Nanca has fled from the Indian village with Grant and me. Oh, Ann, it had to come! I lost my head. The old Spaniard died three days ago. That was the cause of it. Nanca's grief was wild and terrible. Her wailing dirge was all Indian, yet immediately she cried out that the Indian way of life for her was impossible without her father. She begged me to take her away. And yet--Oh, Ann, Ann! How could I take that other man's child? We left her outside the old chief's wigwam. Much as I have scoffed at marriage, I have married Nanca. Grant insisted. He was a little bitter. I do not know what makes him so. I have seen Dad. We quarreled bitterly. Agatha was there with him. I can hardly write what followed. By some God-forsaken twist of Fate, a jealous, sullen-eyed young Indian who had loved Nanca and had been spurned by her father, followed us relentlessly from the Glades to St. Augustine. He told Dad that Nanca had not been married to the artist--that she was a mother and not a wife--and Dad believed it. I told him patiently enough that there is no ceremony among the Seminoles--that the man goes forth to the home of the girl at the setting of the sun, and that he is then as legally her husband as if all the courts in Christendom had tied the knot. Dad can not see it. I shall be in New York in two weeks. Nanca and I are going to Spain. I can not forget Dad's white, horror-struck face nor what he said. He is bigoted and unjust. God help me, I hope that I may never set eyes upon him again! * * * * * * We have been very happy here in Spain. I have run across a wonderful old room in a Spanish castle. Ceiling, doors, fireplace, paintings, table, chairs and lanterns, I am transplanting. What a setting for Nanca! We are sailing for home. Nanca is not so well as I could hope. She grieves, I think, for the little girl in Florida. There are times when I am bitterly jealous of those two other men. There was a lapse of weeks in the letters. Then came a long one from New York. Grant came that night just after you had gone. He has been with me a week. His notions are more erratic than ever. For instance, last night, while we were smoking, I told him the story of Prince Theodomir. He was greatly interested. "What a chance!" said he softly. "What a chance, Norman, for wild commotion in your ridiculous little court. I've been there. It's a kingdom of crazy patriots who grant freedom of marital choice to their princes to freshen and strengthen the royal blood; and they boast an ancient line of queens wiser than Catherine of Russia. A hidden paper purporting to be a deathbed statement of Prince Theodomir's--this little daughter of Nanca and the artist--and, Lord! what complications we could have immediately. How easily she might have been the child of Theodomir and a princess!"