As the boat touched the sands young Reinaldo came forward with a charming grace to help the ladies to land, and was kissed by each, with effusion. Indeed, there was so much kissing, and such an immediate high shrill chattering, such a profusion of "_queridas_," and "_mijitas_," and "_mi amigas_," that Thorpe, after exchanging a few words with his host, made haste to the house. Doña Prudencia, clad in the richest of black satins, with a train a yard long and a comb six inches high, came forward to the edge of the corridor to greet him. She looked very pretty and plump and consequential. "So good you are to come, Señor Torp," she said softly, giving him her little hand with a gesture which drew down his lips at once. "I shall never forget how good you have been to ask me," he said, enthusiastically. "This picture alone was worth coming to California for." "Ay! You shall see more than theese, Señor Torp. It ees an honour to receive you in the _casa_ of the Iturbi y Moncadas. It ees yours, señor, burn it if you will. Command my servants like they are your own." Thorpe, by this time, knew something of the peculiar phrasing of native Californian hospitality, and merely bowed and murmured acknowledgments. The other guests came up at the moment, and there was another Spanish chorus, an agitated wave along the three-sided corridor. Thorpe glanced curiously about him. The black-eyed women were undulating and coquetting for the benefit of the new men, while throwing kisses and rapturous exclamations to Doña Eustaquia and the girls in her charge. Thorpe looked over more than one big fan. Suddenly his attention was attracted by a woman on the opposite corridor. She had risen, and was looking intently at Doña Eustaquia, who as yet had not glanced across the court. She was a very beautiful woman, the most beautiful woman Thorpe had seen in California, and her face was vaguely familiar. She looked very Spanish, but her hair was gold and her eyes were as green as the spring foliage. Then there was a sharp feminine shriek behind him; he was thrust aside, and Doña Eustaquia ran past him, crying, "Chonita! Chonita!" The beautiful stranger met her half way, and they embraced and kissed each other on either cheek some fifteen times. "Que! Que! Que!" the women of his party were exclaiming, and then followed a deluge of words of which he could separate only "Chonita Estenega." They, in turn, ran forward, and were received with a manner so polished that it was almost cold. Thorpe had recognised her. He had met her at a court ball in Austria, where, as the wife of the Mexican minister, she had been the most admired woman in the palace. "Is Don Diego Estenega here?" he asked Prudencia. "I met him a number of times in Vienna, and should like to meet him again." Prudencia drew up her small important person with an expression of conscious virtue that did not confine itself to her face, but made her very gown swell and rustle.