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And tell Don Blas, even should the reply be unfavorable, not to be discouraged. Women, you know, are peculiar. Ah, Don Alejandro, when you and I were young and went courting, would we have been discouraged by a first refusal?" Señor Travino appreciated the compliment, and, with a genial smile, slapped his host on the back, while the old matchmaker gave vent to a vociferous guffaw.
Lola and Edith May Jonas were whispering together. They had not noticed Alejandro. "The man is waiting," said the boy, in her ear. Jane touched Lola. "Keep my seat, dear," she said. "Some one wants to speak to me." And she followed Alejandro across the field. Alejandro's vagabundo came forward to meet her with an air of light cordiality.
Through the help of Padre Alejandro and an old friend of his, José had work bringing him pay which appeared absolute wealth to him. The cottage, with its good walls and roof, its neat rooms and garden, being compared with the mere hut they had left behind, seemed a palace.
Had it not been so with Pepita's mother, who died at twenty-five almost an old woman, worn out with trouble and hard usage? But afterward, when Padre Alejandro saw José, he spoke of Pepita to him also, though only as if incidentally among other things. "She should marry some good fellow who could take care of her," he said. "If you go to Madrid it will also be better for her."
Poor Alejandro! He was sound at heart, an eloquent child of the Mediterranean, born to orate in the lands of the sun, but he took it into his head that it was his duty to make himself over into the likeness of one of the putrid products of the North. A mutual friend, Antonio Gil Campos, introduced me to Silverio Lanza.
Don Alejandro was a distinguished-looking man, and spoke his native tongue in a manner which put my efforts as an interpreter to shame. The conversation was allowed to drift at will, from the damages of the recent drouth to the prospect of a market for beeves that fall, until supper was announced.
Roland had got so into the habit of taking it for granted that every Paranoyan he met must of necessity be a devotee of the beloved Alejandro that it came as a shock to him to realize that there were those who objected to his restoration to the throne. Till now he had looked on the enemy as something in the abstract.
Roland had nothing to say. He was regaining his composure, but he had a long way to go yet before he could feel thoroughly at home. King Alejandro produced a cigaret-case, and offered it to Roland, who shook his head speechlessly. The King lit a cigaret and smoked thoughtfully for a while. "You know, Mr. Bleke," he said at last, "this must stop. It really must.
"Well, Don Alejandro," said the old ranchero, "this is my limit of escort to guests of the ranch. Now, the only hope I have in parting is, in case the reply should he unfavorable, that Don Blas will not be discouraged and that we may see you again at Las Palomas.
And it is near Cali that Alejandro Tujun, a Japanese in constant touch with the Japanese Foreign Office, is at this writing dickering for the purchase of 400,000 acres of level land for "colonization." On such an acreage enough military men could be colonized to give the United States a first-class headache in time of war. It is two hours flying time from Cali to the Canal.
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