But there was a spirit of mischief abroad upon that mountain
slope. It embodied itself in a puff of wind that stirred
gratefully the curls above the girl's brow. Also, it fanned the
neck of the watcher below and cunningly moved his hat from his
side; not more than a few feet, indeed, but still far enough to
transfer it from the shade into the glaring sun and into the view
of the girl above. The owner made no move. If the wind wanted to
blow his new panama into some lower treetop, compelling him to
throw stones, perhaps to its permanent damage, in order to
dislodge it, why, that was just one more cause of offense to pin
to his indictment of irritation against the great island republic
of Caracuna. Such is the temper one gets into after a year in the
tropics.

Like as peas are panama hats to the eyes of the inexpert; far more
like than men who live under them. For the girl, it was a direct
inference that this was a hat which she knew intimately; which,
indeed, she had rather maliciously eluded, riot half an hour
before. Therefore, she addressed it familiarly: "Boo!"

The result of this simple monosyllable exceeded her fondest
expectations. There was a sharp exclamation of surprise, followed
by a cry that might have meant dismay or wrath or both, as
something metallic tinkled and slid, presently coming to a stop
beside the hat, where it revealed itself as a pair of enormous,
aluminum-mounted brown-green spectacles. After it, on all fours,
scrambled the owner.

Shock number one: It wasn't the man at all! Instead of the black-
haired, flanneled, slender Adonis whom the trouble-maker
confidently assumed to have been under that hat, she beheld a
brownish-clad, stocky figure with a very blond head.

Shock number two: The figure was groping lamentably and blindly in
the undergrowth, and when, for an instant, the face was turned
half toward her, she saw that the eyes were squinted tight-closed,
with a painful extreme of muscular tension about them.

Presently one of the ranging hands encountered the spectacles, and
settled upon them. With careful touches, it felt them all over. A
mild grunt, presumably of satisfaction, made itself heard, and the
figure got to its feet. But before the face turned again, the girl
had stepped back, out of range.

Silence, above and below; a silence the long persistence of which
came near to constituting shock number three. What sort of hermit
had she intruded upon? Into what manner of remote Brahministic
contemplation had she injected that impertinent "Boo!"? Who, what,
how, why--

"Say it again." The request came from under the rock. Evidently
the spectacled owner had resumed his original situation.

"Say WHAT again?" she inquired.

"Anything," returned the voice, with child-like content.

"Oh, I--I hope you didn't break your glasses."

"No; you didn't."

On consideration, she decided to ignore this prompt countering of
the pronoun.

"I thought you were some one else," she observed.

"Well, so I am, am I not?"

"So you are what?"

"Some one else than you thought."

"Why, yes, I suppose--But I meant some one else besides yourself."

"I only wish I were."

"Why?" she asked, intrigued by the fervid inflection of the wish.

"Because then I'd be somewhere else than in this infernal hell-
hole of a black-and-tan nursery of revolution, fever, and
trouble!"

"I think it one of the loveliest spots I've ever seen," said she
loftily.

"How long have you been here?"

"On this rock? Perhaps five minutes."

"Not on the rock. In Caracuna?"

"Quite a long time. Nearly a fortnight."

The commentary on this was so indefinite that she was moved to
inquire:--

"Is that a local dialect you're speaking?"

"No; that was a grunt."

"I don't think it was a very polite grunt, even as grunts go."

"Perhaps not. I'm afraid I'm out of the habit."

"Of grunting? You seem expert enough to satisfy--"

"No; of being polite. I'll apologize if--if you'll only go on
talking."

She laughed aloud.

"Or laughing," he amended promptly. "Do it again."

"One can't laugh to order!" she protested; "or even talk to order.
But why do you stay 'way out here in the mountains if you're so
eager to hear the human voice?"

"The human voice be--choked! It's YOUR human voice I want to hear
--your kind of human voice, I mean." "I don't know that my kind of
human voice is particularly different from plenty of other human
voices," she observed, with an effect of fine impartial judgment.

"It's widely different from the kind that afflicts the suffering
ear in this part of the world. Fourteen months ago I heard the
last American girl speak the last American-girl language that's
come within reach of me. Oh, no,--there WAS one, since, but she
rasped like a rheumatic phonograph and had brick-colored
freckles. Have you got brick-colored freckles?"

"Stand up and see."

"No, SIR!--that is, ma'am. Too much risk."

"Risk! Of what?"

"Freckles. I don't like freckles. Not on YOUR voice, anyway."

"On my VOICE? Are you--"

"Of course I am--a little. Any one is who stays down here more
than a year. But that about the voice and the freckles was sane
enough. What I'm trying to say--and you might know it without a
diagram--is that, from your voice, you ought to be all that a man
dreams of when--well, when he hasn't seen a real American girl for
an eternity. Now I can sit here and dream of you as the loveliest
princess that ever came and went and left a memory of gold and
blue in the heart of--"

"I'm not gold and blue!"

"Of course you're not. But your speech is. I'll be wise, and
content myself with that. One look might pull down, In irrevocable
ruin, all the lovely fabric of my dream. By the way, are you a
Cookie?"

"A WHAT?"

"Cookie. Tourist. No, of course you're not. No tour would be
imbecile enough to touch here. The question is: How did you get
here?"

"Ah, that's my secret."

"Or, rather, are you here at all? Perhaps you're just a figment of
the overstrained ear. And if I undertook to look, there wouldn't
be anything there at all."

"Of course, if you don't believe in me, I'll fly away on a
sunbeam."

"Oh, please! Don't say that! I'm doing my best."

So panic-stricken was the appeal that she laughed again, in spite
of herself.

"Ah, that's better! Now, come, be honest with me. You're not
pretty, are you?"

"Me? I'm as lovely as the dawn."

"So far, so good. And have you got long golden--that is to say,
silken hair that floats almost to your knees?"

"Certainly," she replied, with spirit.

"Is it plentiful enough so that you could spare a little?"

"Are you asking me for a lock of my hair?" she queried, on a note
of mirth. "For a stranger, you go fast."

"No; oh, no!" he protested. "Nothing so familiar. I'm offering you
a bribe for conversation at the price of, say, five hairs, if you
can sacrifice so many."

"It sounds delightfully like voodoo," she observed. "What must I
do with them?"

"First, catch your hair. Well up toward the head, please. Now pull
it out. One, two, three--yank!"

"Ouch!" said the voice above.

"Do it again. Now have you got two?"

"Yes."

"Knot them together."

There was a period of silence.

"It's very difficult," complained the girl.

"Because you're doing it in silence. There must be sprightly
conversation or the charm won't work. Talk!"

"What about?"

"Tell me who you thought I was when you said, 'Boo!' at me."

"A goose."

"A--a GOOSE! Why--what--"

"Doesn't one proverbially say 'Boo!' to a goose?" she remarked
demurely.

"If one has the courage. Now, I haven't. I'm shy."

"Shy! You?" Again the delicious trill of her mirth rang in his
ears. "I should imagine that to be the least of your troubles."

"No! Truly." There was real and anxious earnestness in his
assurance. "It's because I don't see you. If I were face to face
with you, I'd stammer and get red and make a regular imbecile of
myself. Another reason why I stick down here and decline to yield
to temptation."

"O wise young man! ARE you young? Ouch!"

"Reasonably. Was that the last hair?"

"Positively! I'm scalped. You're a red Indian."

"Tie it on. Now, fasten a hairpin on the end and let it down. All
right. I've got it. Wait!" The fragile line of communication
twitched for a moment. "Haul, now. Gently!"

Up came the thread, and, as its burden rose over the face of the
rock, the girl gave a little cry of delight:--

"How exquisite! Orchids, aren't they?"

"Yes, the golden-brown bee orchid. Just your coloring."

"So it is. How do you know?" she asked, startled.

"From the hair. And your eyes have gold flashes in the brown when
the sun touches them."

"Your wits are YOUR eyes. But where do you get such orchids?"

"From my little private garden underneath the rock."

"Life will be a dull and dreary round unless I see that garden."

"No! I say! Wait! Really, now, Miss--er--" There was panic in the
protest.

"Oh, don't be afraid. I'm only playing with your fears. One look
at you as you chased your absurd spectacles was enough to satisfy
my curiosity. Go in peace, startled fawn that you are."

"Go nothing! I'm not going. Neither are you, I hope, until you've
told me lots more about yourself."

"All that for a spray of orchids?"

"But they are quite rare ones."

"And very lovely."

The girl mused, and a sudden impulse seized her to take the unseen
acquaintance at his word and free her mind as she had not been
able to do to any living soul for long weeks. She pondered over
it.

"You aren't getting ready to go?" he cried, alarmed at her long
silence.

"No; I'm thinking."

"Please think aloud."

"I was thinking--suppose I did."

There was so much of weighty consideration in her accents that the
other fear again beset him.

"Did what? Not come down from the rock?" "Be calm. I shouldn't
want to face you any more than you want to face me, if I decided
to do it."

"Go on," he encouraged. "It sounds most promising."

"More than that. It's fairly thrilling. It's the awful secret of
my life that I'm considering laying bare to you, just like a dime
novel. Are you discreet?"

"As the eternal rocks. Prescribe any form of oath and I'll take
it."

"I'm feeling just irresponsible enough to venture. Now, if I knew
you, of course I couldn't. But as I shall never set eyes on you
again--I never shall, shall I?"

"Not unless you creep up on me unawares."

"Then I'll unburden my overweighted heart, and you can be my augur
and advise me with supernatural wisdom. Are you up to that?"

"Try me."

"I will. But, remember: this means truly that we are never to
meet. And if you ever do meet me and recognize my voice, you must
go away at once."

"Agreed," he said cheerfully, just a bit too cheerfully to be
flattering.

"Very well, then. I'm a runaway."

"From where?"

"Home."

"Naturally. Where's home?"

"Utica, New York," she specified.

"U.S.A.," he concluded, with a sigh. "What did you run away from?"

"Trouble."

"Does any one ever run away from anything else?" he inquired
philosophically. "What particular brand?"

"Three men," she said dolorously. "All after poor little me. They
all thought I ought to marry them, and everybody else seemed to
think so, too--"

"Go slow! Did you say Utica or Utah?"

"Everybody thought I ought to marry one or the other of 'em, I
mean. If I could have married them all, now, it might have been
easier, for I like them ever so much. But how could I make up my
mind? So I just seized papa around the neck and ran away with him
down here."

"Why here, of all places on earth?"

"Oh, he's interested in some mines and concessions and things.
It's very beautiful, but I almost wish I'd stayed at home and
married Bobby."

"Which is Bobby?"

"He's one of the home boys. We've grown up together, and I'm so
fond of him. Only it's more the brother-and-sister sort of thing,
if he'd let it be."

"Check off No. 1. What's No. 2?"

"Lots older. Mr. Thomas Murray Smith is an unspoiled millionaire.
If he weren't so serious and quite so dangerously near forty--
well, I don't know."

"Have you kept No. 3 for the last because he's the best?"

"No-o-o-o. Because he's the nearest. He followed me down. You can
see his name in all its luster on the Hotel Kast register, when
you get back to the city--Preston Fairfax Fitzhugh Carroll, at
your service."

"Sounds Southern," commented the man below.

"Southern! He's more Southern than the South Pole. His ancestors
fought all the wars and owned all the negroes--he calls them
'niggers'--and married into all the first families of Virginia,
and all that sort of thing. He must quite hate himself, poor Fitz,
for falling in love with a little Yankee like me. In fact, that's
why I made him do it."

"And now you wish he hadn't?"

"Oh--well--I don't know. He's awfully good-looking and gallant and
devoted and all that. Only he's such a prickly sort of person. I'd
have to spend the rest of my life keeping him and his pride out of
trouble. And I've no taste for diplomacy. Why, only last week he
declined to dine with the President of the Republic because some
one said that his excellency had a touch of the tar brush."

"He'd better get out of this country before that gets back to
headquarters."

"If he thought there was danger, he'd stay forever. I don't
suppose Fitz is afraid of anything on earth. Except perhaps of
me," she added after-thoughtfully.

"Young woman, you're a shameless flirt!" accused the invisible one
in stern tones.

"If I am, it isn't going to hurt you. Besides, I'm not. And,
anyway, who are you to judge me? You're not here as a judge;
you're an augur. Now, go on and aug."

"Aug?" repeated the other hesitantly.

"Certainly. Do an augury. Tell me which."

"Oh! As for that, it's easy. None."

"Why not?"

"Because I much prefer to think of you, when you are gone, as
unmarried. It's more in character with your voice."

"Well, of all the selfish pigs! Condemned to be an old maid, in
order not to spoil an ideal! Perhaps you'd like to enter the lists
yourself," she taunted.

"Good Heavens, no!" he cried in the most unflattering alarm. "It
isn't in my line--I mean I haven't time for that sort of thing.
I'm a very busy man."

"You look it! Or you did look it, scrambling about like a doodle
bug after your absurd spectacles."

"There is no such insect as a doodle bug."

"Isn't there? How do you know? Are you personally acquainted with
all the insect families?"

"Certainly. That's my business. I'm a scientist."

"Oh, gracious! And I've appealed to you in a matter of sentiment!
I might better have stuck to Fitz. Poor Fitz! I wonder if he's
lost."

"Why should he be lost?"

"Because I lost him. Back there on the trail. Purposely. I sent
him for water and then--I skipped."

"Oh-h-h! Then HE'S the goose."

"Goose! Preston Fairfax Fitz--"

"Yes, the goose you said 'Boo!' to, you know."

"Of course. You didn't steal his hat, did you?"

"No. It's my own hat. Why did you run away from him?"

"He bored me. When people bore me, I always run away. I'm
beginning to feel quite fugitive this very minute."

There was silence below, a silence that piqued the girl.

"Well," she challenged, "haven't you anything to say before the
court passes sentence of abandonment to your fate?"

"I'm thinking--frantically. But the thoughts aren't girl thoughts.
I mean, they wouldn't interest you. I might tell you about some of
my insects," he added hopefully.

"Heaven forbid!"

"They're very interesting."

"No. You're worthless as an augur, and a flat failure as a
conversationalist, when thrown on your own resources. So I shall
shake the dust from my feet and depart."

"Good-bye!" he said desolately. "And thank you."

"For what?"

"For making music in my desert."

"That's much better," she approved. "But you've paid your score
with the orchids. If you have one or two more pretty speeches like
that in stock, I might linger for a while."

"I'm afraid I'm all out of those," he returned. "But," he added
desperately, "there's the hexagonal scarab beetle. He's awfully
queer and of much older family even than Mr. Fitzwhizzle's. It is
the hexagonal scarab's habit when dis--"

"We have an encyclopaedia of our own at home," she interrupted
coldly. "I didn't climb this mountain to talk about beetles."

"Well, I'll talk some more about you, if you'll give me a little
time to think."

"I think you are very impertinent. I don't wish to talk about
myself. Just because I asked your advice in my difficulties, you
assume that I'm a little egoist--"

"Oh, please don't--"

"Don't interrupt. I'm very much offended, and I'm glad we are
never going to meet. Just as I was beginning to like you, too,"
she added, with malice. "Good-bye!"

"Good-bye," he answered mournfully.

But his attentive ears failed to discern the sound of departing
footsteps. The breeze whispered in the tree-tops. A sulphur-yellow
bird, of French extraction, perched in a flowering bush,
insistently demanded: "Qu'est-ce qu'il dit? Qu'est-ce qu'il dit?"
--What's he say? WHAT'S he say?--over and over again, becoming
quite wrathful because neither he nor any one else offered the
slightest reply or explanation. The girl sympathized with the
bird. If the particular he whose blond top she could barely see by
peeping over the rock would only say something, matters would be
easier for her. But he didn't. So presently, in a voice of
suspiciously saccharine meekness, she said:--

"Please, Mr. Beetle Man, I'm lost."

"No, you're not," he said reassuringly. "You're not a quarter of a
mile from the Puerto del Norte Road."

"But I don't know which direction--"

"Perfectly simple. Keep on over the top of the rock; turn left
down the slope, right up the dry stream bed to a dead tree; bear
right past--"

