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to drive them down to the harbour, whence the Ceres was to carry them
off into the Olympus of plutocrats. Captain Mitchell had snatched at the
occasion of leave-taking to remark to Mrs. Gould, in a low, confidential
mutter, "This marks an epoch."

Mrs. Gould loved the patio of her Spanish house. A broad flight of stone
steps was overlooked silently from a niche in the wall by a Madonna in
blue robes with the crowned child sitting on her arm. Subdued voices
ascended in the early mornings from the paved well of the quadrangle,
with the stamping of horses and mules led out in pairs to drink at the
cistern. A tangle of slender bamboo stems drooped its narrow, blade-like
leaves over the square pool of water, and the fat coachman sat muffled
up on the edge, holding lazily the ends of halters in his hand.
Barefooted servants passed to and fro, issuing from dark, low doorways
below; two laundry girls with baskets of washed linen; the baker with
the tray of bread made for the day; Leonarda--her own camerista--bearing
high up, swung from her hand raised above her raven black head, a bunch
of starched under-skirts dazzlingly white in the slant of sunshine. Then
the old porter would hobble in, sweeping the flagstones, and the
house was ready for the day. All the lofty rooms on three sides of
the quadrangle opened into each other and into the corredor, with its
wrought-iron railings and a border of flowers, whence, like the lady of
the mediaeval castle, she could witness from above all the departures
and arrivals of the Casa, to which the sonorous arched gateway lent an
air of stately importance.

She had watched her carriage roll away with the three guests from the
north. She smiled. Their three arms went up simultaneously to their
three hats. Captain Mitchell, the fourth, in attendance, had already
begun a pompous discourse. Then she lingered. She lingered, approaching
her face to the clusters of flowers here and there as if to give time
to her thoughts to catch up with her slow footsteps along the straight
vista of the corredor.

A fringed Indian hammock from Aroa, gay with coloured featherwork, had
been swung judiciously in a corner that caught the early sun; for the
mornings are cool in Sulaco. The cluster of _flor de noche buena_ blazed
in great masses before the open glass doors of the reception rooms. A
big green parrot, brilliant like an emerald in a cage that flashed like
gold, screamed out ferociously, "_Viva Costaguana!_" then called twice
mellifluously, "Leonarda! Leonarda!" in imitation of Mrs. Gould's voice,
and suddenly took refuge in immobility and silence. Mrs. Gould reached
the end of the gallery and put her head through the door of her
husband's room.

Charles Gould, with one foot on a low wooden stool, was already
strapping his spurs. He wanted to hurry back to the mine. Mrs. Gould,
without coming in, glanced about the room. One tall, broad bookcase,
with glass doors, was full of books; but in the other, without shelves,

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