Page:The Road to Monterey (1925).pdf/341

 door with his dusty hat in his hand. She spread the flag before him, lifting it until she was all hidden but her eyes.

"What a beautiful flag you've made!" said Henderson, looking over the blue field of it into her eyes.

"We hurried to finish it," she explained; "there wasn't time for all the stars. So we made only one; Don Gabriel—Gabriel. One star—for you."

"Why, Helena," he said, pleased, embarrassed, flushing to his fair hair, "you made it—it's your star."

"No," shaking her head gravely, "mine would be so lonely all alone."

Henderson let his thorn-pinned hat fall as he stretched his arms to receive the flag, laying hold of the hands that held it, lowering them a little to uncover her face.

"There is no star in the heavens as lonesome as mine would be without one for you beside it," he said.

Cecilia withdrew a little from the door, wise in her hour. She stood aside like a sentinel, guarding the romance within.

"Then, if it is neither your star nor mine, Gabriel?" Helena asked, glad in what he had declared.

"It is California's," he answered, with happy inspiration.

Henderson raised the flag with his own hands, Helena watching from the window. Felipe saluted