ostentation, watching the loopholes of escape.

The customs official crowded importantly into their boat and rowed
out to the ~Karlesfin~. A boat from the steamer landed her purser
with his papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green
umbrella and clinical thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began
to load upon lighters the thousands of bunches of bananas heaped
upon the shore and row them out to the steamer. The ~Karlesfin~
had no passenger list, and was soon done with the attention of
the authorities. The purser declared that the steamer would remain
at anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night.
The ~Karlesfin~ had come, he said, from New York, to which port her
latest load of oranges and coconuts had been conveyed. Two or three
of the freighter sloops were engaged to assist in the work, for
the captain was anxious to make a quick return in order to reap
the advantage offered by a certain dearth of fruit in the States.

About four o'clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters,
not very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the
fateful ~Idalia~--a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff,
clean-cut as a steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off
shore, see-sawing the waves as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel.
A swift boat manned by a crew in uniform came ashore, and a stocky-
built man leaped to the sands.

The newcomer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather motley
congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once toward
Goodwin, who was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure present.
Goodwin greeted him with courtesy.