The Island of Love (Camfield Series No. 15) by Barbara Cartland Page B

their talks together boring and stupid.
    Then she told herself that although it might seem conceited she was certain he was as stimulated by the subjects they discussed as she was.
    Although with her father he talked of ordinary matters the moment they were alone it seemed as if he was as eager as she was to discuss more fundamental subjects, which she knew Heloise would not understand.
    “He is so different from what I expected,” she told herself.
    As the train began to move out of the station Lydia began counting the days when she would still be on the train with the Earl, and however disagreeable her sister might be, she knew she could not be prevented from talking to him, if she had the chance.
    Once they were through the Rocky Mountains and in California, it was only a short journey before they arrived in San Francisco.
    Lydia had been hoping that they would see something of the City which she felt would be fascinating, and which her books had told her had grown up from a dusty, remote village called Yerba Buena which meant ‘the place of the good herb.’
    The story of how it had begun with the Missions which came from Spain, then grown with the Russian-American Fur Company, and finally with the American occupation, was fascinating.
    California had been a land of unrest and conspiracy with a wide-spread mistrust of foreigners until the Gold Rush turned it into a modem Babel.
    Lydia would not have known so much about San Francisco if, at one of the larger stations at which they stopped she had not given a cry of delight when she saw there were books for sale on a stall.
    “Books!” she had exclaimed. “Oh, please, Papa, let me buy some!”
    The Earl heard what she said and exclaimed: “Now I know what is missing in The Duchess! I had a feeling that the famous Commodore had forgotten something of importance, but I could not think what it could be.”
    “I suppose he was so busy poring over his plans that he had not the time to think of anything else,” Lydia said with a smile.
    “But of course when we were in New York, I should have thought we would need books.”
    “Please,” Lydia said quickly, “I am not complaining!”
    “Of course not, but I promise you when we return I will see there is a stack of books of every description to keep you interested.”
    He then proceeded to buy every book, although there were not many, that was available, and did the same at every other station where there was any literature for sale apart from the local newspapers.
    Lydia therefore found herself with a very miscellaneous collection.
    There were cheap novelettes some of which she fancied had been collected from the train after their owners had left them behind, religious tracts and true adventure stories.
    She, however, was most grateful for the primitive but very interesting guide-books that had been written about various parts of America.
    Because San Francisco was now so important a city Lydia was disappointed when she heard the Earl say:
    “The battleship which is to carry us to Hawaii will, I am certain, have been waiting impatiently for our arrival, and we must therefore go straight on board from the station.”
    Lydia did not express her disappointment, but Heloise said:
    “If the sea is rough I cannot bear it!”
    “I think that is very unlikely,” the Earl smiled. “We will now be on the Pacific Ocean and it will be growing warmer every day until you will find it very hot by the time we reach Hawaii.”
    “I hope you have packed all the right clothes, Lydia,” Heloise said when they were alone. “I shall be extremely angry if I am not the smartest and most outstanding person at the Coronation!”
    “Excepting the Queen,” Lydia smiled. “You can hardly want to overshadow the leading lady of the day.”
    “Why not?” Heloise asked.
    “Because it would be unkind,” Lydia explained. “Actually she will be very resplendent because the King ordered two crowns when he was in Europe from an English