It was the voice of a nervous, frightened girl--not of a royal personage--this time. Just then she heard a knock on the cabin door. There was no time for a response. "Quiet! Be careful!" she cautioned, _sotto voce_. As she hurried to the door, she pulled her taut nerves together. There on the threshold was her kinsman: Nita had been right as usual, in her sharp way. Carlos, Duke of Alva, with smiling lips and sinister eyes, greeted her with the suave courtesy which is so characteristic of his race and class. He typified the worst of the Spanish folk, even as the young girl did the best. To a keen student of physiognomy the mental attitude of the Duke of Alva would have been an open book. To Maria Theresa, loyal to family and countrymen, he was the symbol of her own strata in Spain--yet, beneath her gracious forgiveness of and enforced indifference to many things, there lurked a latent mistrust, which she had never yet defined in practical, applicable terms. With white teeth, crisp-curling black hair, and eyes of sparkling coal-shade, the Duke of Alva bowed with that polished grace which had broken many a heart and carried him over many a stretch of thin ice, in the courtly adventuring on the Continent. "Carlos!" exclaimed the Princess. "Fair cousin--if I but knew you were as pleased, as you are surprised, at seeing me!" With the words he advanced and kissed her cold finger-tips with Old-World punctiliousness. "What are you doing on the _Mauretania_? Why did you leave Spain, Carlos?" As he shut the door he smiled, and now her intuition warned her of the cunning which lurked behind those pleasantly curving lips. "First tell me that you are glad to see me! I have come many leagues to hear those words, Maria!" "Why.... Why,... of course, I am always glad to see you, cousin." He simulated a pathetic irony. "You say you are always glad to see me--and yet, I fear it is not _always_ since my unfortunate quarrel with your brother. Alas, and that has hardened your heart against me." The Duke was a suitor of the romantic school: each phrase was studied, each attitude as obviously planned as a military campaign. It was a method which had invariably succeeded, until his efforts with the Princess of Aragon. Yet, he was too satisfied with bygone results to abandon the time-tried artistries of former victories. The Princess dropped her eyes before the undeniable questioning of his burning glances. As she looked away, he assured himself that he had scored. "My brother ... what do you know of him, Carlos? When did you see him last? Have you been in Seguro?" Two long whistles, and the vibration of the great steamship evidenced the beginning of the long voyage. The answer to the questions was still more pathetic in cadence.