I did hate to have father laugh at me, but I couldn't help looking at her slyly when now and then I saw her about the city. She was like no other Spanish woman I had ever seen. Most of them are as white as callas, powdered over the lashes; but you could see the strong bloom of her skin even through the thick coat of rice powder she wore, and her lashes were lovely. I noticed that because she kept them half down, and looked out through them. But the most fascinating thing about her was the way she moved, like something flowing; and once in a shop I heard her speak, and her voice was so attractive, sweet and rather thick, with such a gracious, petting sound to it! But she was always alone. With it all she seemed to be mysterious, like her quiet closed-up house. I got to making up stories about her, and sometimes in my room, in front of my mirror, I practised looking out through my lashes. But it was a nuisance, for though they weren't short they curled back so suddenly that it didn't look right; and my hair being blond and flying into corkscrews, and my being so little, and forgetting not to step on my flounces when I tried to "sweep," altogether made it rather a failure, in spite of the black lace shawl. But though I thought about her I didn't say anything more to father or Abby, because questions that hadn't bothered them when I was little seemed to worry them now. Father was for ever talking of the things I must not do. One was not to be about in our neighborhood alone. It was changing. And above all never to go over to Dupont Street, for that, he said was getting to be notorious, and he hated to have it so near. It was only a block below us, but it seemed to me very quiet, and though Mr. Rood's gambling-house was on the corner there was never any noise there, only such fine young men, and some that I knew, all the time going in and out of it. But that pleased father least of anything, and he asked me how would I like to move over to the North Beach district, where all my friends were. Talking it over with Hallie and Estrella I liked the idea very much. But when I came home again to the old house, with the long windows, and the palm, and the long steps up to the conservatory, and all the rooms I knew, the very idea that I could have thought for a moment of going away from it gave me a lump in my throat. So I had to tell father that I couldn't. He pinched my cheek, and said: "Next year, then;" and so we stayed on. This was in February, 1865. CHAPTER I THE BASKET OF MUSHROOMS