"Yes,--but on my way upstairs. The lift had stopped, you know. I was frightfully angry at him and said something cruel, but the next morning he looked so white and wretched and wrote me such a pathetic letter, asking me to forgive and forget and all that sort of thing, and I sent him a wire to the steamer, saying I would."

"Ah! That was his telegram. We wondered."

"And he's been very nice since, in the few letters I've had from him."

"I daresay. But Ted's right, Top Step. In the parlance of the saints you _do_ 'want to keep your lamps lit.' Carter, denied health and strength and physical glory, has had everything else he's ever wanted except you,--and he hasn't given you up yet."

Honor nodded, her face flushed, her eyes straight ahead.

"And now--more plain talk, T. S. This is a fine, sporting, rather spectacular thing you're doing, going down to Mexico after Jimsy, and I'm absolutely with you, but--if the worst should be true--if the boy really has gone to pieces--you won't marry him?"

"No," said the girl steadily, after an instant's pause. "If Jimsy should be--like his father--I wouldn't marry him, Stepper. There shouldn't be--any _more_ 'Wild Kings.' But I'd never marry any one else, and--oh, but it would be a long time to live, Stepper, dear!"

"I'm betting you'll find him in good shape,--and keep him so, Top Step.

At any rate, however it comes out, you'll always be glad you went."

"I know I will."

"Yes; you're that sort of woman, T. S.,--the 'whither thou goest' kind.

I believe women may roughly be divided into two cla.s.ses; those who pa.s.sively let themselves be loved; those who actively love. The former have the easier time of it, my dear." His tired eyes visioned his wife, now closeted with Madame. He sighed once and then he smiled. "And they get just as much in return, let me tell you,--more, I really believe.

But I want you to promise me one thing."

"What?"

"That you'll never give up your singing. Keep it always, T. S. There'll be times when you need it--to run away to--to hide in."

She nodded, soberly.

His eyes began to kindle. "Every woman ought to have something! Men have. It should be with women as with men--love a thing apart in their lives, not their whole existence! Then they wouldn't agonize and wear on each other so! I believe there's a chapter in that, for my book, Top Step."

"I'm sure there is," said Honor, warmly. They had reached the station now and a red cap came bounding for her bags. "And I won't even try to thank you, Stepper, dear, for all----"

"Don't be a goose, T. S.,--look! There are your Mexicans!"

Honor followed his eyes. "Aren't they _delicious_?" They hurried toward them. "The girl's adorable!"

"They all are." Stephen Lorimer performed the introductions with proper grace and seriousness and they all stood about in strained silence until the Senora was nervously sure they ought to be getting on board. "Might as well, T. S.," her stepfather said. She was looking rather white, he thought, and they might as well have the parting over. Honor was very steady about it. "Good-by, Stepper. I'll write you at once, and you'll keep us posted about Mr. King?" She stood on the observation platform, waving to him, gallantly smiling, and he managed his own whimsical grin until her train curved out of sight. One in a thousand, his Top Step.

How she had added to the livableness of life for him since the day she had gravely informed her mother that she believed she liked him better than her own father, that busy gentleman who had stayed so largely Down Town at The Office! Stephen Lorimer was too intensely and healthily interested in the world he was living in to indulge in pallid curiosity about the one beyond, but now his mind entertained a brief wonder ...

did he know, that long dead father of Honor Carmody, about this glorious girl of his? Did he see her now, setting forth on this quest; this pilgrimage to her True Love, as frankly and freely as she would have gone to nurse him in sickness? He grinned and gave himself a shake as he went back to the machine,--he had lost too much sleep lately. He would turn in for a nap before luncheon; Mildred would not be out of her Madame's deft hands until noon.

The family of Menendez y Garcia beamed upon Honor with shy cordiality.

Senor Menendez was a dapper little gentleman, got up with exquisite care from the perfect flower on his lapel to his small cloth-topped patent leather shoes, but his wife was older and larger and had a tiny, stern mustache which made her seem the more male and dominant figure of the two. Mariquita, the girl, was all father, and she had been a year in a Los Angeles convent. The mother wore rich but dowdy black and an impossible headgear, a rather hawklike affair which appeared to have alighted by mistake on the piles of dusky hair where it was shakily balancing itself, but Mariquita's narrow blue serge was entirely modish, and her tan pumps, and sheer amber silk hose, and her impudent hat. The Senor spent a large portion of his time in the smoker and the Senora bent over a worn prayer book or murmured under her breath as her fingers slipped over the beads in her lap, but the girl chattered unceasingly.

Her English was fluent but she had kept an intriguing accent.

"Ees he not beautiful, Mees Carmody, my Papa?" She pushed the accent forward to the first syllable. "And my poor _Madrecita_ of a homely to chill the blood? _But_ a saint, my mawther. Me, I am not so good. Also _gracias a Dios_, I am not so----" she leaned forward to regard herself in the narrow strip of mirror between the windows and--a wary eye on the Senora--applied a lip stick to her ripe little mouth. She wanted at once to know about Honor's sweethearts. "_A fe mia_--in all your life but one _novio_? Me, I have now seex. So many have I since I am twelve years I can no longer count for you!" She shrugged her perilously plump little shoulders. "One! Jus' like I mus' have a new hat, I mus' have a new _novio_!"

They were all a little formal with her until after they had left El Paso and crossed the Mexican border at Juarez, when their manner became at once easy, hospitable, proprietary. They pointed out the features of the landscape and the stations where they paused, they plied her unceasingly with the things they purchased every time the train hesitated long enough for _vendadors_ to hold up their wares at the windows,--_fresas_ (the famous strawberries in little leaf baskets), _higos_ (fat figs), _helado_ (a thin and over-sweet ice cream), and the delectable _Cajeta de Celaya_, the candy made of milk and fruit paste and magic. They were behind time and the train seemed to loiter in serenest unconcern. Senor Menendez came back from the smoker with a graver face every day. The men who came on board from the various towns brought tales of unrest and feverish excitement, of violence, even, in some localities.

If his friends could not be sure of meeting Honor at Cordoba and driving her to the Kings' _hacienda_ the Senor himself would escort her, after seeing his wife and daughter home. Honor a.s.sured him that she was not afraid, that she would be quite safe, and she was thoroughly convinced of it herself; nothing would be allowed to happen to her on her way to Jimsy.

"Your father is so good," she said gratefully to Mariquita.

"Yes," she smiled. "My Papa ees of a deeferent good; he ees glad-good, an' my _Madrecita_ ees sad-good. Me--I am _bad_-good! You know, I mus'

go to church wiz my mawther, but my Papa, he weel not go. He nevair say 'No' to my mawther; he ees _too_ kind. Jus' always on the church day he is seek. _So_ seek ees my poor Papa on the church day!" She flung back her head and laughed and showed her short little white teeth.

But Senor Menendez had an answer to his telegram on the morning of the day on which they were to part; his friend, the eminent _Profesor_, Hidalgo Morales, accompanied by his daughter, Senorita Refugio, would without fail be waiting for Miss Carmody when her train reached Cordoba and would see her safely into the hands of her friends. Honor said good-by reluctantly to the family of Menendez y Garcia; the beautiful little father kissed her hand and the grave mother gave her a blessing and Mariquita embraced her pa.s.sionately and kissed her on both cheeks and produced several entirely genuine tears. She saw them greeted by a flock of relatives and friends on the platform but they waved devotedly to her as long as she could see them. Then she had a quiet and solitary day and in the silence the old anxieties thrust out their heads again, but she drove them st.u.r.dily back, forcing herself to pay attention to the picture slipping by the car window,--the lovely languid _tierra caliente_ which was coming to meet her. The old _Profesor_ and his daughter were waiting for her; shy, kindly, earnest, less traveled than the Menendez', with a covered carriage which looked as if it might be a relic of the days of Maximilian. Conversation drowsed on the long drive to the Kings' coffee plantation; the Senorita spoke no English and Honor's High School Spanish got itself annoyingly mixed with Italian, and the old gentleman, after minute inquiries as to her journey and the state of health of his cherished friend, Senor Felipe Hilario Menendez y Garcia, sank into placid thought. It was a ridiculous day for winter, even to a Southern Californian, and the tiny villages through which they pa.s.sed looked like gay and shabby stage settings.

The _Profesor_ roused at last. "We arrive, Senorita," he announced, with a wave of his hand. They turned in at a tall gateway of lacy ironwork and Honor's heart leaped--"_El Pozo_." Richard King.

"The name is given because of the old well," the Mexican explained. "It is very ancient, very deep--without bottom, the _peons_ believe." They drew up before a charming house of creamy pink plaster and red tiles, rioted over by flowering vines. "I wait but to make sure that Senor or Senora King is at home." A soft-eyed Mexican woman came to the door and smiled at them, and there was a rapid exchange of liquid sentence. "They are both at home, Senorita. We bid you farewell."

The servant, wide-eyed and curious, had come at his command to take Honor's bags.

"Oh--but--surely you'll wait? Won't you come in and rest? It was such a long, warm drive, and you must be tired."

He bowed, hat in hand, shaking his handsome silver head. "We leave you to the embraces of your friends, Senorita. One day we will do ourselves the honor to call upon you, and Senor and Senora King, whom it is our privilege to know very slightly. For the present, we are content to have served you."

"Oh," said Honor in her hearty and honest voice, holding out a frank hand, "this is the _kindest_ country! _Every one_ has been so good to me! I wish I could thank you enough!"

The old gentleman stood very straight and a dark color surged up in his swarthy face. "Then, dear young lady, you will perhaps have the graciousness to say a pleasant word for us in that country of yours which does not love us too well! You will perhaps say we are not all barbarians." He gave an order to his coachman and the quaint old carriage turned slowly and precisely and started on its long return trip, the _Profesor_, still bareheaded, bowing, his daughter beaming and kissing her hand. Honor held herself rigidly to the task of seeing them off. Then--_Jimsy!_ Where was he? She had had a childish feeling that he would be instantly visible when she got there; she had come from Italy to Mexico,--from Florence to a coffee plantation beyond Cordoba in the _tierra caliente_ to find him,--and journeys ended in lovers' meeting, every wise man's son--and daughter--knew. The nods and becks and wreathed smiles of the serving woman brought her back to earth.

"Senora King?" She asked, dutifully, for her hostess--her unconscious hostess--first.

"_Si Senorita! p.r.o.nto!_" The servant beckoned her into a dim, cool _sala_ and disappeared. "Well, I know what that means," Honor told herself. "'Right away.' Oh, I _hope_ it's right away!"

But it was not. The Kings, like all sensible people, were at their _siesta_; twenty racking moments went by before they came in. Richard King was older than Jimsy's father but he had the same look of race and pride, and his wife was a plain, rather tired-looking Englishwoman with very white teeth and broodingly tender blue eyes which belied the briskness of her manner.

"I am Honor Carmody."

"You are----" Mrs. King came forward, frowning a little.

"I--I am engaged to your nephew--to Jimsy King. I think you must have heard of me."

"My dear, of course we have! How very nice to see you! But--how--and where did you----"

The girl interrupted breathlessly. "Oh, please,--I'll tell you everything, in a minute. But I must know about him! I came from Italy because--because of his trouble at college. Is he--is he----" she kept telling herself that she was Honor Carmody, the tomboy-girl who never cried or made scenes--Jimsy's Skipper--her dear Stepper's Top Step; she was not a silly creature in a novel; she would not scream and beg them to tell her--_tell her_--even if they stood there staring at her for hours longer. And then she heard Richard King saying in a voice very like his brother's, a little like Jimsy's:

"Why, the boy's all right! Ab-so-lutely all right! Isn't he, Madeline?

Steady as a clock. That college nonsense----"

And then Honor found herself leaning back in a marvelously comfortable chair by an open window and Mr. King was fanning her slowly and strongly and Mrs. King was making her drink something cool and pungent, and telling her it was the long, hot drive out from Cordoba in the heat of the day and that she mustn't try to talk for a little while. Honor obeyed them docilely for what she was sure was half an hour and which was in fact five minutes and then she sat up straight and decisively.

"I'm _perfectly_ all right now, thank you. Will you tell me where I can find Jimsy?"

"I expect he's taking his nap down at the old well. I'll send for him.

You must be quiet, my dear."

She got to her feet and let them see how steady she was. "_Please_ let me go to him!"