"I'm glad you didn't take the black-eyed one," said Nan when number three was finally set aside. "She looked as hard as nails and I know she and Jack would have been scrapping half the time. Do, dear Aunt Helen, pick out a nice, pretty, amiable somebody whom we can respect and yet who isn't the bossy kind."
"You'll have to reconcile yourselves to obeying a governess, Nan," said Miss Helen smiling.
"Oh, we'll obey all right; see if we don't, but Jack and I do hate to be visibly bossed. We don't mind it so much when people don't make a sharp point of things in that severe kind of way some people, like Aunt Sarah, for instance, have. We don't have much respect either for people who let us walk over them, so please get a governess that is just right."
"I'll try," returned her aunt gravely, for she took the remarks to heart.
CHAPTER VI
SEÑORITA
It was in old Sonora town that Miss Helen came across Señorita Dolores Mendez de Garcia. This part of the city always fascinated Miss Helen and she took frequent walks through the ancient streets bordered by the houses built a century before and occupied by the former Spanish residents. But a few of these now remained, though the quaint one-storied, adobe structures, with their deep-niched windows, spoke eloquently of a former régime. It was at the door of one of the best preserved of these houses that there stood a dark-eyed girl as Miss Helen passed by. Her fair skin and soft brown hair marked her as unlike her dark-complexioned neighbors, and when she picked up the handkerchief which Miss Helen accidentally dropped she returned it saying, "Permit me to return your handkerchief, madam." It was then that Miss Helen marked the girl's grace and refinement. "Surely," she said to herself, "she is a descendant of some blue-blooded hidalgo. I should like to know more of her." Then as a sudden thought struck her she said to the girl, "Could you recommend to me a good teacher of Spanish? I wish to take a few lessons."
The warm color spread over the girl's soft cheeks as she replied hesitatingly: "Perhaps if madame will allow me to call upon her I shall be able to give her the information she desires."
Miss Helen gave her address and made an appointment for the next day, then she went on her way wondering if she had been too impulsive. The appointment was promptly kept and the conference was a long one. Mrs. Corner was finally called in and the session continued behind closed doors.
"What in the world do you suppose they can be talking about all this time?" said Nan to Mary Lee as the two swung in a hammock on the veranda. "They've been there hours I do believe."