annoyance of having their baggage and persons examined with a view
to discovering what weapons--

"Como no senores? All the examination you desire." Which was
exceedingly kind of them. Whereupon, when the Lieutenant had
interpreted to me their permission, we fell upon them and amid
countless expressions of mutual esteem gave them and their baggage
such a "frisking" as befalls a Kaffir leaving a South African
diamond mine, and found them armed with--a receipt from the
quarantine doctor for "one pearl-handled Smill and Wilson No. 32."
Either they really intended to postpone their little affair until
they reached Panama, or they had succeeded in concealing their
weapons elsewhere.

The doctor and his assistant were already being rowed out to the
steamer that was to bring the victims. They were to be lodged in a
room across the corridor from the conspirators, which corridor it
would be our simple duty to patrol with a view to intercepting any
exchange of stray lead. We fell to planning such division of the
twenty-four hours as should give me the most talkative period. The
Lieutenant took the trouble further to convince the trio of my
total ignorance of Spanish by a distinct and elaborate
explanation, in English, of the difference between the words
"muchacho" and "muchacha." Then we wandered down past the grimy
steerage station to the shore end of the little wharf to await the
doctor and our proteges.

The ocean breeze swept unhampered across the island; on its rocky
shore sounded the dull rumble of waves, for the sea was rolling a
bit now. The swelling tide covered inch by inch a sandy ridge that