Page:Gaston Leroux--The bride of the sun.djvu/19

Rh in. Where's the door? I suppose it would be bad form to climb in through the window? Won't I be in the way, though? You seem awfully busy."

"I am, but you may come in. Round the corner there, and the first door on your right"

He followed her indications and found an archway leading into a huge courtyard crowded with Chinese coolies and Quichua Indians. A huge dray, coming from the direction of the harbor, rumbled under the archway, and wheeled in the court to let an empty one pass out. People and things seemed to unite in making as much dust and noise as possible.

"So she manages all this," he reflected as he made his way toward a door at which she had appeared.

"You may kiss me," she said as she closed the door behind them.

He took her in his arms and held her to him, by far the more troubled of the two. Again it was she who spoke first.

"So you really have not forgotten?"

"Could you believe it, dear?"

"Well, you were so long in coming."

"But I wrote, and ..." "Well, never mind now. It is not too late. I have just refused my fourth suitor, Don Alonso de Cuelar. And father, I think, is furious with