which he received many visits from his patrons, it was very clearly realized by him that not only all Eureka, but all Durden's, had declared against the doctor, and were ready to cry him down, and, as far as possible, to ruin him.

Jerry could scarcely believe the situation, and more than once during his many interviews with the people, he asked them if it were possible, even with this provocation, for them to condemn this man who had spent years in their service; who had been their friend in every phase of life; who had set no limit to the time nor the money spent for them.

And the answer came sharply-if the doctor had not pretended; if, from the first, he had declared his intentions, they would not have blamed him; but he had won their confidence by false pretences so that he could cheat them, and this they could not forgive.

Jerry's repeated assurances that the doctor had bought the land for some good purpose, and not as a speculation, were not heeded, for all the facts of the case, as far as the people could see them, were against the doctor. The buying of the land was one fact; the notice in the Star was another fact; Jerry's ignorance of the transaction was a third fact; and the fourth fact, which everyone knew, was that for years the doctor had been buying up the interests in the Eureka mines in the name of Paul Henley.

All this evidence could not be disputed, and Jerry could only retreat on the declaration that, after all, there was no real reason why the doctor should not buy the land; no real reason why the people should blame him for his course; no reason save that he had given them so much that they felt they had a claim on all.

He determined, after much hesitation, that he would go to the doctor and ask him for some explanation; and yet, how could he do such a thing; what right had he to question any act of this man; how dare he look beyond his word and teaching?

Besides, the doctor knew all that had been said about this transaction before he revealed his name, and, if he had cared for the opinion of the people, he

would have printed his explanation along with his call for workmen; and if he had cared for Jerry, he would have given him long ago some hint that would have stopped his pen, and so would have left unsaid many hard things which had irritated the people against the unknown buyer.

And with this last unavoidable conclusion, Jerry faced a truth that he had long realized, but from which he had turned away-the truth that the doctor had never loved him. For years, ever since he had realized that the doctor was in every particular different from those about him, Jerry had watched him carefully, and by means of the deep love he bore him had learned that the doctor's life was one long struggle to lose himself in anything that would absorb him. Through all disguises Jerry had seen this motive in all that the doctor did for the people about him; and when he turned to his own case Jerry still saw this motive. The discovery hurt him, for always the thought followed, "I am a work that keeps him from remembering-I am a duty that satisfies his conscience; only this I am to him." It was through his love that Jerry had felt in the doctor's nature the lack of this same love; found that the doctor had another theory than the one he held as to honest love and honest hate; the doctor never flinched from his duty to all the world, nor to any segment of it that came within his reach, but he did not love it.

And bitterly it had come home to Jerry that all the adoration he had without question lavished on this his Ideal had fallen unheeded, if not unseen. This knowledge had not come to him all at once, but gradually, like the shadows that follow the morning sunlight-all is still bright, but when you look attentively the shadow is where the sunlight was.

The doctor was a mystery that with all his love Jerry could not solve. He was learning new lessons about him now, but his heart was growing heavy with the new wisdom.

For years Jerry had realized in some measure the doctor's suffering, and had pitied him. Too often he had seen him sit for hours and never turn a pagetoo often had seen the mask drop from his face and a deadly weariness take

haunted by the ghost of old Anita? Besides," she added, irrelevantly, "you know I don't believe in old Anita and her baskets."

Manuelo smiled; a smile like swift sunshine. "That is because you have not seen them, señorita," said he. "If you had, you would believe in no others. There is one of them so high, señorita" -with a graceful turn of the wrist indicating the size.

"Three feet! Why, it is a mammoth, Manuelo!"

"And fine"-he cast a disdainful glance at the baskets about her-"you have nothing like it, señorita. But that is not all. Where the pattern goes there feathers woodpecker's feathers woven in, all of the brightest scarletoh, far gayer than these!"

are

Elsa shook her head, dejectedly.

"You are determined to make me miserable, Manuelo. Now, what is the use of telling me this when Anita and her baskets are-how many miles away? -and you know she wouldn't sell one of them for less than the price of a small ranch. If I were a man I might mount my horse, make off into the wilderness, and raid the mystical Anita for the sake of her baskets; but since I am not-" with an expressive smile the young girl turned again to the contemplation of her treasures.

It was a pretty enough sight-Manuelo thought so, at least-the dainty creature surrounded by the ancient baskets, beneath a frame of splendid scarlet passion - flowers. The sunlight glinted on her golden hair and floating dress; and all about and beneath lay the fragrant groves of orange and lemon, and the gardens where roses-red, white, and golden-held carnival all the year round. A pretty sight, Manuelo thought, quite unaware what a striking element he himself added, cast upon the lower step with all the lazy grace of his nation in his figure, all its dark beauty in his face, and all its picturesqueness in his costume-loose shirt, wide trousers, sombrero, and gay kerchief knotted about his throat. By his side lay his guitar. There were two things on earth that Manuelo loved-his guitar and Lolita.

Lolita was loosely tethered in the grove at this moment. There was noth

ing in her appearance to distinguish her from any other of the score of bronchos in the village. But as for the guitar, there was none like it in all the South or West. In the first place, it was very old. Manuelo's mother had fingered it, and her mother's mother before her. They said it came first from Spain, a love-gift from some ardent Spanish lover, in the days when Manuelo's ancestors were great people in the new land, and to be a Mexican was to be of the nobility of California. Be that as it might, nothing else remained of all the traditional grandeur and pride save the guitar, and, perhaps, a statuesque turn of its young heritor's head. And the quaint golden inlaid tracery of the guitar had grown rusty, while the statuesque head served only to set off a ragged sombrero.

That troubled Manuelo not at all, strange compound of pride and carelessness, fiery impetuosity, and supine indolence that he was.

His old curmudgeon of an uncle, with whom he lived, might scold and swear, rolling Spanish oaths at him; Manuelo was thoroughly contented with his meagre lot, equally happy while tearing madly about the country on Lolita, or lying idly at the feet of Elsa Loring, singing Southern melodies to his beloved guitar.

How many hours he had spent so since blue-eyed Elsa came to occupy the hammock on the porch at Las Delicias, neither Manuelo nor Elsa cared to reckon. To Elsa it was such a natural thing to have him at her feet; to Manuelo, so simply natural to be there. And now Elsa had contracted the basket

Elsa's blue eyes gave him a glance before which his own fell for sheer joy.

"Yes," said she, "I dare say you will. I believe you even cause them to spring from the ground. I am not sure you don't sit up nights to manufacture them yourself-and all for a song! Look at that beauty-only four dollars it cost me. You could have sold it to the Englishman for double. I sometimes think, Manuelo, that you are-too good to me."

Manuelo looked out into the groveat Lolita.

"Señorita," he stammered, "impossible! It is you who are too good."

"And all the other things, the walks, and drives, and music," persisted the girl, "when I was so ill, and they brought me here to cure me, and I was so homesick that I almost preferred to die. Do you know what I should have done without your music?—I should have gone mad."

She turned her eyes to him. Actually there were tears in them.

Manuelo sprang from his step. "Señorita," he cried, quite beside himself, "I beg of you! It was all nothing! I loved to do it, señorita-the walks, the drives, the music; and as for the baskets a miserable set of wretched ones, not worth your thanks," he added, in order to dispose of them utterly. "Now, had they been the baskets of Anita, the señorita might indeed

And Elsa threw back her golden head and laughed merrily with still moist

eyes.

"Aunt Mary," she said, an hour later -Manuelo, after singing her many songs, had gone in search of the mail, a duty he had long since assumed, counting himself richly paid for the dusty ride by the smile home letters brought to Elsa's lips-"Aunt Mary," said she,

"this is the loveliest country on earth, but it would be rather dull without Manuelo, don't you think? Tell mewhat can I give him to show how grateful I am to him?"

Aunt Mary thought a moment, her mild eyes fastened upon the delicate wild-rose face before her. Perhaps that very thing suggested her reply.

"My dear," she said, "why not give him your photograph?"

Elsa sat bolt upright in horror. "Good gracious, Aunt Mary! My photograph to Manuelo!"

"Well, my dear," answered the placid lady, "there is nothing he would like so well. You asked my opinion. You owe a great deal to his devoted service. He has shown himself a faithful friend, and it would please him to be treated as such. Besides, the lad is a gentleman. Under the circumstances there can be no impropriety."

66

No, of course not," murmured Elsa, blushing daintily, "but it is very, very unorthodox! Still, as you say, I owe him a great deal."

She sat very thoughtfully after that for a long time, leaning back in the hammock, letting her eyes wander from the nest of roses and passion-flowers about her, over palms, and pepper-tops, to the distant snow-capped peaks against the sky of more than Italian blue. All that landscape was full of Manuelo to herfull as her days had been since she first came, a delicate invalid, who could do no more than lie all day in the hammock and listlessly absorb the sunlight. Well, it was Manuelo who swung the hammock for her the very day after her arrivalManuelo, who chanced just then to be irrigating the orange-groves at Las Delicias.

Elsa's fragile grace and fairness, the golden hair and blue eyes which looked twice angelic beside the florid Spanish beauties and tropical wealth of color all about, exercised a subtle spell upon Manuelo from the outset. Her sufferings and needs appealed to all that was chivalrous in his ardent nature. From watching to occasional ready aid, from that to daily service, was a rapid growth. Never had lady more devoted cavalier than Elsa in the dark-eyed Mexican. It was he who guided her walks; who found

away.

"Who knows?" said he, dreamily; "I have thought of it. It is dull at times, and Pedro grows crosser. There is my cousin Jesus in the Esperanza mines. There there is always something. Perhaps some day!"

'Some day is no day," said Elsa, shaking her head. "You should make up your mind and go at once."

Manuelo glanced about, at the garden, the vine-covered porch, the cool little fountain in its forest of calla lilies, then he looked at Elsa and smiled very sweetly. "Señorita," said he, "it is good here too." He picked up the guitar, touched the chords, and swept the girl away with the magic of a Southern song.

Elsa thought of all these things and many more now. The result of her meditation was that she selected from her desk that night a photograph of herself. On the back she wrote, "Manuelo, from Elsa Loring, with grateful thanks."

She gave it to him the next day with a little graceful, merry phrase; but she was totally unprepared for its effect upon Manuelo.

A great wave of color, of light, surged into his face and glowing eyes. He absolutely trembled. For a moment he could say nothing. When he did speak, it was but two stammering, tremulous words.

"Señorita! Gracias! mille gracias!"

"It is nothing, nothing at all, Manuelo," said Elsa, lightly. But in her heart she had a sudden misgiving as to the wisdom of Aunt Mary's benevolence.

Manuelo never spoke again of the gift. Only he was, if possible, more serviceable and gentle and thoughtful than ever, while his mellow voice and plaintive guitar might be heard nightly floating above the perfumed groves of Las Delicias.

Elsa grew fonder and fonder of him, and treated him like a favored brother. She found the country, the climate, and Manuelo all perfect, and declared that she herself should be perfectly happy but for one thing.

"And that one thingMary, with a smile.

-?" said Aunt

"The baskets of Anita," asserted Elsa, as with a mischievous laugh she disappeared into the house.

The peaceful weeks flew by. In a land where there is nothing to mark the flight of time save fresh succession of flowers, time flies faster than elsewhere. The oranges came, and ripened upon the trees into luscious globes of juicy sweetness; the almonds blossomed, and the apricots and peaches turned the landscape into a Japanese garden of pearl and white. The poppies blossomed and ran across the mesas, acres of them,waves of living, palpitating orangegolden glow. The larks came and sang over them. One by one out came the multitudinous wild flowers and carpeted every inch of ground, running boldly into the very poppy-fields. And, finally, when every tree and bush and bit of land was set in flower and leaf and clothing green, the roses held their perfect April festival. By millions they waved and climbed and bloomed extravagantly on every hand. White and gold and crimson, and every tint between, the land disappeared under roses, the whole face of the country glowed and blossomed with them.

So, perfumed and flattered and wooed, and caressed by flowers and sun and softest air, the fragile Elsa strengthened her hold of life daily, and bloomed, like the land about her, into beauty and sudden happiness. Such a change had come over her. Manuelo was not a little proud of it.