Her father’s frown deepened. “My dear child, you are talking most intemperately. The object of your misplaced sympathy is not going to be made the victim of anybody’s vengeance. You can rest assured, as I said before, that he will have a fair and impartial trial. As the representative of his country I shall see to that. And that is all that he or any other fair-minded person could expect me to do for him.” “It isn’t all,” the girl protested. “There needn’t be any trial at all if you don’t wish it. You have sufficient personal influence with the Portiforo administration to have him set free even though he were guilty.” Minister Throgmorton shrugged his shoulders. “I fear that you overestimate my power, my dear,” he said deprecatingly. “However, even if I had sufficient influence, I don’t think I should feel justified in using it in that way. The prisoner’s demeanor is scarcely such as to entitle him to clemency. His bearing toward the authorities is almost defiant; and, as for his attitude toward me----” Virginia interrupted him with an excited exclamation. “You have been to see him?” she inquired eagerly. “Yes; I called at the arsenal immediately after his arrest. I deemed it my duty to interview him.” He paused, and an expression of annoyance came to his face. “But I could get absolutely nothing out of him. The fellow was almost contemptuous in his refusal to answer my questions. No; I certainly shouldn’t feel like doing any more than my duty calls for to help him.” After some further pleading and argument, Virginia went out of the room convinced that so far as her father was concerned the Camera Chap was a doomed man. For a while she was in despair; then an idea came to her which caused her to order the touring car and journey therein to Puerto Cabero. Arrived at the seaport, she went down to the wharf which the _Kearsarge’s_ launches were using for a landing. One of the battleship’s graceful little fifty-footers had just come in with a liberty party of jackies. Virginia addressed a natty young officer in charge of the men. “Is this boat going right back to the battleship?” she inquired. “In a few minutes, miss. Do you wish to go?” “If Captain Cortrell is there. I must see him immediately.” The officer replied that she would find the commanding officer in his cabin, and a few minutes later Virginia was speeding over the water toward the big gray fighter. As she reached the warship’s side and stepped to the main deck her hopes suddenly soared. The sight of the guns protruding from the grim turrets, and the sturdy, white-jacketed boys from her own land swarming over the decks, was decidedly reassuring. Somehow, in spite of what her father had said, she could not believe that the ruler of a “fussy little banana republic”--as she was wont to refer contemptuously to Baracoa--would dare to go to extreme lengths with a citizen of a country powerful enough to own such engines of destruction as this.