Behind the foothills above Rincona rose the lofty mountains which in Maria Abbott's youth had seemed to tower above the valley a solid wall of redwoods; but long since plundered and defaced for the passing needs of man.
"Great country--what?" said Gwynne, starting the car. "You couldn't pry me away from it--that is, unless I have the luck to represent it in Washington half the year. You'll be coming back yourself some day."
"I? Never. I hate the sight of its grinning blue sky after the red horror of those three days. I haven't seen a cloud as big as my hand, and in common decency it should howl and stream for months."
"Well, forget it for a day. Perhaps you will be placed next the fair Alexina at luncheon--"
"Groome. You must have met her at the Hofer ball."
Gwynne looked at his stuttering and flushed young cousin and burst into laughter.
"As bad as that, was it? Well, she's not bespoken as far as I know. Wade in and win. You have my blessing. She is almost as beautiful as Isabel--"
"Oh, very well. No doubt I'd think so myself if I hadn't happened to meet Isabel first, and if I were not too old for her anyway."
Gwynne could think of no better remedy for demoralized nerves than a flirtation with a resourceful California girl, and if Dick annexed a living companion for his trying journey to England so much the better.
Gathbroke's excitement subsided quickly. He was in no condition for sustained enthusiasm. He felt as if quite ten years had passed since he had half fallen in love with Alexina Groome in a ball room that was now a charred heap in the sodden wreck of a city he barely could conjure in memory.
Besides, he had half fallen in love so often. And she was too young. He had really been more drawn to that strange Miss Dwight; upon whom, however, he had not yet called.
He felt thankful that the girl _was_ too young for his critical taste. He wanted nothing more at present in the way of emotions.
Rincona had been named in honor of Rincon Hill, where Tom Abbott's grandmother had reigned in the sixties; a day, when in order to call on her amiable rival, Mrs. Ballinger, her stout carriage horses were obliged to plow through miles of sand hills, and to make innumerable détours to avoid the steep masses of rock, over which in her grandson's day cable car and trolley glided so lightly until that morning of April eighteen, nineteen hundred and six.