The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1904-04-03
CHAPTER Xxx.

The morning after herinterview with
Essex Mariposa had appeared at
breakfast white-cheeked and apathetic.
She had eaten nothing, and when aues-
toned as to her state Of health had re-
piled that she had passed a sleepless
night and had a headache
Barron, sitting opposite, had been
watching her covertly through the
meal. He saw that she ate nothing,
and guessed that the headache she
pleaded was the result of a wakeful
night. The evening before. when he
had gone in TO see the little boys in
. bed, he had casually asked them If they
had been playing games that afternoon
in which shouting had been a prorni-
nent feature.
"Indians?" Benito had suggested, sit
ting up in his cot and scratching the
back Of his neck; that's a hollering
game"
Any game with screams When I
came in 1 thought heard shouts COM
ing from somewhere"
That wasn't u.s." said Miguel from
his larger bed in the corner. I'VE was
playing burying soldiers In the back
yard, and that's a game where you
the sandy place. There's no sorter
hollering In it. Sometimes we play
were crying, but that's quiet"
"P'raps," said Benito sleepily, lit was
Miss Moreau's gentleman in the par
Tor. 1 let him in. They might have
been singing. Now tell us the story
about the Indians and the pony ex-
press"
This was all the satisfaction he got
from the boys. After the story was
told he did not go downstairs. but went
into his own room and sat by his lit
tered table, thinking. The details Of his
entrance into the house a few hours be-
fore We're engraved on his minds eye.
BY the uncertain gaslight ne saw the
dark face Of the stranger, with its
slightly insolent droop Of eyelid and
non-committal line Of clean-shaven lip.
It was to his idea a disagreeable face.
The simple man in him read through
it's shield of reserve TO the complexi-
ties beneath. The healthy frank Amer
lean saw in il the intricate sophistica-
ton Of older civilizations, OF vast COM
inunities where God hath made man
upright; but they have sought out
many inventions"
On his ear again fell the cold polite
ness Of the voice. Gamaliel Barron was
too lacking in any form Of self con-
seriousness. was too indifferently con-
iGent Of himself as a Westerner. the
equal Of any and all human creatures,
TO experience that sensation Of mau-
vsise homie that men of smaller fiber
are apt to feel in the presence Of beings
of superior polish. Polish was nothing
to him The man everything. And ii
seemed TO him he had seen the man,
deep down, In that one startled mo-
ment OF encounter in the hall. Thought
fully smoking and fitting back in his
chair he mentally summed him I'D in
two words, bad egg" He would keep
his eye on him, and TO do so would put
off the trip to the mines he was to take
in the course Of the next two weeks.
The next morning Mariposa's appear
ance at the breakfast table reused the
uneasiness he felt to poignant anxiety.
With the keenness Of growing love, he
realized that IT was the mind that was
home to lunch-an unusual deviation,
a he almost invariably lunched down
town at the Lick House-and found her
at the table as pale and distract as ever.
After the meal was over he followed
her into the hall. She was slowly as
cending the stairs, one hand on the bal
ustrade, her long. black dress sliding
upward from stair to stair.
He followed her noiselessly, and at
the top Of the flight, turning to go TO
her room. she saw him and paused, her
u n