"I hate untidy travellers!"--she would say--"Horrors of men and women in oil-skins, smelling of petrol! No goblin ever seen in a nightmare could be uglier than the ordinary motorist!"
She had no luggage with her, save an adaptable suitcase which, she declared "held everything." This she quickly packed and locked, ready for her journey. Then she stepped to the window and waved her hand towards the near hill and the "hut of the dying."
"Fool of a bear man!" she said, apostrophising the individual she chose to call by that name--"Here you come along to a wild place in California running away from ME,--and here you find a sort of untutored female savage eager and willing to be your 'woman!' Well, why not? She's just the kind of thing you want--to fetch wood, draw water, cook food, and--bear children! And when the children come they'll run about the hill like savages themselves, and yell and dance and be greedy and dirty--and you'll presently wonder whether you are a civilised man or a species of unthinking baboon! You will be living the baboon life,--and your brain will grow thicker and harder as you grow older,--and your great scientific discovery will be buried in the thickness and hardness and never see the light of day! All this, IF she is 'your woman!' It's a great 'if' of course!--but she's big and handsome, with a beautiful body and splendid strength, and I never heard of a man who could resist beauty and strength together. As for ME and my 'vulgar wealth' as you call it, I'm a little wisp of straw not worth your thought!--or so you assume--no, good Bear!--not till we come to a tussle--if we ever do!"
She took up her gloves and hand-bag and went downstairs, entering the broad, airy flower-bordered lounge of the Plaza with a friendly nod and smile to the book-keeper in the office where she paid her bill. Her chauffeur, a smart Frenchman in quiet livery, was awaiting her with an assistant groom or page beside him.
"We go on to-day, Madame?" he enquired.
"Yes,--we go on"--she replied--"as quickly and as far as possible. Just fetch my valise--it's ready packed in my room."
The groom hurried away to obey this order, and Morgana glancing around her saw that she was an object of intense curiosity to some of the hotel inmates who were in the lounge--men and women both. Her grey-blue eyes flashed over them all carelessly and lighted on Manella who stood shrinking aside in a corner. To her she beckoned smilingly.