Stephens nodded. “Under those circumstances, you were quite right not to take any chances. Still,” he added pensively, “I don’t see what we can do with the tip in its present form. It would hardly pay us to send a man down to Baracoa.” “Why not?” the correspondent protested. “It’s a big story if it’s true and----” “Yes, if it’s true!” the managing editor interrupted doubtfully. “If I thought there was a ten-per-cent chance of there being anything in this wild rumor, I wouldn’t mind the expense of sending five men down there to dig up the story, even if we had to charter a private yacht, but with all due respect to your friend, the attorney general’s butler, this sounds to me like the effects of a combination of Welsh rabbit and strawberry shortcake, with a couple of slabs of custard pie thrown in. I don’t feel like spending even ten cents on such an impossible yarn.” Then, suddenly, his face lighted up. “By Jove! I was forgetting!” he exclaimed. “We don’t have to send a man down there. We’ve got a man in Baracoa now--and a good one, too.” “Who is it?” “Gale, of our city staff. He’s taking a month’s vacation, and that’s where he went to spend it. He sent us a good story from there a couple of days ago about an attempt on the life of Portiforo. I couldn’t have picked a better man than Gale for an assignment of this sort. He’s got more gall than any other reporter on our staff. If Felix is locked up in El Torro fortress, I’ll bank on Gale being able to locate him. I’ll wire him to-day to get busy.” Thus it came about that a week after the Camera Chap’s arrival in San Cristobal, Gale received a dispatch, the laconic but comprehensive contents of which caused him to seek an immediate interview with his host, the United States minister to Baracoa. Minister Throgmorton was in his library in conversation with a tall, bearded man, when Gale knocked on the door. “I beg your pardon, I didn’t know you were busy,” the _News_ man said. “Perhaps I’d better come back later. It isn’t anything important.” “Come right in,” the United States representative responded genially. “I want you to meet General Replife, minister of war in President Portiforo’s cabinet. General, permit me to present my friend, Mr. Gale, a New York journalist of distinction. Now, Gale, what can I do for you?” “It is nothing important,” Gale repeated. “I merely wanted to ask you whether it would be possible for you to get me a pass to go through the fortress of El Torro.” “El Torro!” exclaimed Minister Throgmorton sharply. “For what reason do you want to go there?” Gale shrugged his shoulders. “Merely on a sightseeing tour, sir,” he replied, conscious, as he spoke, that the dark eyes of General Replife were fixed scrutinizingly on his face. “I’ve heard that it is an interesting sort of place, and I shouldn’t like to return to New York without being able to say that I had included it among the places I visited.”