Don Sebastian gave him a quiet glance, but Jake thought it was keenly observant and remembered how, one night when a messenger entered Kenwardine's patio, Richter, the German, had stood where he obstructed the Spaniard's view. "No," he said, "I should prefer the hotel. Will you promise?" "I will," Jake answered impulsively. "However, you seem to suggest that I should leave my partner to grapple with this thing himself and I don't like that. If he's up against any danger, I want to butt in. Dick's no fool, but there are respects in which he's not very keen. His mind's fixed on concrete, and when he gets off it his imagination's sometimes rather weak----" He stopped, feeling that he must not seem to censure his friend, and Don Sebastian nodded with a twinkle of amusement. "I think I understand. There are, however, men of simple character and no cunning who are capable of going far and sometimes surprise the friends who do not know them very well. I cannot tell if Senor Brandon is one of these, but it is not impossible. After all, it is often the clever man who makes the worst mistakes; and on the whole I imagine it would be wiser to leave your comrade alone." He got up and laid his hand on Jake's arm with a friendly gesture. "Now I will put you on your way, and if you feel puzzled or alarmed in future, you can come to me." CHAPTER XXI DICK MAKES A BOLD VENTURE Some delicate and important work was being done, and Stuyvesant had had his lunch sent up to the dam. Bethune and Dick joined him afterwards, and sat in the shade of a big traveling crane. Stuyvesant and Dick were hot and dirty, for it was not their custom to be content with giving orders when urgent work was going on. Bethune looked languid and immaculately neat. His speciality was mathematics, and he said he did not see why the man with mental talents should dissipate his energy by using his hands. "It's curious about that French liner," Stuyvesant presently remarked. "I understand her passengers have been waiting since yesterday and she hasn't arrived." "The last boat cut out Santa Brigida without notice," Bethune replied. "My opinion of the French is that they're a pretty casual lot." "On the surface. They smile and shrug where we set our teeth, but when you get down to bed-rock you don't find much difference. I thought as you do, until I went over there and saw a people that run us close for steady, intensive industry. Their small cultivators are simply great. I'd like to put them on our poorer land in the Middle West, where we're content with sixteen bushels of wheat that's most fit for chicken feed to the acre. Then what they don't know about civil engineering isn't worth learning."