Bandit Love. Juanita Savage
"In the intervals of making love to you, Myra, I shall sing the praises of your beauty even after you are all mine."
"Don Carlos, you are quite impossible!" exclaimed Myra. "I warn you again I shall take precautions to avoid you in future if you persist in this folly."
"That will necessitate your cancelling all your engagements, or nearly all of them, for the rest of the season," responded Don Carlos. "Already I have contrived to obtain an invitation to practically every function at which you are likely to be present. Your aunt was good enough to show me your engagement book this afternoon. Dear lady, I assure you that you will find it difficult to avoid me."
Myra fancied he was boasting again, but he was stating facts, as she subsequently discovered. At practically every Society function she attended during the next few weeks, save for a few private parties, Don Carlos de Ruiz was a fellow guest, and invariably he contrived to talk to her and make love, even when Tony Standish was also present, and ignored the snubs and rebuffs she administered.
"Sure, and I'm beginning to feel something like the fox must feel when the hounds are in full cry after him," soliloquised Myra, as she drove home one night after another vain attempt to rebuff Don Carlos. "No wonder he is able to boast of so many conquests if he has pursued every other woman who took his fancy as relentlessly as he is pursuing me! What can I do?"
What made Myra's position the more embarrassing was that de Ruiz and Standish had become very friendly, Don Carlos having exercised his personal magnetism to the utmost to win Tony's regard. One hobby they actually had in common was collecting old jade, and on discovering this Don Carlos sent to Spain for two of the choicest and rarest of his pieces—ancient Chinese sword ornaments of jade set with gold. These he presented to Tony, who was delighted, but protested that he could not accept so valuable a gift without making some return.
"Later, I promise you, my dear Standish, I shall take one of your treasures," said Don Carlos in his charming way. "Meanwhile accept these trifles as a token of my esteem. It is a joy to give to a fellow collector something which money cannot buy, and it will be a delight to take from you something you prize. By the way, let me remind you again of your promise to come to my place in Spain this winter to see my collection. I shall be pleased and honoured to entertain you and any of your friends at El Castillo de Ruiz."
"Thanks. Frightfully good of you, Don Carlos," said Tony. "If I make my usual cruise in my yacht this year I shall certainly make a point of visiting you. I say, if you are not already booked, what about doing me the honour of being one of my guests at Auchinleven in August for the shooting, and then being one of the yachting party later on if I arrange a cruise. I shall be charmed if you will."
"My dear Mr. Standish, you are too good," exclaimed Don Carlos, with unaffected delight. "Ten thousand thanks! Nothing will give me greater pleasure. I gladly and gratefully accept your invitation, but you must promise to allow me to attempt to return your hospitality in Spain. I cannot promise you much in the way of sport, except, perhaps, a little brigand shooting, but I can promise you some novel experiences."
"Thanks awfully," said Tony. "I must tell Myra, and show her your beautiful present."
Myra gazed at her fiancé in wide-eyed amazement and consternation when she heard the news.
"Tony Standish, you must be blind and crazy!" she burst out tempestuously. "I won't come to Auchinleven if Don Carlos is to be one of your house party. I won't! Surely you must have seen for yourself that Don Carlos has been making love to me on every possible occasion for weeks? Yes, right in front of your very nose, Tony. He said he would see to it that we were fellow-guests for the shooting—and now you have invited him to Auchinleven!"
"I—er—I say, Myra, this is news to me," exclaimed Tony, flabbergasted. "You—er—you don't actually mean to say that Don Carlos has been making love to you in earnest? I can't imagine his doing such a thing. I mean to say he—er—he seems an awfully good sort, although he is a foreigner, and he and I have become quite pally. He seems quite a good sport, and he does not strike me as being the sort of chap who would poach on another fellow's preserves. Really, Myra, this is quite a shock!"
"If you are referring to me as your 'preserves,' Tony, Don Carlos has certainly been poaching—or trying to poach," said Myra. "He persists in making love to me and refuses to be rebuffed, and he has repeatedly sworn that he will take me from you and make me his own at all costs."
"The deuce he has!" ejaculated Tony, surprised, indignant, and flustered. "I say, Myra dear, I—er—I wish—er—I wish you'd told me this before—I mean before he and I became pally, I had no idea he was really making love to you. No idea, I assure you. If I'd known, I certainly wouldn't have invited him to Auchinleven or accepted his presents. Now I don't know what the deuce to do. I'm in a frightfully awkward position. Frightfully awkward!"
"Frightfully awkward!" Myra mimicked. "Oh, Tony, don't be such a duffer! Unless you want to lose me, you've got to tell Don Carlos de Ruiz—and tell him very, very plainly—that his attempts to make love to me and win me away from you have got to stop. You've got to warn him off."
"Why, of course I will, darling," said Tony, in flustered haste. "Confound the fellow! I should not have believed it of him. Never heard of such outrageous conduct. I'll go and see him at once, Myra, and warn him that if he dares to attempt to make love to you again I'll—er—I'll show him! Yes, by Jove!"
He rushed off, full of righteous indignation but still feeling he was in a "frightfully awkward position," to interview Don Carlos, whom he found wearing a silken dressing gown and stretched out luxuriously among cushions on a settee in his suite at the Ritz.
"My dear Standish, how good of you to return my call so soon!" cried Don Carlos, rising with a welcoming smile as Tony was shown in. "I am truly delighted to see you. You know what a pleasure is an unexpected visit from a friend when one is feeling bored. Sit down and make yourself comfortable, my dear Standish, and let me mix you a drink."
"Er—no, thank you," said Standish, disarmed to some extent at the outset, for he felt it would be boorish and "bad form" to have a row with a man who seemed to hold him in high regard. "No, I won't have a drink. As a matter of fact, Don Carlos, I have called to see you in connection with—er—with a delicate personal matter."
"My dear Mr. Standish, I am flattered that you should make me your confidant, and I shall be only too pleased if I can assist you."
"Assist me! Hang it all, sir, you—er—you don't seem to understand!" spluttered Tony, taken aback again, but determined, nevertheless, to "have it out" with the Spaniard. "I—er—I haven't called to take you into my confidence or anything of the sort. I have come to demand an explanation."
"An explanation?" Don Carlos raised his black eyebrows in seeming bewilderment. "An explanation? Concerning what, Mr. Standish?"
"Concerning your outrageous conduct, sir," blurted out Tony, trying to look fierce, but succeeding only in looking hot and embarrassed. "Concerning Myra—Miss Rostrevor. She tells me you have persistently been attempting to make love to her ever since you first met her, and have even gone so far as to ask her to throw me over and elope with you! What the deuce do you mean by it, sir? Miss Rostrevor, as you are well aware, is engaged to be married to me. How dare you make love to my fiancée?"
CHAPTER IV
Don Carlos's eyebrows rose still higher, his lips twitched, and Tony Standish got the impression that it was only with difficulty he was refraining from laughing outright. That angered him, and his ruddy face became still redder.
"Well, what have you to say for yourself?" he demanded, after a pause.
"This is no laughing matter."
"My dear Mr. Standish, what can I say for myself?" Don Carlos retorted, quietly and gravely. "Your demand for an explanation places me in a most embarrassing position. How should one answer in the circumstances. If Miss Rostrevor has