"Aunt Helen said the young lady was to tell her about a Spanish teacher," returned Mary Lee, "but I should think she must be giving a lesson herself."
"Hark, there is the piano," said Nan, "and it is not Aunt Helen playing. That surely must be a Spanish dance. Isn't it lovely? It sounds like castanets and Moorish palaces and things."
"Oh, you are so romantic, Nan," said Mary Lee; "you are always imagining all sorts of things."
"She plays well," continued Nan without heeding her sister, and listening intently to the music. "I wonder if she plays the guitar or the mandolin; I should love to hear her."
"They are coming out now," remarked Mary Lee after a pause. "She is very pretty, Nan, isn't she?"
Nan drew herself up from her lounging position and Mary Lee did the same. The movement attracted Miss Helen's attention. "Come here, girls," she said, "I want you to meet Miss de Garcia who will perhaps be your teacher for the time you will be here." Miss Helen was anxious to note the effect upon the girls, of this latest applicant.
The young lady gave a flashing smile to each of the girls and extended a slim hand. "I am pleased to meet the young ladies," she said with a slight accent and deliberate utterance. "We shall be good friends, yes?"
The girls were ready to promise friendship on the spot, and after a few more words Miss de Garcia departed promising to be on hand the next morning to begin her work.
As soon as she was out of hearing the questions began. "Where did you find her, Aunt Helen? Is she Spanish? Isn't she lovely? Are we to have Spanish lessons? Can she teach English? Oh, do tell us all about her."
"I met her quite by accident," said Miss Helen, "but I was charmed at once. I had no idea of engaging her as a teacher for you children till I learned that she was quite qualified and then it seemed as if a good providence had sent her to me. She has given me satisfactory references, and there seems no reason why she should not be everything we could desire. She speaks French as well as she does English, for she was partially educated in France at a convent there, and spent a year in England. She is an orphan who was adopted by her aunt when she was scarce more than a baby. The aunt has since died, but the girl has been living in the family of her aunt's husband where I fancy she is not entirely happy. Now the uncle has married a second time and Miss de Garcia felt that her place in the household is not such as it was during her aunt's lifetime, therefore she is very anxious to be independent for she cannot bear to be a burden upon those to whom she is not related by ties of blood. I learned this only through some little remarks she happened to make, for she made no complaints, yet I judge that is the situation."