“Yes, I think I hear him.” A horse came at a quick canter up the drive. Carlotta turned to Hi.
“After my marriage,” she said, “you must come out to stay with us, if you will. There are rivers there not unlike what I should imagine yours to be, and rolling hills of grass.”
“I would love that,” he said. He looked at her, and was at once shot through with anguish to think that she was to be married to a man not good enough for her. “He has frightened her,” he thought, “or got some hold upon her, in the way these beasts do.”
Suddenly he realised that Don Manuel was there, kissing Donna Emilia’s hand; he must have come in like a panther.
“I say,” he thought, “what a man.”
All manly strength, beauty and grace moved in that figure; but the face was the extraordinary thing; it won Hi at once, partly by its power, partly by its resemblance to the bust of the young Napoleon on the landing at the Foliats. The man turned to Hi, with eyes most strange, masterful, unbearable and bright as flames. “This is an extraordinary man,” Hi thought. “Either splendid or very queer, perhaps both.” The extraordinary man greeted him in English; then burst out with:
“Ah, I am glad to see you, Mr. Ridden. Your father sixteen years ago sent me two English hunting saddles, because I rode his stallion, what? And how is your father? And how do you like Santa Barbara? Ah, your father; I was proud of those saddles; no gift have I liked so. You shall come to me at Encinitas and ride and ride. That is the life, what?”
He took Hi’s hands in both his own, in his impulsive way, and looked into his eyes, in a way that was both frightening and winning; it entirely won Hi.
“You’re not a bit like your father,” he said, “not a little bit. Your father likes being top-dog; sometimes bully, sometimes blarney. You want to make things. I know your sort.
“Where are you staying?” he continued. “At the Santiago? That’s a vile hole, the Santiago. Yet all our visitors form their first impressions there. Whereabouts have they put you?”