apothecary's near by, where she was at last restored to consciousness.

While the apothecary was attending her, the daughter, pale and silent, bent over her, her face bathed with tears. She was a young lady of good stature, slender, pale, her hair black and wavy; her whole personality, if not of supreme beauty, attractive and interesting. She was dressed with elegance, her mother also; and I inferred that they were persons distinguished in the town. But one of the throng that had pressed into the shop informed me that they were strangers, and had been but a few days in Gijon.

When I found that she was neither dead nor hurt to any serious extent, and feeling the chill of the bath penetrating me and making me shiver, I wished them good-night.

The young lady raised her head, came towards me with animation, and seizing my hands cordially, looked into my eyes with tearful earnestness, and murmured with emotion:

"Thank you, thank you, señor! I shall never forget this!"

I gave her to understand that my service deserved no thanks; that anybody in my place would have done the same, as I sincerely thought. The only real sacrifice that I had made was that of the stewed tripe; but I did not say this, very naturally.

When I reached the steamer and got into my room I felt so chilled that I feared a heavy cold, if not pneumonia. But I rubbed myself energetically with alcohol and wrapped myself so warmly in my bed that I wakened as usual in the morning, healthy and lively, and in excellent humor.

CHAPTER II.

WHEN I had dressed myself, and after I had complied with my ordinary duties and looked after the carpenters repairing the damages from the fire, I thought of the lady who had been on the point of drowning the night before. In strict truth, the one whom I thought of was the daughter. Those eyes were of the kind that neither can be, nor should be, forgotten. And with the vague hope of seeing them again I went ashore and directed my steps towards the apothecary's.

The druggist informed me that they were stopping at the Iberia. So I went to ask about the lady's condition.

"Is it necessary that you should see them?" the chambermaid asked me.

That was my desire, but I hardly ventured to say so. I told her it was not necessary, but I should like to know how they had passed the night. I was told that Doña Amparo (the old lady) had rested fairly well and that the doctor, who had just gone, found her better than he had expected. Doña Cristina (the young lady) was perfectly well. I left my card and went down stairs somewhat depressed. But I had no sooner reached the street floor than the chambermaid came after me and asked me to come back, saying that the ladies wished to see me.

Doña Cristina came out into the corridor to meet me. She wore an elegant morning-gown of a violet color, and her black hair was half-imprisoned by a white cap with violet ribbons. Her eyes were beaming with delight and she held out her hand most cordially.

"Good morning, Captain. Why were you avoiding the thanks we wished to give you? I had just finished a letter to you in which I expressed, if not all the gratitude we feel, at least a part. But it is better that you have come—and yet the letter was not wholly bad!" she added, smiling. "Although you may not believe it, we women are more eloquent with the pen than with the tongue."

She took me into a parlor where there was an alcove whose glazed doors were shut.

"Mamma," she called, "here is the gentleman who saved you, the captain of the Urano."

I heard a melancholy murmuring, something like suppressed sighing and sobbing, with words between that I could not make out. I questioned the daughter with my eyes.

"She says that she regrets extremely having caused you to risk your life."

I replied in a loud tone that I had run no danger at all; but even if I had, I was simply doing my duty.

Again there proceeded from the alcove various confused sounds.

"She tells me to give you a tablespoonful of orange-flower extract."

"What for?" I exclaimed in surprise.

"She thinks that you also must have sustained a shock," explained Doña Cristina, laughing. "Mamma uses that remedy a great deal, and makes us all take it too. Just tell her that you are going to take it, and it will please her immensely."

Before I could recover from my astonishment I did as Doña Cristina requested, and was immediately rewarded with a murmur of approval.

"I have just given it to him, mamma," she announced, darting a mischievous glance at me. "Now you may feel at ease!"

"Many thanks, señora," I called out. "I believe it will do me good, for I was feeling a bit nervous."

Doña Cristina pressed my hand and struggled to keep from laughing. She said in a low voice:

"Bravo! You are on the way to become a consummate actor."

The strange and unintelligible sounds renewed themselves.

"She asks if you have telegraphed to your wife, and advises you not to do so, as it might frighten her."

"I have no wife. I am a bachelor."

"Then to your mother," Doña Cristina had the goodness to interpret.

"I have no mother, either; nor father, nor brothers or sisters. I am alone in the world."

Doña Amparo, so far as I could understand, showed herself surprised and displeased at my lone condition, and invited me to change it without loss of time. She also added that a man like me was destined to make any woman happy. I do not know what qualities of a husband the lady could have observed in me, except facility in grasping and sliding down a cable. I responded that surely I desired nothing else; but up to now no occasion had presented itself. My life as a mariner, to-day in one place, to-morrow in another, the shyness of men like me who do not frequent society, and even the fact that I had not met a woman who really interested me—all this had impeded its realization.

While saying this I fixed my gaze upon the smiling eyes of Doña Cristina.

A sweet and fanciful thought thereupon came into my head.

"Let us change the subject, mamma. Everyone follows his own pleasure, and if the Captain has not married it must be, of course, because he has not cared to."

"Exactly," said I, smiling, and gazing at her fixedly, "I have not cared to marry up to the present, but I cannot say that I may not care to some day when least looked for."

"Meanwhile we wish that you may be happy; that you may get a very handsome wife and a half-dozen plump children—lively and mischievous."

"Amen," I exclaimed.

The frankness and graciousness of the young lady were spontaneously attractive. I felt as much at ease with her as if I had known her for years. She invited me to seat myself on the sofa, seating herself there also, speaking low that her mother might rest, for the doctor had said that she had better not talk.

I asked for the details of her mother's condition, and was told that she had suffered a slight contusion on the shoulder, which the doctor had said was of little account. She had also overcome the ill effects of the chill. The only thing to be feared was the nervous shock. Her mamma was very nervous; her heart troubled her, and nobody could say what might be the consequences of that terrible shock. I did my best to assuage her fears. Then to make conversation, I asked her if they were Asturians, although knowing that they were not, both from what the doctor had said, and because of their accent.

"No, señor, we are Valencianas."

"Really? Valencianas?" I exclaimed. "Then we are almost compatriots! I was born in Alicante."

So we continued the talk in Valencian, with pleasure unspeakable on my part, and I think also on her part. She told me that they had been in Gijon only nine days, having come to