the engineering experts, and just as though she enjoyed it. The men up
at the mines say she tired them all out."

I had no desire to discuss the young lady with Aiken, so I pretended
not to be interested, and he ceased speaking, and we smoked in
silence. But my mind was nevertheless wide awake to what he had told
me. I could not help but see the dramatic values which had been given
to the situation by the presence of this young lady. The possibilities
were tremendous. Here was I, fighting against her father, and here was
she, beautiful and an heiress to many millions. In the short space of
a few seconds I had pictured myself rescuing her from brigands,
denouncing her father for not paying his honest debt to Honduras, had
been shot down by his escort, Miss Fiske had bandaged my wounds, and I
was returning North as her prospective husband on my prospective
father-in-law's yacht. Aiken aroused me from this by rising to his
feet. "Now then," he said, briskly, "if you want to go to Laguerre you
can come with me. I've got to see him to explain why his guns haven't
arrived, and I'll take you with me." He made a wry face and laughed.
"A nice welcome he'll give me," he said. I jumped to my feet. "There's
my trunk," I said; "it's ready, and so am I. When do we start?"

"As soon as it is moonlight," Aiken answered.

The remainder of the day was spent in preparing for our journey. I was
first taken to the commandante and presented to him as a commercial
traveller. Aiken asked him for a passport permitting me to proceed to
the capital "for purposes of trade." As consular agent Aiken needed no
passport for himself, but to avoid suspicion he informed the
commandante that his object in visiting Tegucigalpa was to persuade
Joseph Fiske, as president of the Isthmian Line, to place buoys in the