She drew herself up with a slight air of offence. "If you want nothing why do you come down into the valley?" she asked. "You say you hate the Plaza!" "I do!" and he spoke almost vindictively--"But, at the moment, there's some one there I want to see." Her black eyes opened inquisitively. "A man?" "No. Strange to say, a woman." A sudden light flashed on her mind. "I know!" she exclaimed--"But you will not see her! She has gone!" "What do you mean?" he asked, impatiently--"What do you know?" "Oh, I know nothing!" and there was a sobbing note of pathos in her voice--"But I feel HERE!"--and she pressed her hands against her bosom--"something tells me that you have seen HER--the little wonderful white woman, sweetly perfumed like a rose,--with her silks and jewels and her fairy car!--and her golden hair... ah!--you said you hated a woman with golden hair! Is that the woman you hate?" He stood looking at her with an amused, half scornful expression. "Hate is too strong a word"--he answered--"She isn't worth hating!" Her brows contracted in a frown. "I do not believe THAT!"--she said--"You are not speaking truly. More likely it is, I think, you love her!" He caught her roughly by the arm. "Stop that!" he exclaimed, angrily--"You are foolish and insolent! Whether I love or hate anybody or anything is no affair of yours! How dare you speak to me as if it were!" She shrank away from him. Her lips quivered, and tears welled through her lashes. "Forgive me! ... oh, forgive!" she murmured, pleadingly--"I am sorry!..." "So you ought to be!" he retorted--"You--Manella--imagine yourself in love with me ... yes, you do!--and you cannot leave me alone! No amorous man ever cadged round for love as much or as shamelessly as an amorous woman! Then you see another woman on the scene, and though she's nothing but a stray visitor at the Plaza where you help wash up the plates and dishes, you suddenly conceive a lot of romantic foolery in your head and imagine me to be mysteriously connected with her! Oh, for God's sake don't cry! It's the most awful bore! There's nothing to cry for. You've set me up like a sort of doll in a shrine and you want to worship me--well!--I simply won't be worshipped. As for your 'little wonderful white woman sweetly perfumed like a rose,' I don't mind saying that I know her. And I don't mind also telling you that she came up the hill last night to ferret me out." Step by step Manella drew nearer, her eyes blazing. "She went to see you?--She did THAT!--In the darkness?--like a thief or a serpent!" He laughed aloud. "No thief and no serpent in it!" he said--"And no darkness, but in the full light of the moon! Such a moon it was, too! A regular stage moon! A perfect setting for such an actress, in her white gown and her rope of gold hair! Yes--it was very well planned!--effective in its way, though it left me cold!"