youth. The coronel's face was thoughtful as he took back the violin.
When at length he began to talk, however, it was on a topic as remote as
possible from music and present personalities--the reconstruction of
Europe as the result of the World War.

With this and kindred subjects, aided by the attentive ministrations of
'Tonio, the afternoon passed swiftly. Dinner proved a feast, the _piece
de resistance_ being tender, well-cooked meat which the Americans took
for roast beef, but which really was roast tapir. More cigars, coupled
with the fatigue of the past two days of paddling, eventually caused the
visitors to seek their rooms, where McKay and Knowlton paired off and
Tim took Jose as his "bunkie."

When Tim awoke the next morning he found himself deserted.

To Knowlton, who drew from the small gold-chest the hundred dollars
allotted to Jose and handed it to him before redressing his wound, the
_puntero_ quietly revealed his intention to go before sunrise.

"Say nothing, senor," he requested. "You need know nothing of it, if you
like. I am here to-night--I am gone to-morrow--that is all. I am of no
further use to you, I am unwelcome in this house of Nunes, and I go. Oh,
have no fear for me! I have my gun, my knife, and my good right arm, and
I can take care of myself very well. No doubt the coronel will be
astonished to find that on leaving to-night I have neither cut anyone's
throat nor stolen anything--ha! I have a black name on this river, and
it is well earned, perhaps. Yet few men are as bad as those who dislike
them think they are. I may borrow a small canoe, but any Indian would do
the same. An unoccupied canoe is any man's property.

"Before our ways part, senor, let me say that as Jose Martinez never
forgets his enemies, so he never forgets friends. Where some men would
have turned me loose like a sick dog with my eighteen dollars, you and
Senor McKay give me a hundred. And far more than that, you saved my life
at a time when many men would have said, 'Bah! let the bloody one die!
He is nothing but scum of the border and leader of that murdering crew.'
You had only to let me lie a few minutes longer and you would be rid of
me. No, Jose does not forget.

"That is all, except--if you will, in parting, take the hand of a man
known as a killer and other things--"

Knowlton gripped that hand with swift heartiness. He would have
protested against such a departure, but the other's steady gaze
betokened infl