"I am confounded, general, by the trouble I have involuntarily caused among your guests. It seems that I was not expected at Pitic."
The general succeeded in regaining a little self-possession.
"I allow it, caballero," he replied. "Still the impromptu visit you have deigned to make me must be most agreeable to me, be assured."
"I hope so, general; and yet, to judge by the glances directed upon me from all sides, I may be permitted to doubt it."
"You are mistaken, señor conde," the general continued, attempting to smile. "For the last few days fame has been so occupied with you, that the eagerness of which you are now the object ought not at all to astonish you."
"I should wish, general," the count said, with a bow, "that this eagerness were more friendly. My conduct, since my arrival in Sonora, should have attracted greater sympathy toward me."
"What would you? We are savages, señor conde," the general said with a sarcastic smile; "we have the misfortune not to love what comes from foreign parts; so you must forgive us. But enough on that subject, for the present," he added, changing his tone. "As you have been kind enough to become my guest, allow me to present you officially to these ladies, who are burning to become better acquainted with you."
Don Louis yielded gracefully to the general's wishes. The latter then, affecting the most exquisite courtesy, presented his guest, as he called him, to the most influential persons at the ball. Then he led him to his daughter, who, since the count's entrance, had stood motionless, with her eyes obstinately fixed upon him.
"Señor conde," the general said, "my daughter, Doña Angela. Doña Angela, the Count Don Louis de Prébois Crancé."
Don Louis bowed respectfully before the young lady.