"No, I don't forget; but there are high class and low of every race. Noble Indians and high-class Mexicans have gone into history. The American makes a great mistake when he judges the high classes by the masses. In this land one has to dig out the facts of each individual line, if he wants to know the truth of a pedigree. But the lady from Mexico seems to have drawn her distinctions very closely, and realizing her own superiority, she dares dictate." "Even to her--husband?" There was just the slightest possible hesitation at the title. "Why not, if she is the superior?" "But--oh, can't you see how all these marriages are a barter-and-sale family affair,--money that is married, instead of people? If she was in love with him as a--a real woman would be, she never would know she was superior, never! Not that I believe she is," she added with a shrug; "to me she looks as wooden as the saints on her own altar." He arose and walked to the window, staring out over the heads of the people. "She may not be wooden to those she cares for," he said at last. "Perhaps not; but I'm certain of one thing: if she ever cared for any one, it is not the man she married. If she cared, she would forget that rigid fanatic sense of duty sometimes." "I came to talk of your affairs," he said, abruptly. "Teddy left some mining shares; they may pan out later on. I have talked with a lawyer about them; this is his address," and he handed her a slip of paper. "Whatever funds are procurable he will turn over to you quarterly. Is there anything else I can do for you at present?" "Yes," she returned; "you might be a bit human and sympathetic. You seem to forget," and her red lip quivered in self-pity, "how utterly alone I am among these Mexicans, and all their women jealous as fiends." He regarded her with a long, steady stare, and then smiled as he rose. "I don't blame them," he observed, quietly. "You have given more attention to several of their men than you ever gave to poor Ted. Where's your baby?" "Heavens! Do you suppose I could drag her on this trip, and a Mexican or Indian nurse?" she demanded, impatiently. "That's so like a man! They think a woman with a child should be merely a domestic animal, like those dunces of Spanish women. I feel as if I were in jail, hedged around with all their conventions. I don't dare walk on the street alone, or with a man; I don't dare ride in a carriage with a man, and it's no pleasure to go with those empty-headed women. Dona Maria is as bad as the rest since I'm in mourning; it is a sort of prison, forbidding the wearer a free breath!" "Take it off," he suggested, so quietly that he quite deceived her, and she uttered a little cry of shocked appeal. "Keith! And poor Teddy--" "Angela!" and his hand fell heavy on her shoulder, "listen to me just once. When Ted was alive I could bear to hear you mention his name, but now that he is dead I--can't. He belongs to me now, and I forbid it."