Just then a telegram was brought in by Pepé, the cherubic office boy. The Consul sighed again as he read it aloud:
“Please wire answer to my letter immediately, stating address of rooms. Am sending large trunk to your care. E. G.”
“Friends of yours?” asked Patsy.
“Never heard of them.”
“Wife and daughter of Congressman?”
“Emerald Green, it’s not a name I know.”
“Do you get many such letters?”
“Tons of them; it’s all in the day’s work.”
The ring in his voice was characteristic of the time. Nobody minded the extra trouble they were put to, everybody gladly lent a hand to help those two young people get married. If a household is turned topsy turvy when a daughter is married, it is not strange that a city should be turned upside down and inside out when a King is wed. Mr. Collier, the American Minister, must have been as much pestered as the Consul; he always had time for us though, and we brought away pleasant memories of him and of the Legation where we were hospitably entertained.
Of all our friends, the Argentino alone held aloof from the joyous bustle; a week before the wedding he left Madrid.