“Yes,” said Appleby dryly, raising his voice a trifle, “it is quite likely that somebody is there. In this country one takes precautions. You, however, have my word that in your case there is no necessity for apprehension.” Morales laughed a little. “It is well that I took mine, but I will ask you for your company as far as the carretera, Señor Appleby. One does not attach too much importance even to the word of a gentleman just now.” They walked through the dusky cane together, and parted with punctilious salutations when they reached the dim white road. Then Appleby went back to the house, and met Harper at the foot of the stairway. “Colonel Morales came to demand an apology from you, and I promised him that you would make it,” he said. Harper seemed hoarse with anger. “I could scarcely keep my hands off him as it was. It would have pleased me to pound the life out of him.” “Well,” said Appleby dryly, “I scarcely think it will be necessary to make the apology now, but I can’t tell you anything more until to‐ morrow. There is a good deal I must think over.” He went up the stairway, and sat for at least an hour staring straight before him with an unlighted cigar in his hand. Then he rose with a little weary smile, and tapped a suspended strip of tin, which rang dissonantly until the major‐domo came in. “You know where Don Maccario is?” he said. Pancho’s eyes twinkled. “I think I could find him.” “Then remember what I tell you,” said Appleby, who laid his hand on the man’s shoulder, spoke softly and rapidly, until the latter nodded. “With permission, I will give the message to three other men who can be trusted and start at once,” he said. “Is it necessary?” said Appleby, with a faint trace of astonishment. Pancho smiled significantly. “I think it is,” he said. “Morales makes certain. He leaves nothing to chance.” XXIII — APPLEBY TAKES A RISK IT was early next morning when Appleby and Harper sat at breakfast on the veranda. The white wall across the patio already shone dazzlingly against a strip of intense blue, and a patch of brightness grew broader across the veranda, but it was pleasantly cool as yet. From beyond the flat roof there rose the rasping thud of machetes swinging amidst the cane and the musical clink of hoes, with the dull rumble of the crushing machinery as an undertone. Appleby had apparently not slept very well, for there was weariness in his face, and he lay a trifle more limply than usual in his chair, with a morsel of bread and a very little cup of bitter black coffee in front of him, for in Spanish countries the regular breakfast is served later in the morning. Harper seemed to notice the absence of the major‐domo. “Bread and coffee! Well, when he can’t get anything else one can live on them, but if Pancho had been around he’d have found us something more,” he said. “Their two meals a day never quite suited me. We have steak and potatoes three times in my country.”