"No, I am a loaver, Blanca, not von cold Nordthern zhentleman, who haf so leedle heart it can be hush, and zo dthin, poor blood it nefer rush fire at a voman's touch. Blanca, I haf been still for days, vaiting for dthis hour. I loaf you, darling, till all my life is nodthing but von longing--I loaf you till I haf no conscience, no _religion_ but my loaf. No, you shall not spik now! Blanca, you must marry me, _here_ in Guatemala. You and I go not back to _San Miguel_ unless you air my vife." "Baron!" "Hush! Spik not so loud, and if you vill not make me mad call me not Baron." An awful sense of loneliness chokes me. The streets of that buried Aztec city are not more silent than this one in Guatemala. "Guillermo, listen! I have no friend here but you; you must take me back to Mrs. Steele. Come!" "How vell you know men! But not _me_, Blanca--not a Peruvian. I know it ees better for you, as vell as for myself, dthat you marry me. You haf nefer been so gentle and so gude as since I hold you near dthat baranca. But you did not like it! You loaf me, but you air like a vild deer; you air so easy startle, and so hard to hold. But I vill be zo gude to Blanca, I vill make her glad I vas so strong not to let her haf her own way. If you keess me and zay before God you marry me, I take you back to Casa 47--if not, Madame Steele go alone to _San Miguel_." [Illustration: "YOU MUST TAKE ME BACK!"--_Page 210_] "Baron de Bach, you're talking crazy nonsense. You don't frighten me, but you _do_ disgust me. You think to get some Peruvian amusement out of frightening a woman; well, you had better go to a bull-fight. I detest you! Let me go or I'll cry out!" He puts one hand over my mouth and holds me as in a vise. "Dthank you, Blanca! You gif me courage. I haf tell you how a Peruvian loaf; I vill tell you how he plan. In dthe bay off Panama ees my yacht. I vill keep you in Guatemala vhile I send for her, and dthen ve go to Peru, to Ceylon--anyvhere you like but America. I write Madame Steele you air my vife, and she vill soon zee ve air not to be find; she vill go back to New York. It ees no use dthat you cry out, no von hear, or if von do, you spik no Spanish, and I haf my pistol if any interfere. I tell you so much dthat you make no meestake. Ve air not far from dthe house of two old friends of me. Dthey vill take care off you, till my yacht come; you need not fear me, Senorita." He loosens his grasp for an instant, and the dark street seems to whirl. I would have fallen if he had not caught me. I hear, as one dreaming, the caressing words of Spanish--I scarcely feel the hot kisses. "I'm all alone," I think, looking down the silent street to a far-off lamp, and then up to the brilliant sky, but even that seems strange, for instead of my old friends in heaven, the Southern Cross shines cold and far above me.