"Do you think he's gone mad at last?" gasped Mrs. Yorba.
"For Heaven's sake, don't leave me for a minute. You must sleep here at night. There's a cot somewhere,--in the attic, I think, if the rats haven't eaten it. What a life to live!" She fell to weeping, as she frequently did in these days. Suddenly her face brightened. "If he should make a will disinheriting us, we could easily enough prove him insane after the way he's been acting these four years. Thank Heaven, this is California! General William could break any will that ever was made."
Mrs. Yorba took an opiate and fell asleep. Magdaléna went out, locking the door behind her. She determined to ascertain at once if her father was insane. If he was, he should be confined in two of the upper rooms with a keeper. The world should know nothing of his misfortune; but it would be absurd for herself and her mother to live in a constant state of physical terror.
As she descended the stair, the door of her father's study opened abruptly and a man shot out as if violently propelled from behind. The door was slammed to immediately.
Magdaléna ran downstairs and toward the stranger. He was a tall man greatly bowed, and as she approached him she saw that he was old and wore a long white beard. His head was large and suggested nobility and intellect; but the eyes were bleared, the flesh of the face loose and discoloured, and he was shabby and dirty. He looked like a fallen king.
"Was--was--my father rude?" asked Magdaléna. "He is not very well. Perhaps I can do something." The man appealed to her strangely, and she had a dollar in her purse.
"We were great friends in our boyhood and youth," replied the stranger. He spoke with an accent, but his English was unbroken. "And he has been my guest many times. There was a time when he thought it an honour to know me. When the Americans came, everything changed. My career closed, for I would have nothing to do with them. I had held the highest offices under the Mexican government. I could not stoop to hold office under the usurpers--many of whom I would not have employed as servants. Then they took my lands,--everything. But I am detaining you, señorita."
"Oh, no, no, indeed! How could they take your lands? Who are you? Tell me everything."