"You are boasting again," interposed Myra once more. "I have no desire
or inclination to listen to an account of your amorous conquests."
"But you must listen, Myra," said Don Carlos earnestly. "You misjudge
me. True, there have been many women in my life, but not one who
inspired love, not one to whom I offered my heart, not one whom I had
any wish to marry. Long ago it was foretold by a gipsy gifted with
second sight that I should meet my fate in my thirty-fifth year in a
foreign land, meet my ideal, the woman of my dreams. That prophecy has
come true. The moment our eyes first met yesterday I knew you were the
woman for whom I had been seeking and waiting. It is useless to fight
against destiny, Myra. I shall win you by hook or by crook, and make
you all mine."
"That sounds like a challenge, Don Carlos," retorted Myra with forced
lightness. "As you believe in gipsy forecasts, however, let me tell
you that a gipsy woman 'read my hand' a few years ago, warned me to
beware of a tall, dark man, and foretold that I should marry a tall,
fair man. If she was right, you are obviously the tall, dark man of
whom I am to beware, just as Tony Standish is the man I am destined to
marry."
"Pouf! I pay no heed to the foolish prattle of so-called gipsy
fortune-tellers," said Don Carlos, smiling again. "The seer who
foretold that I should meet and win you was King of the Spanish
Gypsies, and his every prophecy comes true."
"Well, to make his prophecy come true as far as you are concerned, Don
Carlos, you will have to fall in love with someone other than me,"
responded Myra. "Hadn't you better have some tea, señor?"