If there was one young man who, more than any other, caused these angry symptoms to appear it was the Count Almonte. His attentions had become annoying. She had told him that his flattery was distasteful; that her betrothed was Pedro Mantanez, the boatman, and that they were waiting to be married only until their savings had reached a certain figure. After one of these dismissals of more than usual frankness, the count went to his apartments in town, arrayed himself in his uniform of honorary lieutenant of the guards, asked the commandant to let him have an escort of half a dozen men, as he expected trouble at his country-place at Cerito, and within an hour or two appeared before Miralda's little shop. He entered this time with an easy, confident air and an evil smile. "You must come with me, my beauty," he said, trying to chuck her under the chin. "Leave my place at once, senor. I have nothing more to say to you." "Oh, but I have much to say to you; and to begin with, I have a warrant for your arrest." "Arrest!" "For theft,--the theft of a heart,--my heart." "Your jokes are always in such wretched taste. Your heart! You never had one." "Then my duty becomes all the easier. You see this paper? It is an order for your arrest. Will you go quietly, or do you prefer to go under guard of a whole company." Astonished, confused, afraid, yet hoping that one of those wretched pleasantries known as practical jokes would be the upshot of this seeming outrage, the girl locked her door, allowed the count to assist her into the carriage that was in waiting, and was rapidly driven, not to the jail, not to the forts, not to the police office, but out of town--to Cerito. He assisted her to alight, urged her hastily in at the door of a handsome residence, where she was received by a couple of servants, and escorted to a large, comfortably furnished apartment, with windows barred after the fashion usual in Spanish houses. "This, my pretty one, is your home for the future," explained the count, dropping easily upon a divan and lighting a cigar. "What place is this?" "It is my house. Ah, but it shall be yours, if only you are kind. It is for you to say how long you will be a prisoner." "But the arrest--the order----" "Ha! ha! Mere sham. I was bound to have you in one way, if I could not get you in another. All's fair in love and war. You made war. I made love." There was an explosion of wrath, of scorn, of hate; there were tears, cries, prayers, threats, promises. Count Almonte merely laughed, and left the young woman to weep herself into a state of resignation or exhaustion.