Harding smiled. “The hacienda can be built again, and they can’t blow up the land. It will stop right there all the time, in spite of them.” “Still, they could seize it.” “Well,” said Harding, with quiet confidence, “when we have chased every Spanish soldier out of Cuba I’ll get it back again, and that is just what is going to happen before very long. It’s quite difficult to freeze a citizen of my country out of his property.” “Unless an American trust casts covetous eyes upon it,” said Appleby. Harding laughed as he shook hands with him and Maccario, and then turned away with a smile still upon his The four Sin Verguenza plodded behind him down the road, and Maccario glanced at his companion. “One would not have fancied the Señor Harding knew he was taking a heavy risk,” he said. “Still, I think it was quite plain to him.” Maccario glanced across the cane towards Santa Marta. “I had many friends there, and he has one or two at most. Morales is a daring and clever man—but it is his misfortune that in this affair he has others of the same kind against him.” “That is an admission,” said Appleby, with a little smile “If you count the Señor Harper, two of them come from America.” Maccario laughed. “And one from England! Men of that kind are not confined to any one country, my friend. Still, they are perhaps more plentiful in the Peninsula—and Cuba—than elsewhere.” Appleby said nothing, and they walked slowly back to the hacienda. Rather more than a fortnight passed uneventfully, and save for a few affairs between outposts and patrols there was no outbreak of hostilities. Morales lay in Santa Marta with the country rising against him, and Maccario patiently waited his time, for the Sin Verguenza were growing stronger every day. The insurrection was still largely sporadic and indifferently organized, and since each leader acted for the most part independently what was happening elsewhere only concerned the Sin Verguenza indirectly, while the struggle had become almost a personal question between them and Morales. In the meanwhile Appleby heard that Harding had eluded the latter’s vigilance and left Santa Marta. Then late one night a man came gasping up the veranda stairway, and Appleby and Maccario descended half‐dressed to meet him in the big living‐room. The dust was white upon him, and he blinked at them out of half‐closed eyes, while Appleby noticed that he limped a little. Maccario pointed to a chair, and poured him out a glass of wine. “You have come a long way?” he said. “From Brena Abajo. I left there in the afternoon the day before yesterday.” “On a mule?” The man smiled grimly as he pointed to his broken shoes. “I came on these,” he said. Maccario turned to Appleby. “Our friend walks fast. It is counted a four days’ journey. Still, I think he knows that one seldom gains anything by trifling with the Sin Verguenza.”