to be a new government when we came again. Clyde knew all about it.
I'm not saying but what an odd official of a government here and
there was acquainted with the merits of a percentage, being
instructed in it by the same. For all that there was excitement. It
was a great life. Sometimes I catch myself heaving a sigh for the old
man that's dead, and saying to myself, "That was a great life yonder."

My recollection is, it was a sub-agent in Cuba who turned evidence
on Clyde at last, for a gunboat missed us by only a few miles coming
down by St. Christopher, as I heard afterward. Then a Spanish cruiser
ran us down, at last, under a corner of a little island among the
Windwards, about thirty miles east of Tobago, where Clyde's
cleverness came to nothing.

It was growing twilight, we driving close off the low shores of the
island. The woods were dark above the shore, and half a mile out was
the black cruiser, with a pennon of smoke against the sky, and the
black water between. I went into Clyde's cabin and found him talking
to himself.

"We'll be scuttling her, Tom," he says.

With that he gave a jerk at the foot of his bunk, and the footboard
came off, and there underneath were four brown canvas bags tied up
with rope. Now, I never knew before that day that Clyde didn't keep
his money in a bank, same as any other civilised gentleman, and it
shows how little I knew about him, after all. He sat there holding up
eagles and double pesos to the lamplight, with his eyes shining and
his wrinkled old mouth smiling.