"Ride Duchess home. I'll take your horse," said he.
"Oh, no, indeed; PLEASE don't bother!" protested Sammy, eagerly.
But Anthony only laughed and gave her a hand up. Sammy settled herself on the Spanish saddle with a sigh of satisfaction.
"I've always wanted to ride your horse!" said she, delightedly, as the big muscles moved smoothly under her.
Anthony smiled. "She's the handsomest mare here-abouts," said he. "I wouldn't take a thousand dollars for her!"
Sammy watched him deftly repair the broken bridle of the now docile and crestfallen Clown, and spring to the saddle.
"I'm taking you out of your way!" she pleaded, and he answered gravely:
"Oh, no; I'll be much happier seeing you safe home."
When they reached her gate, the two changed horses, and Sammy rode slowly up the dark driveway alone. Even on this brilliant afternoon the old Peneyre place looked dull and gloomy. Dusty dark pines and eucalyptus trees grew close about the house. There was no garden, but here and there an unkempt geranium or rank great bush of marguerites sprawled in the uncut grass, and rose bushes, long grown wild, stood in spraying clusters that were higher than a man's head. Pampas trees, dirty and overgrown, outlined the drive at regular intervals, their shabby plumes uncut from year to year.
The house was heavy, bay-windowed, three-storied. Ugly, immense, unfriendly, it struck an inharmonious note in the riotous free growth of the surrounding woods. The dark entrance-hall was flanked by a library full of obsolete, unread books, and by double drawing-rooms, rarely opened now. All the windows on the ground floor were darkened by the shrubbery outside and by heavy red draperies within.