Oh, that gold plate! I can see it just as plain--solid, solid,
heavy, rich, pure gold; nothing but gold, gold, heaps and heaps of it.
What a service that was!"
Maria paused, shaking her head, thinking over the vanished splendor.
Illiterate enough, unimaginative enough on all other subjects, her
distorted wits called up this picture with marvellous distinctness. It
was plain she saw the plate clearly. Her description was accurate, was
almost eloquent.
Did that wonderful service of gold plate ever exist outside of her
diseased imagination? Was Maria actually remembering some reality of a
childhood of barbaric luxury? Were her parents at one time possessed
of an incalculable fortune derived from some Central American
coffee plantation, a fortune long since confiscated by armies of
insurrectionists, or squandered in the support of revolutionary
governments?
It was not impossible. Of Maria Macapa's past prior to the time of
her appearance at the "flat" absolutely nothing could be learned. She
suddenly appeared from the unknown, a strange woman of a mixed race,
sane on all subjects but that of the famous service of gold plate; but
unusual, complex, mysterious, even at her best.
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