"Of course you don't. That's just it! Blind! Blind and stubborn,--determined to wreck and ruin your whole life. And I must stand by, helpless, and see you do it. And the _danger_ of the thing!

With Diaz out of the country it's in the hands of the brigands. You'll be murdered ... or worse! Well--I know whose head your blood will be on.

Not mine, thank Heaven!" There was very little that day, Mildred Lorimer felt, that she could thank Heaven for. It was not using her well.

"You know that Stepper will give me letters and telegraph ahead to the train people," said Honor. "And you mustn't believe all the hysterical tales in the newspapers, Muzzie dear. Here's Stepper now."

Stephen Lorimer was turning the car in at the driveway and a moment later he came into the house. He looked very tired but he smiled at his stepdaughter. "You're in luck, Top Step! I've just come from the Mexican Consulate. Met some corking people there, Mexicans, starting home to-morrow. They'll be with you until the last day of your trip! Mother and father and daughter,--Menendez is the name. Fascinating creatures.

I've got your reservations, in the same car with them! Mildred," he turned to his wife, still speaking cheerily but begging for absolution with his tired eyes, "Senora Menendez--Menendez y Garcia is the whole name--sent her compliments and said to tell you she would 'guard your daughter as her own.' Doesn't that make you feel better about it?"

"She can defend her from bandits, I suppose?"

"My dear, there will be Senor Menendez, and they tell me the tales of violence are largely newspaper stuff,--as I've told you repeatedly. They will not only look after Honor all the way but they will telegraph to friends to meet her at Cordoba and drive her out to the Kings'

_rancho_--I explained that she wished to surprise her friends. I don't mind telling you now that I should have gone with her myself if these people hadn't turned up."

"Stepper, dear!"

"And I'll go now, T. S., if you like."

"No, Stepper. I'd rather go alone, really--as long as I'm going to be so well looked after, and Muzzie needn't worry."

"'Needn't worry!'" said Mildred Lorimer, lifting her hands and letting them fall into her lap.

"Honestly, Muzzie, you needn't. If you do, it's because you let yourself. You must know that I'll be safe with these people."

"Your bodily safety isn't all," her mother, driven from that corner, veered swiftly. "The thing itself is the worst. The _idea_ of it--when I think--after all that was in the paper, and every one talking about it and pitying you--_pitying_ you, Honor!"

Her daughter got up suddenly and crossed over to her mother. "Every one but you, Muzzie? Can't you manage to--pity me--a little? I think I could stand being pitied, just now." It was indeed a day for being mothered.

There was a need which even the best and most understanding of stepfathers could not fill, and Mildred Lorimer, looking into her white face and her mourning eyes melted suddenly and allowed herself to be cuddled and somewhat comforted but the heights of comforting Honor she could not scale.

"I think," said the girl at length, "I'd like to go up to my room and rest for a little while, if you don't mind, Muzzie,--and Stepper."

"Right, T. S. You'll want to be fresh for to-morrow."

"Do, dear--and I'll have Kada bring you up some tea. Rest until dinner time, because Mrs. Van Meter's dining with us," she broke off as she saw the small quiver which pa.s.sed over her daughter's face and defended herself. "I had to ask her, Honor. I couldn't--in common decency--avoid it. She's so devoted to you, and think what she's done for you, Honor!"

Honor sighed. "Very well. But will you make her promise not to let Carter know I am coming?"

"My dear, how could she? You'll be there yourself as soon as a letter."

"She might telegraph." She turned to her stepfather. "Will you make her promise, Stepper?"

"I will, Top Step. Run along and rest. I daresay there will be some of the Old Guard in to see you this evening." He walked with her to the door and opened it for her. The small amenities of life had always his devoted attention. He smiled down at her. "_Rest!_" he said.

"I can rest, now, Stepper." It was true. When she reached the haven of her big blue room she found herself relaxed and relieved. Again the direct simplicity of her nature upheld her; she had not found Jimsy, but she would find him; she was going to him without a day's delay; she could "rest in action."

The soft-footed, soft-voiced Kada brought her a tea tray and arranged it deftly on a small table by the window. He smiled incessantly and kept sucking in his breath in his shy and respectful pleasure. "Veree glod,"

he said as the gardener had said before him, "Veree _glod_! I lige veree moach you comin' home! Now when thad Meestair Jeemsie comin' home too, happy days all those days!" He had brought her two kinds of tiny sandwiches which she had favored in the old tea times, chopped olives and nuts in one, cream cheese and dates in the other, and there was a plate of paper-thin cookies and some salted almonds and he had put a half blown red rose on the shining napkin.

"Kada, you are very kind. You always do everything so beautifully! How are you coming on with your painting?"

"Veree glod, thank-you-veree-moach!" He bowed in still delight.

"You must show me your pictures in the morning, Kada."

"Thank-you-veree-moach! Soon I have one thousand dollar save', can go study Art School."

"That's fine, Kada!"

"_Bud_"--his serene face clouded over--"veree sod leavin' theeze house!

When you stayin' home an' thad Meestair Jeemsie here I enjoy to work theeze house; is merry from moach comedy!"'

He bowed himself out, still drawing in his breath and Honor smiled.

"Merry from much comedy" the house had been in the old gay days; dark from much tragedy it seemed to-day. What would it be to her when she came back again? But, little by little, the old room soothed and stilled her. There were the sedate four-poster bed and the demure dresser and the little writing desk, good mahogany all of them; come by devious paths from a Virginia plantation; the cool blue of walls and rugs and hangings; the few pictures she had loved; three framed photographs of the Los Angeles football squad; a framed photograph of Jimsy in his cla.s.s play; a bowl of dull blue pottery filled now with lavish winter roses. It was like a steadying hand on her shoulder, that sane and simple girlhood room.

The window gave on the garden and the King house beyond it. She wondered whether she should see James King before she went to Mexico. She felt she could hardly face him gently,--Jimsy's father who had failed him in his dark hour. In view of what his own life had been! She leaned forward and watched intently. It was the doctor's motor, the same seasoned old car, which was stopping before the house of the "Wild Kings," and she saw the physician hurry up the untidy path and disappear into the house.

James King was ill again. She would have to see him, then. Perhaps he would have a good message for Jimsy. She finished her tea and slipped into her old blue kimono, still hanging in the closet, turned back the embroidered spread and laid herself down upon the bed. She took Jimsy's ring out of the little jewel pocket where she carried it and put it on her finger. "I will never take it off again," she said to herself. Then she fell asleep.

"Fresh as paint, T. S.," said her stepfather when she came down.

"My dear, what an adorable frock," said her mother. "You never got _that_ in Italy!"

"But I did, Muzzie!" Honor was penitently glad of the sign of fellowship. "There's a really lovely little shop in the Via Tournabouni.

Wait till my big trunk comes and you see what I found for you there! Oh, here's Mrs. Van Meter!"

She hurried to the door to greet Carter's mother. Marcia Van Meter kissed her warmly and exclaimed over her. She was thinner but it was becoming, and her gown suited her perfectly, and--they were seated at dinner now--was that an Italian ring?

"Yes," said Honor, slowly, looking first at her mother, "it is an Italian ring, a very old one. Jimsy gave it to me. It has been in the King family for generations. Isn't it lovely?"

"_Lovely_," said Mrs. Van Meter, coloring. She changed the subject swiftly but she did not really seem disconcerted. Indeed, her manner toward Honor during the meal and the hour that followed was affectionate to the point, almost, of seeming proprietary and maternal.

Some boys and girls came in later and Mrs. Van Meter rose to go. "I'll run home, now, my dear, and leave you with your young friends."

"I'll go across the street with you, Mrs. Van Meter," said Stephen Lorimer, flinging his cigarette into the fire. He had already extracted her promise not to telegraph Carter but he meant to hear it again.

"Thanks, Mr. Lorimer, but I'm going to ask Honor to step over with me. I have a tiny parcel for Carter and a message. Will you come, Honor?"

She slipped her arm through the girl's and gave it a little squeeze as they crossed the wide street. "Hasn't the city changed and grown, my dear? Look at the number of motors in sight at this moment! One hardly dares cross the street. I declare, it makes me feel almost as if I were in the East again." She gave her a small, tissue wrapped parcel for her son and came out on to the steps again with her. "Be careful about crossing, Honor!"

"Yes," said Honor, lightly. "That would hardly do,--to come alone from Italy and then get myself run over on my own street. What's that Kipling thing Stepper quotes:

To sail unscathed from a heathen land And be robbed on a Christian coast!

Well, good-night, Mrs. Van Meter, and good-by, and I'll write you how Carter is!"

The older woman put her arms about her and held her close. "Dearest girl, Carter told me not to breathe to any one, not even to your mother, about--about what happened last summer--and--and what he asked you, and I haven't, but I _must_ tell you how glad...." then, at the bewilderment in Honor's face in the light of the porch lamp,--"he showed me the telegram you sent him to the steamer."

"Oh,--I remember!" Her brief wire to him, promising to forgive and forget his wild words of the evening before. She had quite forgiven, and she had so nearly forgotten that she could not imagine, at first, what his mother meant. And now, because the older woman was trembling, and because Carter must have told her of how he had lost control of himself and been for a moment false to his friend, she gave back the warm embrace and kissed the pale cheek. "Yes. And I _meant_ it, Mrs. Van Meter!"

"You _blessed_ child!" Marcia Van Meter wiped her eyes. "You've made me very happy."