&ldquo;Aha!&rdquo; he triumphed, tilting up his hairless pug face and straddling his thin, long legs. &ldquo;That surprises you. I am bound to do my best for my company. They have enormous expenses. Why&mdash;our agent in Horta tells me they spend fifty thousand pounds every year in advertising all over the world! One can&rsquo;t be too economical in working the show. Well, just you listen. When I took charge here the estate had no steam-launch. I asked for one, and kept on asking by every mail till I got it; but the man they sent out with it chucked his job at the end of two months, leaving the launch moored at the pontoon in Horta. Got a better screw at a sawmill up the river&mdash;blast him! And ever since it has been the same thing. Any Scotch or Yankee vagabond that likes to call himself a mechanic out here gets eighteen pounds a month, and the next you know he&rsquo;s cleared out, after smashing something as likely as not. I give you my word that some of the objects I&rsquo;ve had for engine-drivers couldn&rsquo;t tell the boiler from the funnel. But this fellow understands his trade, and I don&rsquo;t mean him to clear out. See?&rdquo; </p> <p> And he struck me lightly on the chest for emphasis. Disregarding his peculiarities of manner, I wanted to know what all this had to do with the man being an anarchist. </p> <p> &ldquo;Come!&rdquo; jeered the manager. &ldquo;If you saw suddenly a barefooted, unkempt chap slinking amongst the bushes on the sea face of the island, and at the same time observed less than a mile from the beach, a small schooner full of niggers hauling off in a hurry, you wouldn&rsquo;t think the man fell there from the sky, would you? And it could be nothing else but either that or Cayenne. I&rsquo;ve got my wits about me. Directly I sighted this queer game I said to myself&mdash;&lsquo;Escaped Convict.&rsquo; I was as certain of it as I am of seeing you standing here this minute. So I spurred on straight at him. He stood his ground for a bit on a sand hillock crying out: &lsquo;Monsieur! Monsieur! Arretez!&rsquo; then at the last moment broke and ran for life. Says I to myself, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll tame you before I&rsquo;m done with you.&rsquo; So without a single word I kept on, heading him off here and there. I rounded him up towards the shore, and at last I had him corralled on a spit, his heels in the water and nothing but sea and sky at his back, with my horse pawing the sand and shaking his head within a yard of him. </p> <p> &ldquo;He folded his arms on his breast then and stuck his chin up in a sort of desperate way; but I wasn&rsquo;t to be impressed by the beggar&rsquo;s posturing. </p> <p> &ldquo;Says I, &lsquo;You&rsquo;re a runaway convict.&rsquo; </p>