"I will tell you how I first met her," he continued dreamily, with his sad eyes fixed on the sea. "It was on Broadway. I saw a beautiful, young, dark-eyed girl crossing the street in such a careless, preoccupied fashion that she only escaped death from the hoofs of an advancing team by the celerity with which I sprang forward and dragged her out of the way. As it was, she had been thrown down and trampled on, and as I laid her down on the pavement I at first believed her dead. She was dressed in costly garments, made in a quaint, foreign fashion that, with her dark eyes and hair and olive skin, proclaimed her Spanish. A crowd gathered around, but no one could tell who she was, so, as she remained unconscious, a physician was called, and she was removed to the hospital. "The hoofs of the horses had severely injured the poor girl, and she remained at the hospital several weeks. I saw her daily, for it is needless to tell you that the first moment I saw her I lost my heart. I won Pepita's friendship, and she told me she was a Spanish girl, an orphan, who had come to America from old Madrid to seek an only brother in New York, only to find him dead. Of this brother she told me a romantic story. On attaining his majority, some years before, her brother had come to America, and had met in New York a beautiful, poor girl, whom he made his bride. On taking her home to Spain his proud parents had refused to receive their son's choice, and in anger he returned to America, never to see them again. "In a few years misfortune overtook them. They became poor and miserable, and longed for the son they had cast off in their pride. They died, and their only remaining child, beautiful Pepita, crossed the seas to find her brother. On the day that I saved her life she had just learned that her brother and his wife were both dead. Despair made her reckless. Alone and friendless in a strange land, with but a few dollars in her purse, she wandered along, wondering if she could ever return to her native land. "The tears blinded her as she crossed the street, and she did not notice that she was under the horses' heads until they trampled her beneath their feet. You guess the end, my friends. I married the lovely Spanish stranger, although my friends blamed me, and for a year we were blissfully happy. We traveled several months, and it was in Paris I had the serpent ring made especially for her and the design destroyed. She had a great fondness for unique trifles, and I always gratified her fancy to the utmost in everything. We returned to this country, and over our home Pepita reigned a lovely queen, seeming not to have a wish ungratified. Our happiness seemed as pure and perfect as mortals could enjoy.