hirt-waist and a
whipcord riding-skirt.

Clay sent for Stuart to join them at the restaurant, and MacWilliams
arriving at the same time, the four men seated themselves conspicuously
in the centre of the cafe and sipped their chocolate as though
unconscious of any imminent danger, and in apparent freedom from all
responsibilities and care. While MacWilliams and Langham laughed and
disputed over a game of dominoes, the older men exchanged, under cover
of their chatter, the few words which they had met to speak.

The manifestoes, Stuart said, had failed of their purpose. He had
already called upon the President, and had offered to resign his
position and leave the country, or to stay and fight his maligners, and
take up arms at once against Mendoza's party. Alvarez had treated him
like a son, and bade him be patient. He held that Caesar's wife was
above suspicion because she was Caesar's wife, and that no canards
posted at midnight could affect his faith in his wife or in his friend.
He refused to believe that any coup d'etat was imminent, save the one
which he himself meditated when he was ready to proclaim the country in
a state of revolution, and to assume a military dictatorship.

"What nonsense!" exclaimed Clay. "What is a military dictatorship
without soldiers? Can't he see that the army is with Mendoza?"

"No," Stuart replied. "Rojas and I were with him all the morning.
Rojas is an old trump, Clay. He's not bright and he's old-fashioned;
but he is honest. And the people know it. If I had Rojas for a chief
instead of Alvarez, I'd arrest Mendoza with my own hand, and I wouldn't
be afraid to take him to the carcel through the streets. The people
wouldn't help him. But the President doesn't dare. Not that he hasn't
pluck," added the young lieutenant, loyally, "for he takes his life in
his hands when he goes to the review tomorrow, and he knows it. Think
of it, will you, out there alone with a field of five thousand men
around him! Rojas thinks he can hold half of them, as many as Mendoza
can, and I have my fifty. But you can't tell what any one of them will
do for a drink or a dollar. They're no more soldiers than these
waiters. They're bandits in uniform, and they'll kill for the man that
pays best."

"Then why doesn't Alvarez pay them?" Clay growled.

Stuart looked away and lowered his eyes to the table. "He hasn't the
money, I suppose," he said, evasively. "He--he has transferred every
cent