And in my heart," she added with a
quick, impulsive tenderness.
Robert Windham bent and kissed her wind-tossed hair. "I think another
has usurped me in the latter task." He smiled, although not without a
touch of sadness. "Ah, well, Adrian is a fine young fellow. You need not
blush so furiously."
"I think he comes," said the Senora Anita, and, unconsciously, her arm
went around the girl. "Is not that his high-stepping mare and his
beanpole of a figure riding beside Benito in yon cloud of dust?"
She smiled down at Inez. "Do not mind your mother's jesting--Go now to
smooth your locks and place a rose within them--as I used to do when Don
Roberto came."
Inez rose and made her way into the casa. She heard a clatter of hoofs
and voices. At the sound of one her heart leaped strangely.
"We have famous news," she heard her brother say. "The name of Yerba
Buena has been changed to San Francisco. Here is an account of it in
Brannan's _California Star_." She heard the rustle of a paper then, once
more her brother's voice: "San Francisco!" he pronounced it lovingly.
"Some day it will be a ciudad grande--perhaps even in my time."
"A great city!" repeated his mother.
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