"I never regretted it till last week. It will never be the same again."
Mrs. Hovey looked at him with supreme disdain.
"I suppose you mean Senora Ramal," said she scornfully.
Her husband, feigning the utmost woe, nodded mournfully; whereupon she began humming the air of the Chanson du Colonel, and was stopped by a smothering kiss.
"And who is the Senora Ramal?" I asked.
"The most beautiful woman in the world," said Mrs. Hovey.
This from a woman who was herself beautiful! Amazing! I suppose my face betrayed my thought.
"It isn't charity," she smiled. "Like John Holden, I have seen fire-balloons by the hundred, I have seen the moon, and—then I saw no more fire-balloons."
"But who is she?"
Hovey explained. "She is the wife of Senor Ramal. They came here some ten days ago, with letters to one or two of the best families, and that's all we know about them. The senora is an entrancing mixture of Cleopatra, Sappho, Helen of Troy, and the devil. She had the town by the ears in twenty-four hours, and you wouldn't wonder at it if you saw her."
Already I felt that I knew, but I wanted to make sure.
"Byron has described her," I suggested, "in Childe Harold."
"Hardly," said Hovey. "No midnight beauty for hers, thank you. Her hair is the most perfect gold. Her eyes are green; her skin remarkably fair. What she may be is unknowable, but she certainly is not Spanish; and, odder still, the senor himself fits the name no better."
But I thought it needless to ask for a description of Harry; for I had no doubt of the identity of Senor Ramal and his wife. I pondered over the name, and suddenly realized that it was merely "Lamar" spelled backward!
The discovery removed the last remaining shadow of doubt.
I asked in a tone of assumed indifference for their hotel, expressing a desire to meet them—and was informed by Hovey that they had left Denver two days previously, nor did he know where they had gone.
Thus did I face another obstacle. But I was on the track; and the perfume of a woman's beauty is the strongest scent in the world as well as the sweetest. I thanked my cousin for a pleasant evening—though he did not know the extent of my debt to him—and declined his urgent invitation to have my luggage brought to his home.
On my way to the hotel I was struck by a sudden thought: Senor Ramal could not be my brother or my cousin would have recognized him! But I immediately reflected that the two had not seen each other for some ten years, at which time Harry had been a mere boy.
The following morning, with little difficulty, I ascertained the fact that the Ramals had departed—at least ostensibly—for Colorado Springs.
I followed. That same evening, when I registered at the Antlers Hotel, a few minutes before the dinner hour, I turned over two pages of the book, and there before me was the entry, "Senor and Senora Ramal, Paris." It was in Harry's handwriting.
After dinner—a most excellent dinner, with melons from La Junta and trout from the mountain streams—I descended on the hotel clerk with questions. He was most obliging—a sharp, pleasant fellow, with prominent ears and a Rocky Mountain twang.
"Senor and Senora Ramal? Most assuredly, sir. They have been here several days. No, they are not now in the hotel. They left this afternoon for Manitou, to take dinner there, and are going to make the night trip up the Peak."
An idea immediately suggested itself to me. They would, of course, return to the hotel in the morning. All I had to do was to sit down and wait for them; but that would have been dull sport. My idea was better.
I sought out the hotel's wardrobe—there is nothing the Antlers will not do for you—and clothed myself in khaki, leggings, and boots. Then I ordered a car and set out for Manitou, at the foot of the mountain.
By ten o'clock I was mounted on a donkey, headed for the top, after having been informed by a guide that "the man and the beautiful lady" had departed an hour previous.
Having made the ascent twice before, I needed no guide. So I decided; but I regretted the decision. Three times I lost the path; once I came perilously near descending on the village below—well, without hesitation. It was well after midnight when I passed the Half-way House, and I urged my donkey forward with a continual rat-a-tat-tat of well-directed kicks in the effort to make my goal.
You who have experienced the philosophical calm and superb indifference of the Pike's Peak donkey may imagine the vocabulary I used on this occasion—I dare not print it. Nor did his speed increase.
I was, in fact, a quarter of an hour late. I was still several hundred yards from the summit when the sun's first rays shot through the thin atmosphere, creating colorful riot among the clouds below, and I stopped, holding my breath in awe.
There is no art nor poetry in that wonderful sight; it is glorious war. The sun charges forth in a vast flame of inconceivable brilliance; you can almost hear the shout of victory. He who made the universe is no artist; too often He forgets restraint, and blinds us.
I turned, almost regretting that I had come, for I had been put out of tune with my task. Then I mounted the donkey and slowly traversed the few remaining yards to the Peak.
There, seated in the dazzling sunshine on the edge of a huge boulder near the eastern precipice, were the two I sought.
Le Mire's head was turned from me as she sat gazing silently at the tumbling, gorgeous mass of clouds that seemed almost to be resting on her lap; Harry was looking at her. And such a look!
There was no rival even in nature that could conquer Le Mire; never, I believe, did woman achieve a more notable victory than hers of that morning. I watched them for several minutes before I moved or spoke; and never once did Harry's eyes leave her face.
Then I advanced a step, calling his name; and they turned and caught sight of me.
"Paul!" cried Harry, leaping to his feet; then he stopped short and stared at me half defiantly, half curiously, moving close to Le Mire and placing his hand on her shoulder like a child clinging to a toy.
His companion had not moved, except to turn her head; but after the first swift shadow of surprise her face brightened with a smile of welcome, for all the world as though this were a morning call in her boudoir.
"Senor and Senora Ramal, I believe?" said I with a smile, crossing to them with an exaggerated bow.
I could see Harry cocking his ear to catch the tone of my first words, and when he heard their friendliness a grin overspread his face. He took his hand from Le Mire's shoulder and held it out to me.
"How did you come here? How did you find us?"
"You forgot to provide Le Mire with a veil," said I by way of answer.
Harry looked at me, then at his companion. "Of course," he agreed—"of course. By Jove! that was stupid of us."
Whereupon Le Mire laughed with such frank enjoyment of the boy's simplicity that I couldn't help but join her.
"And
