average do not fill out this application."

I was suddenly aware of a sinking feeling in the pit of my
stomach; the blank all but slipped from my nerveless fingers. Then
all at once there came back to me the words of some chance
acquaintance of some far-off time and place, words which were the
only memory that remained to me of the speaker, except that he had
lived long and gathered much experience, "Bluff, my boy, is what
carries a man through the world. Act as if you're sure you are and
can and you'll generally make the other fellow think so." I sat
down at a desk and filled out the application in my most self-
confident flourish.

"Go to Culebra to-morrow," said the Inspector, as I bade the room
good-day and stepped forth with my most military stride and
bearing, "and report back here Friday morning."

I descended to the world below, not by the long perspective of
stairs that leads down and across the gully to the heart of Ancon,
but by a short-cut that took me quickly into a foreign land. The
graveled highway at the foot of the hill I might not have guessed
was an international boundary had I not chanced to notice the
instant change from the trim, screened Zone buildings, each in its
green lawn, to the featureless architecture of a city where grass
is all but unknown; for the formalities of crossing this frontier
are the same as those of crossing any village street. It was my
first entrance into the land of the panamenos, technically known
on the Zone as "Spigoties," and familiarly, with a tinge of
despite, as "Spigs"; because the first Americans to arrive in the
land found a few natives and cabmen who claimed to "Speaga dee