grimly, "and you know why."

"I do know," she said sweetly, "and it's dear of you; but now that you understand things you'll accept, won't you?"

"Of course I shall, if you wish it," he replied with fervor.

"Thank you, and—and—I shall not be nearly so busy from now on. I have almost finished my—my—picture."

The answer, the various answers that Hayden made were of the usual order and need not be recorded; but her predictions were speedily fulfilled, for within the hour, Mrs. Ames had called him to the telephone and in the nearest approach to dulcet tones which she could compass was urging him to take luncheon with herself and a few friends at the Waldersee on the following day.

With Marcia in mind, he promptly, even effusively accepted. He was struck by the fact that his prospective hostess had chosen one of the most conspicuous hotels in the town wherein to entertain her guests instead of doing the thing decently and soberly amid the 1850 splendors of her ancestral down-town home. Yes, the eccentric old creature had something in the wind, beyond question, and his curiosity was but increased when he learned, some hours later, from Kitty Hampton that neither herself, Bea Habersham nor Edith Symmes were bidden to the feast.

But not long was he left in suspense, for Mrs. Ames herself hastened to allay his curiosity when she met him the next day in one of the reception-rooms of the hotel, where he arrived promptly on the hour she had mentioned. He looked about him in some surprise, for although there were several detached people in the room, the rest of her guests, whoever they might be, had not yet arrived.

"I asked you a bit early, Mr. Heywood, Harden,—oh, what is your name? Well, it doesn't matter—Hayden—oh, yes; because there was something I particularly wanted to say to you. You see, this is rather an especial occasion," she settled complacently a row of dull black bracelets set with great diamonds on her arm. Hayden reflected on her odd passion for dusty gems. "Can you imagine who my guests are and why I have asked them here?" she lifted her formidable lorgnon and surveyed him through it, her eyes reminding more than ever of those of some fierce, inquisitive bird.

"Truly, I can not, dear lady," Hayden assured her in all sincerity. "You suggest all manner of unexpected and delightful things."

"My guests," said Mrs. Ames, smoothing her black bombazine impressively and detaching a bit of straw from some tangled fringe, "are, to mention the men first, Wilfred, Horace Penfield and yourself, and my women guests are Marcia Oldham and Ydo Carrothers."

"Really!" was all Hayden could think of to exclaim, and he uttered that somewhat feebly.

"Yes," the old lady nodded her head, all the jet ornaments on her rusty black bonnet jingling together. "Yes, I've been so nasty about Marcia Oldham that I want to make some public reparation." She drew herself up and spoke virtuously; but Hayden doubted the entire sincerity of the statement. That might be her reason, in part, but he felt convinced of some deeper motive. She might feel that she no longer had cause for active opposition to Marcia; but the girl did not appeal to her temperament and never could. At best, she could regard a woman of Marcia Oldham's type with but tepid interest. "And she's been gracious enough to say she'd come. At first, she refused point blank, but I got Wilfred to persuade her. He and she have always been good friends. Miss Gipsy Fortune-teller was also inclined to balk; but she too will be here. The wild thing!" she chuckled delightedly. "I do hope she'll marry Wilfred. Why, Mr. Hayden, she'd make something of him. Wilfred's not a fool by any means; but he's so dreadfully lazy. She'll be whip and spur to him. What do I care for her fortune-telling and all her wild escapades! I like 'em. They make my old blood tingle. There's a girl after my own heart!"

"Dear me! Who is that?" peering through her glasses. "Maria Sefton and a party! Good!" She went into a series of cackles that positively made her bones rattle. "Every one in town has heard of Wilfred's infatuation for the Mariposa by this time, and there is just one question asked: 'How will that old witch of a mother of his behave now?'" Again she broke into peals of her shrill, cackling laughter. "What will they say to this? Look how I've fooled them! Marcia on one side of me, the Mariposa on the other! They won't know which it is or why the other dear charmer's here, or what it all means." She wiped away the tears laughter had brought to her eyes. Hayden saw now laid bare her underlying motive in urging Marcia to be present. It was really to mystify her world.

"Ah, Mr. Hampton—Henderson—I can truthfully say that through a long life, I've never yet done the thing people expect of me."

"I can well believe that," Hayden assured her. He looked about him, down through the vista of the rooms with their differing and garish schemes of decoration, at the groups of people moving to and fro, at the whole kaleidoscopic, colorful picture. "Lots of people here to-day," he said.

"Oh, dear me, yes," replied the old lady. "This is undoubtedly one of the great hotels of the world. Everything passes through here sooner or later, except perhaps, the law of righteousness. Here comes Horace, he's not bearing it, I am sure. How do you do, Horace?" Penfield, admirably dressed, slim, self-possessed and alert, bent over her hand, and nodded to Hayden.

"I've just been granted an inspection of the new gown Edith Symmes has ordered for Bea Habersham's ball," he said. "We've been at her dressmaker's and she drove me here on her way home."

"I thought you looked pale," said Mrs. Ames, viewing him through the inevitable lorgnon. "Go on, tell me all about it."

"I'm afraid the details are too harrowing," said Horace mildly. "The body of the gown—isn't that what you call it—? the ground-work, you know—"

"Yes—yes, that's all right," nodded Mrs. Ames. "Go on—the body of the gown—"

"Is of a sort of sickly, mustard-colored satin with chocolate-colored trimmings, and wreaths of pink stuff and coral ornaments that look like lobster-claws. Really, it gives you quite a turn just to see it; and then, she has some kind of a grass-green weeping-willow tree that she is going to wear in her hair. Really, the whole thing is pretty shuddery. Haunts you, you can't throw it off." Penfield looked a trifle blue about the mouth and so depressed that Hayden could not help laughing.

"Edith is going beyond herself," commented Mrs. Ames. "Some one ought to marry her and reform her. Why not you, Horace?"

"'She killed a boy, she killed a man, why should she not kill me?'" quoted Horace gloomily.

"Well, we'll have some luncheon and then you'll feel better," consoled his hostess. "Here come the girls now."

Master of facial expression as he was, Horace could no more have helped his jaw dropping than he could his eyes blinking as Marcia and the Mariposa, followed by Wilfred Ames, came toward them. Hayden was particularly struck by the fact that as the two girls walked down the room laughing and talking, there was no suggestion in the manner of either of their being strangers or even formal acquaintances. There was the easy manner of old friendship between them, and he recalled again the "Ydo" that Marcia had inadvertently spoken that day in the Park, and pondered afresh.

Marcia looked to Hayden's eyes more charming than ever. The slightly strained expression about the mouth and eyes, which always caused him a pang, was to-day quite effaced, and his heart throbbed with pleasure as he caught the dear little smile that she gave him, and he saw that her eyes were full of a soft and radiant happiness. She wore a white cloth own, with an immense black hat, the butterflies and her beloved California violets, a dewy and deliciously fragrant cluster which Hayden had sent to her that morning. Ydo in rose color was a brilliant and effective contrast to her.

"'As moonlight unto sunlight And as water unto wine,'"

murmured Penfield who was in the mood for quotation.

Mrs. Ames arose and settling afresh her hideous row of black bracelets, led the way to the dining-room. She had ordered one of the most conspicuous tables at an hour when the huge room was sure to be crowded, and she viewed with unabated, even increasing satisfaction the whispered comments from the tables where any of her acquaintances were sitting. She had created the sensation she desired. Fortune favored her.

"There are enough here to spread this far and wide," she whispered complacently to Hayden, "and Horace is a host in himself on such occasions. One may always trust him to see that the good work goes merrily on. The dear boy!" there was positive affection in her tone. "This will be in every one's mouth before night. It is better to have Horace for a publicity bureau than to get out an 'extra.'"

"Look at the forest!" said Ydo quizzically calling Robert's attention to the tall palms grouped about the room and the exotic, incongruous effect of the long fronds, which should properly have cast their shadows on desert sands, but now must wave above the white surface of small tables or be outlined harshly against the red and gold panels of the walls. "This is very different from the wilds," she continued. "Hardly savors of the simplicity of drinking from the wayside spring and munching a bit of bread and some fruit as one trudges along. Ah-h-h! That must be soon for me."

"But Wilfred?" suggested Hayden in a low voice. "What are you going to do about him?"

She glanced toward the imperturbable, lazy, blond giant, who sat talking to Marcia, but always with his eyes fixed on Ydo, content merely to be in her presence. Then she lifted her round chin audaciously, "If I decide to let him come with me, he will be well content. He hates cities and loves the open. He will be an excellent camerado, I assure you. But, if Wilfred does not care to go voyaging, voyaging, why, then he shall stay; but for myself, I must onward, away for ever from the old tents."

She had lifted her voice slightly on the last words and Mrs. Ames looking toward her had caught them. "Ah, mademoiselle," she broke in, "whenever you begin to talk, I've always got to stop and listen. Not because you utter words of wisdom by any means," she gave a hard little chuckle, "but because when you talk, I hear again the voice of youth. It rings in your tones and smiles in your eyes; it's something as effervescent and sparkling as the bubbles that rise in this wine. You are exactly like the nightingale in the old French fable. Just as irresponsible. You remember he sang all summer while the ants toiled unceasingly getting in their winter stores, and then when winter came, and he pined with hunger, the thrifty ants said: 'Do you not know that winter follows summer, and that all roads lead to the desert?'"

Ydo leaned forward all aggression and animation. "But that is a wicked fable," she cried, "for it tells only one side of the question. It never tells what the nightingale said to the ants. But I know. He said: 'Pouf! Chut! I have sung my beautiful songs all summer and now you foolish ants think I am going to starve. Stupid, short-sighted little insects! I shall simply spread my wings, and fly away, not to the desert either, but to the bounteous South, and there, under the great, yellow moon, among the ilex trees, where the air is heavy with the fragrance of flowers, I shall sing as you have never dreamed I could sing. Adieu!'"

Mrs. Ames chuckled afresh. "They can't beat you—at any rate."

"By the way," said Hayden suddenly, "isn't that your secretary at the door?"

Ydo looked up surprised. "Certainly, it is Eunice," she said, "I wonder—"

Eunice, mournful and repressed, walked primly down the room in the wake of a waiter and with a murmured word or two with the Mariposa, handed her a telegram. The latter, still with an expression of perplexity, requested Mrs. Ames' permission to open it, acquainted herself with its contents, and then turned to the secretary at her elbow.

"That is all right, Eunice. There is no answer." Then she leaned across Hayden and spoke to Marcia, "Nothing of any importance," with a faint shrug of the shoulders, "I dare say you will get one also. He merely says that he will not be home quite so soon as he expected."

"He!" "He!" Hayden knew a pang of jealousy, like a stab of a stiletto. What "he" was of such interest to Marcia that he should send her telegrams announcing his return home, or his failure to come? And why should this person, whoever he might be, also telegraph Ydo? His thoughts reverted involuntarily to the gray-haired man "that ordinary, middle-aged person," who had accompanied her the night she had dined at the Gildersleeve, the night that he, Hayden, had returned to her her silver butterfly. Who was this shadowy creature, a sinister and skulking figure always in the background? Doubts and fears assailed him. He suffered a hades of suspicion, a momentary and temporary hades—and then, he looked at Marcia. She was talking across the table to Horace Penfield, and Hayden noted the purely drawn oval of her face, the sensitive, delicate mouth, the sweet, wistful eyes, and all the incipient doubts which had made such an onrush upon his consciousness vanished, were routed and put to flight, and Marcia looked up to meet his gaze and suddenly, shyly, sweetly blushed. Again the world was his and his heart was flooded with sunshine.

Mrs. Ames, well-pleased with the notice her party had attracted, was complacently arranging her bracelets preparatory to rising, when her eye was evidently caught by the iridescent sheen of Marcia's butterflies. She held up her glasses, the better to view them.

"There is no manner of doubt about it, Miss Oldham," she said in a rather dry and grudging fashion, "that your butterflies are exquisite. I'm a judge of jewels. I know. What's the reason, Miss Gipsy, that you haven't a set? Not economy, I warrant."

Ydo glanced at her from under her eyes, a slow, audacious smile forming about her lips, "I mean to have a set," she said composedly, "but I want mine copied from one Mr. Hayden has in his collection."

Marcia turned surprised eyes on Hayden. "I did not know that you were a collector of butterflies," she said.

"Oh, he is so modest!" Ydo's laughter rang out like a chime of bells, full of elfin malice. "But I am going to tell you a secret. He is the distinguished discoverer of a rare and wonderful specimen of almost fabulous value. A specimen which collectors have supposed to be quite extinct."

Marcia's eyes were as round as saucers, and Mrs. Ames was surveying her unexpectedly distinguished guest with a respectful surprise of which Robert would never have dreamed her capable.

"Why have you never mentioned it to me?" cried Marcia, and there was reproach in her tone.

Hayden, annoyed at first, determined to out-match Ydo in her audacity, "But I have," he cried, his eyes alight with fun, "only I called it by a different name."

"A different name!" she puzzled.

"One of the names in the vernacular," explained Robert with grave mendacity, "is the cake! I have often spoken to you, Miss Oldham, of 'the cake.' Of course, it has also its imposing Latin name."

It was Ydo's turn to look puzzled now; the conversation seemed to be slipping away from her into channels that she could not follow. "Truly," she cried, "I want a string of those lovely butterflies, so I will make you an offer, Mr. Hayden. I'll buy that butterfly. Name your price."

"Believe me, mademoiselle, as I have told you before, there is no price you could name which would tempt me to sell outright." His jaw looked very square and his gray eyes gazed very steadily into her dancing green ones.

The Mariposa made a little face, a combination of lifted brows and twisted mouth. "Just so," she said spreading out her hands, "about what I expected; but even if you can't be tempted to sell outright, I dare say you do not mind showing the photographs?"

Hayden smiled grimly. "That is ingenuous, senorita. Of course, I have no objection to showing the photographs—at the proper time."

Mrs. Ames picked up her gloves and rose. "I don't know what you're talking about. It's all Greek to me," with her strident cackle, "but this I do know, Hurlburt—Hammerton—and that is she'll get ahead of you, this Gipsy girl. Never doubt that."

Marcia had grown slightly paler during the conversation, and now she turned surprised, almost frightened, yes, frightened eyes from Hayden to Ydo.



CHAPTER XIV

The day of his dinner having arrived, Hayden found himself turned from his own doors by the ruthless Kitty and adrift upon the world.

"Yes, you've simply got to go," she said firmly in reply to his protestations. "The decorators will be here any minute and then we'll begin to do things. You'll really be much happier at a club or on the streets, anywhere rather than here, for if you insist on staying, you'll be chased from pillar to post. You won't be able to find such a thing as a quiet corner in the whole apartment. Now go, just as quickly as you can."

Meekly he obeyed, humbly grateful that Tatsu was allowed to remain. He could trust Tatsu's diplomacy and powers of resource to save his cherished possessions, and ultimately to restore a seemly order from the chaos, he was sure that Kitty and her decorators would create. On the whole, he succeeded in putting in about as stupid and empty a day as he had expected, perhaps because he had expected it, but late in the afternoon, as he was strolling up the Avenue in the direction of home, he espied, with a feeling of genuine pleasure, the figure of Mrs. Habersham a few paces ahead of him. The prospect of her society, if only for a block or so, was a welcome relief to him. He felt rather aggrievedly that he had been the prey of bores during the entire day, skilfully escaping one, only to be firmly button-holed by another. Therefore he quickened his steps to overtake Mrs. Habersham, whom he had always found especially sympathetic and sincere.

She, on her part, seemed delighted to see him. "I am just on my way home to dress for your dinner," she said, "and I wanted a bit of a walk first. Don't you feel the spring in the air?"

"Winter contradicts your statement," laughed Hayden, as a cutting wind caused her to shiver and draw her furs more closely about her throat.

"He can't deny those harbingers of spring anyway, no matter how hard he tries," she waved her hand toward a florist's window full of jonquils, daffodils, lilacs, and lilies-of-the-valley. "Oh," with a change of subjects. "I have been hearing on every side of Mrs. Ames' luncheon yesterday. It has assumed such importance as a topic of conversation, that it is now spoken of as 'the luncheon.' There is fame for you! Why truly," laughing softly, "my curiosity was aroused to such an extent that I have just been up to see Marcia and get all the details."

"Then you have seen Miss Oldham to-day?" Hayden attempted to infuse into his tones, merely polite, superficial interest; what he really put into them was an eager longing to hear of his butterfly lady.

"I have just come from her," said Bea Habersham, "I do hope she will be more like herself this evening!"

"Like herself!" Hayden wheeled sharply. "Why, what do you mean? Is she not well? Is she ill?" He could not conceal his anxiety.

"Oh, dear me, no." Mrs. Habersham reassured him with a smile. "Not ill at all, not in the least. It was only—"

"Only what?" insisted Hayden.

"Only that she seemed a bit—well, overwrought, not quite like herself."

"How overwrought? Do tell me just how she appeared to you. I feel as if you were keeping something back," urged Robert.

"Nonsense. You are building up a great mountain out of a very insignificant mole-hill," reproved Bea with a smile. "It is quite absurd. I see, however," with a resigned smile, "that you will never be satisfied unless I go into the most elaborate details and tell you just how she looked and just what she said."

"Oh, please," so simply and earnestly, that her heart was touched and she gave him one of her rarest and most sympathetic smiles.

"Very well, to begin then," Bea spoke with assumed patience. "Of course, I feel exactly as if I were in the witness box, but what will one not do for one's friends. Then to be quite circumstantial: This afternoon, I stopped at the Oldhams. Marcia was fortunately at home, and I noticed at once that she was looking rather down in the mouth, and was very distrait. She seemed in rather a peculiar state, to alternate from a mood of excitement to one of depression, and more than once while I was talking to her, I saw the tears well up to her eyes. I, at first, thought that her mother had been bothering her, for that Venus was in one of her most exacting and fractious moods, but I soon came to the conclusion that that was not the root of the trouble. Fortunately, Marcia and I were alone for a short time before I left and I endeavored to find out what was weighing on her mind. Not from curiosity, believe me, but because I felt convinced that something of more than usual importance had disturbed her poise.

"She would not really unburden herself to me, Marcia is so reticent and self-contained, you know; but she did admit that she was greatly worried. From the various things she said, I was able to piece out some facts, and you are welcome to them, although, I must confess that I think they throw very little light upon the matter."

"Do let me know them!" begged Hayden. "You know, of course, dear Mrs. Habersham, that I can not bear to hear of her being unhappy or distressed, and I should like nothing in all the world so much as to feel that I could be of some assistance to her."

"I am sure of that," said Bea sweetly; "but to go on. After her mother left the room, I asked Marcia if she were quite well. She looked a little surprised at the question, and then said: 'Yes, oh, yes,' but in the most languid and listless of manners. And all the time that I was talking to her, her mind seemed to be far, far away, as if she were working constantly over some problem, trying to think it out. To tell the truth, she really did not look ill; but just—well, just frightened. That is about the only way I can express it. She really looked frightened."

"But what could possibly have frightened her?" frowned Hayden. "Did she give you any clue?"

"None whatever. As I say, she seemed to be thinking of something else, all the time she was speaking to me of perfectly extraneous subjects, until at last, I felt that I was taxing her powers of self-command, and that the kindest thing I could do was to leave her to herself, since she would not give me her confidence."

"Strange," murmured Hayden. "But don't you think it was probably some absurd or tyrannical action of her mother's that caused her unhappiness?"

"It wasn't exactly unhappiness," objected Mrs. Habersham. "It was more as if she had had some kind of a shock, and could not immediately recover from it. Of course, I am only giving you my impressions, but it was more as if she feared something, and this fear, whatever it was, grew instead of decreasing."

"Did you happen to learn how she had been putting in her time all day?" Hayden's mind went back to that telegram which had been handed Mademoiselle Mariposa at the luncheon the day before, the telegram from the mysterious man, a message of interest to both Ydo and Marcia. Could that have anything to do with Marcia's present state of mind? He recalled the puzzled and faintly alarmed gaze she had turned first on the Mariposa and then on himself at the conclusion of the luncheon yesterday, and instead of finding any light in these reflections, he seemed to plunge deeper into the darkness.

He shook his head slowly, completely perplexed.

"Did she tell you how she had put in her day?" he repeated.

"Let me see," Mrs. Habersham thought a moment, "she had been at Mademoiselle Mariposa's early in the afternoon; but what she did before that, I do not know. Of course, I suppose, she spent the morning at—at her studio."

"She had been at the Mariposa's? Are you sure?" questioned Hayden.

"Oh, positive." Bea lifted her face to look at him in surprise. "Yes, I distinctly remember her saying so. We were speaking of what we were to wear to-night, and she mentioned Mademoiselle Mariposa's costume particularly. She said she had seen it this afternoon, that Ydo, as she calls her, had shown it to her."

"Mrs. Habersham," Hayden looked down at her, his square face set, his eyes full of decision, "I do not believe that I am prying into Miss Oldham's affairs, when I ask you, who have been her intimate friend since your early school-days,—what is the cause for the friendship between Miss Oldham and Mademoiselle Mariposa? When did the acquaintance begin?"

Bea lifted sincere eyes to his. "Truly, Mr. Hayden, I do not know. I can not throw any light on the subject. I remember though when we were school-girls, Marcia used to spin some fascinating yarns about the sayings and doings of her friend Ydo; but since the lady has made her spectacular appearance as a fortune-teller, the Veiled Mariposa, and become such a social fad, why, it is simply impossible to get any information out of Marcia. Kitty and I have plied her with questions, because we were both interested in mademoiselle, but Marcia shuts her mouth tight and never says a word, merely remarking that for the present, Ydo desires nothing should be known. The more mysterious she appears, the better it is for business. Do you not think so?"

"Naturally," he replied.

"The only time I have ever seen them together, Ydo and Marcia," continued Bea, who was in a loquacious mood and ready to be lured on by Hayden's interest, "was one evening when I happened to see them dining together at the Gildersleeve. They were with Mr.——" Bea hesitated the twinkling of an eyelash, "an elderly man," she concluded rather lamely.

Hayden looked straight ahead. The words seemed to repeat themselves in his brain. He remembered that other occasion when Marcia had been there with an elderly man. His mind leaped to the conclusion that it was the same—the same middle-aged person with whom he had later seen Marcia driving down the Avenue, and Horace Penfield had smiled and made some offensive remark about the rich uncle from Australia. He felt convinced that this was the man who had sent Ydo the telegram the day before, for Ydo knew him. Had he, Robert, not seen him at her apartment? The demon of jealousy began its diabolical whisperings, a mist seemed to float before Hayden's eyes; but with all the strength of his nature, he refused to listen. This demon was a visitor that he was resolved not to admit, no matter how insistent its demands. Had he not promised Marcia his heart's fealty? Had he not vowed to himself that no matter what mysteries encompassed and enmeshed her, he would believe and never doubt? And he again determined with all the strength of his soul to hold that faith so high and pure and clean that it should never know the stain of suspicion.

"We are making too much of this matter," said Bea resolutely, after stealing a glance at Hayden's face. "It is a pity that a person can't indulge in a mood now and then without having it subjected to an elaborate analysis by his friends. Marcia will appear to-night perfectly radiant, I am sure, and you and I will feel like idiots. Do you know, I quite reproached her for going to that luncheon yesterday. Why on earth should she further any of Mrs. Ames' plans? I told her so frankly; but she only smiled and said that it was trivial to notice such things. That even if Mrs. Ames had been rather catty, Wilfred had always been an especially good friend of hers, and since she didn't believe in bearing malice and harboring grievances, she was only too willing to be persuaded to go.

"But what every one is frantic to know is, what did it all mean? Why really, there are two decided factions. One says it means that Mrs. Ames has capitulated and that she took this method of announcing the withdrawal of all opposition to an engagement between Wilfred and Marcia, and merely invited the Mariposa to show how foolish was the gossip about Wilfred's devotion to her. The other faction asserts that there is really something in all this talk about Wilfred's infatuation for Mademoiselle Mariposa, and that his mother countenances it and took this method of showing the world her approval of his choice. But every one is utterly at sea. No one knows really what to think. So you may fancy how tongues are wagging.

"But good gracious! if I'm to be at your dinner on time, I've got to be hurrying home, don't you think? Look at that darkening sky! By the way, I hope Edith Symmes will not spoil the effect of everything with some terrible gown. Horace Penfield says that he has seen it and that it is the most awful thing she has yet perpetrated."

Hayden could not forbear laughing. "Horace misled you," he said, "he told us all about it at the luncheon yesterday. He had just been at her dressmaker's with her to look at it. He says it is really the most atrocious thing he has ever seen; but," triumphantly, "it will not grace my humble dinner. It is being saved for a far more important occasion—your ball."

"Oh, my goodness!" gasped Bea. "Well," firmly, "I shall put a flea in Edith's ear. She must call a halt. She is simply letting that crazy imagination of hers run rampant. I shall speak to her to-night."



CHAPTER XV

During the ten days allowed her for preparation Kitty continued charmed with Hayden's idea of a butterfly dinner. It suited her volatile fancy. Her enthusiasm remained at high pitch, and she exerted herself to the utmost in behalf of her favorite cousin. As a consequence, although she made a pretense of consulting Hayden about the various arrangements, the final results were almost as much of a surprise to him as to the rest of the guests, and as he walked through his rooms at the last moment he admitted to himself that Kitty really had surpassed herself.

Yellow and violet orchids fluttered everywhere, carrying out the butterfly effect; and while he stood admiring their airy and unsubstantial grace, Kitty floated in followed by Hampton, thin and kindly, with more of an expression of interest than he usually wore.

"Why, Kitty," cried Hayden, shaking hands with Hampton, "you look exactly like a butterfly, a lovely little blue butterfly attracted here by the flowers."

"But that is what I am," Kitty answered him triumphantly. "A blue butterfly. Don't you see my long wing-sleeves? And look at the blue butterflies in my hair! Oh," as Mrs. Habersham came in, "here is Bea. Isn't she gorgeous?"

Bea herself was the affirmative answer to that question. She was indeed gorgeous, a splendid brown butterfly with all kinds of iridescent effects gleaming through her gauzes. Dark velvet outlined her skirt and floating sleeves, and dark antennae stood upright from the coils of her hair.

Marcia, who was with her, to Hayden's infinite relief, was a white butterfly, looking very lovely, but, as he noticed with concern, paler than he had ever seen her, and with something like distress in her eyes, quite perceptible to him if unnoticed by the rest. He could not keep his solicitude out of his voice and glance, and this, he felt instinctively, annoyed, instead of gratifying her; for almost immediately she assumed a gaiety of manner foreign to her usual gentle and rather cool reserve.

His attention was distracted for the moment by the arrival of Edith Symmes, and the little group paid her the momentary attention of an awed silence, for she had perpetrated what was, perhaps, the greatest atrocity of her life—a vivid scarlet gown which made her face look a livid wedge.

"Don't you like this frock?" she whispered complacently to Bea Habersham.

"No, you know it is a horror, Edith," that lady replied, with the bluntness of intimacy. "I think," turning and surveying her friend calmly from head to foot, "that it is the very worst I have ever seen you wear, and that is saying a great deal. It makes you look like green cheese. For Heaven's sake, put some other color on!"

"Not I." Edith was quite unruffled. "You know perfectly well, Bea, that if I wore what you and Kitty and the rest of the world would call decent clothes, that every one would say: 'How plain poor Edith Symmes is! She dresses well, but that can not make up for her lack of beauty,' But when I wear these perfectly dreadful, glaring things that I love, what is said of me? 'What a stylish, even a pretty woman, Edith Symmes might be, if she didn't wear such criminal clothes,' Don't you see, you handsome idiot, that I please myself and score at the same time?"

Not being able to refute these plausible arguments, Bea contented herself with stubbornly maintaining her point. "But red, Edith, why red? It is a nightmare. Who ever heard of a scarlet butterfly?"

Edith laughed lightly. "I invented one just for this occasion. Such a compliment to Mr. Hayden." Her serenity was not to be marred, and fortunately, before the discussion could go further, dinner was announced.

The dining-room Kitty had transformed into a tropical bower. From an irregular lattice of boughs across the ceiling orchids fell as if they had grown and bloomed there. These were interspersed with long trails of Spanish moss in which the lights were cunningly disposed. Orchids swayed, too, from the tops of the tall palms which lined the walls, and above the bright mass of the same flowers on the table floated on invisible wires the most vivid and beautiful tropical butterflies.

Hayden was an admirable host. Possessing the faculty of enjoyment himself, he succeeded in communicating it to his guests; and the dinner, as it progressed, was an undeniable success. Marcia, on his right hand, had apparently thrown off the oppression or worry from which she had suffered earlier in the evening, and, according to Mrs. Habersham all through the afternoon; and her evident enjoyment was immensely reassuring to Hayden, for it seemed to him both natural and spontaneous.

"Bobby," said Kitty, a few moments before they left the table, "I'm really afraid after this that the rest of the evening will be a dreadful let-down. I think if we showed the part of wisdom we'd all fly home as soon as we get up and keep intact a bright memory."

"Ah," said Hayden mysteriously, "you don't know what you would miss. The best of the evening is yet to come. I've got a whole bagful of tricks up my sleeve."

"I'm sure it's going to be a magic-lantern, or perhaps stereopticon views illustrating his thrilling adventures in darkest Africa, or New York, with himself well toward the center of the picture," laughed Edith Symmes.

"I wish it were," said Penfield. "By the way, Hayden, you're among friends. We'll all promise to keep your guilty secrets; but do be frank and open if you can, and tell us the romantic story of your discovery in South America, and how you happened to find something a lot of people had been searching for in vain."

Hayden looked at Horace in surprise. That he should have ventured on this subject was odd, and Robert was for the moment inclined to resent it. For the fraction of a second he hesitated; and then caught at the suggestion. He had been wondering how he should tell Marcia that he was the discoverer of the lost and traditional mine on the estate, of which, he continued to believe intuitively and unreasonably, without a scintilla of real evidence, she was one of the owners. Yes, he had been wondering how he should tell her and here was the opportunity.

"Very well, I will," he said quickly. "It isn't stereopticon views, or a magic-lantern, Mrs. Symmes. It's worse. It's photographs, and I'm very well toward the center of the picture. With the best will in the world, now that I've got you all here, I shan't let you escape. You must listen to the story of my life."

He had sent for Tatsu, and, at the appearance of the Japanese servant, Robert whispered a word or two to him and he left the room. Just as he did so Hayden felt a slight pressure on his arm. Turning, he met Marcia's eyes. Her gaze was fastened on him with a frightened, almost imploring expression and he saw that she had again grown very pale.

"What is it?" he said to her in a low voice. "You are not well, or you are unhappy about something. Do not feel it necessary to remain here if you would rather go home."

"Oh, no, no!" she protested vehemently. "I am quite well, and I would rather stay, only, I implore you, I beg of you, not to show any maps or photographs of that mine. I beg it!" Her voice, her eyes besought him.

Tatsu returned at this moment with a package which he handed to Hayden, and the latter, taking it from him, looked carefully over its contents, allowing an expression of disappointment to over-cloud his face.

"The wrong bundle," he said mendaciously. "Too bad! And I might have to search an hour before laying my hands on the right one. I evidently wasn't intended to bore you with any of my ancient mariner tales this evening. This is distinctly an omen." He lifted his brows slightly and significantly to Kitty, and she who was playing hostess, immediately rose.

Hayden carried the package into the drawing-room with him and laid it on a small table. He felt puzzled and perplexed. What did Marcia know, and what was worse, what did she fear? For there could be no doubt that she was badly frightened. How flat had fallen his happy plan of letting her know that he, by some joyous and romantic chance, was the discoverer of the long-lost Veiled Mariposa! But the party was far too small for any one member of it to engage in meditation, and Hayden as host found his attention claimed every moment. For a calm review of this odd occurrence and any attempt to arrive at a satisfactory explanation of Marcia's words and actions he saw clearly he would have to wait until the departure of his guests.

It was a real relief, a positive relaxation from strain, therefore, when Tatsu threw open the door and unctuously announced Mademoiselle Mariposa. There was the slightest rustle of skirts, the faint waft of an enchanting fragrance, and Ydo came forward. As usual, her little mask concealed her face, revealing only her sparkling eyes, and her mantilla of Spanish lace covered her hair! but she had discarded her customary black gown. She, too, was a butterfly, this evening, a glowing yellow one with deep lines of black and touches of orange and scarlet, a gown as vivid and daring as herself. As she advanced with her exquisite and undulating grace of carriage, a little thrill ran through the group, for although they had moved in an atmosphere of color all evening, she seemed in some subtle and individual way to express deeper and more vital tints, and veiled, as she was, to cause even the lights to flicker and grow dim.

Behind her followed her private secretary, more demure and colorless than ever, bearing the various objects Mademoiselle Mariposa would need in the exercise of her profession.

All of the women, in fact the whole party, greeted her with warm expressions of pleasure with the exception of Marcia who, Hayden thought, looked more distressed, even more alarmed than ever.

Ydo returned their pleasant speech with her accustomed ease, and then turning to Hayden, as if consulting him about the arrangements for her fortune-telling, said in a low tone:

"The man you wish to see has returned and I have arranged a meeting in my library to-morrow afternoon between you and the owners of the property. You will be there, of course."

"Naturally." He smiled. Ah, the thing was really to be settled at last. He drew a long sigh of relief as the burden of this waiting and suspense fell from his shoulders. Hayden's experience since the discovery of The Veiled Mariposa had convinced him that anything, anything was better than uncertainty.

Meantime, Ydo, her Spanish accent more marked than usual, if anything, had asked: "Which is it first? The palms, or the crystal, or what, senor?" addressing Hayden.

"Do not leave it to me," he answered. "Ask the ladies."

The Mariposa turned inquiringly to the group of butterflies.

"Oh, the crystal," said Bea Habersham. "I'm sure mademoiselle couldn't find a new line on any of our hands."

"The crystal, Eunice."

Ydo spoke to the secretary over her shoulder, and that young woman silently and very deftly set to work. She cleared a small table, placed it in front of the Mariposa, and deposited upon it the cushion and the crystal, and finally, she threw some powder into a quaint bronze incense-brazier, and then seated herself at the piano.

"I will ask the rest of you to remain absolutely quiet," said Ydo. "Now, Eunice, begin."

Eunice obediently struck a few strange chords, and then fell into a monotonous melody with a recurring refrain repeated again and again. The blue smoke from the incense-brazier curled lazily upward in long spirals and floated through the room, filling it with a pungent and heavy sweetness; the monotonous music went on, the strange rhythm recurring in an ever stronger beat. The Mariposa who had sat motionless gazing at the crystal began to speak.

"Ah, the vision is not clear to-night. I see nothing but clouds. Your figures appear for a moment and then disappear. Ah, here is Mr. Hayden standing on a mountain top with his hands full of gold."

There was an explosion of laughter at this, and the Mariposa paused as if innocently surprised. "Clouds!" she gazed into the crystal again. "Ah, here is Mrs. Symmes. I see you in an immense studio, painting, painting all the time, canvas after canvas. You will in the future devote your life to art, madame. You will give up the world for it."

She paused and Edith, casting a triumphant glance at Mrs. Habersham, admitted that she had been cherishing just such an ambition, looking only the more pleased at the unrestrained horror and surprise manifested by her friends.

"Miss Oldham, I see Miss Oldham, now," continued Ydo. "She weeps. She is not happy. Idle tears."

Hayden did not hear the rest, he looked about for Marcia, but she had vanished, slipped from the room. Strange, he had not seen her go, but then she had that peculiarly noiseless way of moving. While he pondered over it she slipped in again without sound, the faintest of rustles, nothing to attract the attention of the others. She was still as white as a snowdrop, but he thought her expression far calmer and less agitated.

But before any one else had time to notice her reappearance, attention was concentrated on Wilfred Ames. He had scarcely spoken during dinner, and since they had returned to the drawing-room, he had kept in the background, giving every one rather plainly to understand that he did not care for conversation. Now, he came forward, his face, which had been set and grim and moody all evening, was white and his eyes were burning. Never for one moment, did those eyes waver from the Mariposa. He seemed Entirely oblivious to the rest of the group, and it was obvious that for him they simply did not exist.

"What do you see here for me?" he tapped the crystal with his forefinger. His voice was low and yet so vibrating with strong and uncontrolled emotion, that it reached the ears of all.

There was storm in the air, the whole atmosphere of the room seemed suddenly charged as if with electricity, and there was no one present who did not feel through all the color and gaiety, the pulse and stir of potent and irresistible forces.

But the Mariposa, after her first involuntary start of surprise and apprehension, had recovered her poise and now strove to control the situation. "One moment, give me but a second to gaze deeply into the crystal and I will tell you, that is if the pictures will form themselves."

"Oh, I beg you to drop that nonsense," Wilfred's voice rang wearily. "It's only a pose. You believe in it no more than any one else. Aren't you tired of that sort of game? Of playing with us all as if we were so many children? Well, if you're not, I am. I tell you, Ydo, I've had enough of it. You threw me over yesterday, for no reason under the sun. Just caprice, whim—you can't whistle me back and throw me over to-morrow. This question's going to be decided here and now for ever. Will you marry me or not?"

"Senor!" Ydo's voice was low, surprised, remonstrating, indignant. "You forget yourself. This is no place to make a scene or to spread before the world our private affairs. I must beg you—"

Wilfred waved his hands impatiently, as if brushing away her objections. "My answer, Ydo. Here and now."



She seemed completely nonplussed, and Hayden divined that this proud and resourceful Ydo felt herself overmatched and outwitted for the first time. She stood perfectly still, but gazing through her mask at Ames. "I—I think that you will get your heart's desire, senor," she murmured at last, her voice broken, inaudible.

Ames stepped forward, still oblivious to the fact that there were other people present. His face had grown still whiter but upon it there was already an irradiation of joy. "Do you mean it?" he said in a low voice vibrating with some strong feeling. "Do you mean it?"

The little group looked at him in amazement. Was this eager man with the burning, intense eyes, the unruffled and imperturbable Wilfred, to whose placid silence they were so accustomed?

"Why, Wilfred!" exclaimed Edith Symmes. "What on earth has come over you?"

But Ames paid not the least attention to her. It was as if he had not heard her voice. "Is it true?" he said again, his eyes fixed unwaveringly on the black mask of the Mariposa.

"Yes, senor," she almost whispered. "Yes, it is true. But in the future, mind you. I see only the future."

"Then tell your maid to throw all this stuff out of the window," Wilfred again rapped the crystal. "You've done with it for ever."

The spell was broken. Hayden and his temporarily stupefied guests roused themselves, and crowded about Ydo and Wilfred in a chorus of questions and congratulations; but every one felt that the moment for departure had come, and in the babble of adieus Hayden made an effort to get a moment's speech with Marcia alone, but in some feminine and elusive way she divined his intention and frustrated it, and in spite of the congratulations of his guests he was left standing upon his lonely hearth with a desolate feeling of failure.

He could hardly say what was the matter. Everything had gone without a hitch; that is, until staid old Ames had so hopelessly forgotten himself. The dinner was perfect, the decorations were beautiful, the small group of congenial people had seemed to enjoy themselves immensely, and best of all, Ydo had brought him the wonderful news that his period of suspense and waiting was practically over. By this time to-morrow night he would know where he stood; and yet, reason about it as he would, the sense of elation and buoyant hope was gone, and in its stead was some dull, unhappy sense of foreboding, a premonition of impending disaster.

For him, at least, there had been some ghastly blight over the whole affair. Why, why had Marcia appeared pale and distressed? And what was far more puzzling, why had she begged him not to show the photographs of the mine upon Penfield's request? Was it that she did not wish one of his guests to know too much about the matter? If so, which one? And how did she know anything about his connection with the mine, anyway?

He tossed and turned for hours trying to arrive at some half-way plausible or satisfactory solution; but none occurred to him, and he finally fell into troubled sleep.



CHAPTER XVI

As was natural after so restless a night, Hayden slept late the next morning, but when he awoke it was with his usual sense of buoyant optimism. The forebodings of the night had vanished, and the good, glad, fat years stretched before him in an unclouded vista. To-day in all probability marked the conclusion of his comparatively lean years. A half an hour of conversation with those mysterious "owners," the disclosure of his maps, photographs, ore samples, the report of the assayers, etc., and then, the final arrangements. It might result in a trip to the property; but a journey made, his high heart promised, with Marcia.

At the thought of her a slight cloud obscured the shining towers of his Spanish castles. He recalled with a pang her pallor, her agitation of the night before. Something had evidently lain heavily upon her mind; she had been greatly distressed, even alarmed; but with the confidence of a lover he saw himself a god of the machine, consoling, reassuring, dissipating grief, and causing smiles to take the place of tears.

Upheld by these pleasant reflections, he breakfasted and then strolled through the rooms. They had been put in perfect order. And with the exception of the orchids, now sedately arranged in bowls and vases, instead of fluttering from palm-trees and lattices, there was no trace of the last night's festivities. Suddenly he bethought himself of getting together his photographs, etc., in readiness for the interview of the afternoon; but they were no longer on the small table between the drawing-room windows, where he had placed them the night before.

After seeking for them in every likely place for a few moments, Hayden rather impatiently summoned Tatsu and demanded to know what he had done with them. Tatsu, however, was a picture of the grieved ignorance he professed. He said that after every one had left the apartment, the night before, he had locked up very carefully and gone to bed; that he had arisen early in the morning, shortly after five, and had put the rooms in their present and complete order; and he was positive that there were no photographs upon the table then.

Hayden questioned him closely about the extra servants taken on for the occasion; but he insisted that none of them had penetrated farther than the dining-room, and that he, himself had seen them all leave before the departure of the guests.

"There is a possibility that I may have tucked them away somewhere and have forgotten about them," said Hayden half-heartedly. "Come, Tatsu, let us get to work and make a systematic search for them. Don't overlook any possible nook or cranny into which they may inadvertently have been thrown."