police the Palace grounds, if I were you, and picket that
street at the right, where there are so many wine shops, and preserve
order generally until Rojas gets here. He won't be more than an hour,
now. We shall be coming over to pay our respects to your captain
to-morrow. Glad to have met you."

"Well, I'm glad to have met you," answered the officer, heartily.
"Hold on a minute. Even if you haven't worn our uniform, you're as
good, and better, than some I've seen that have, and you're a sort of a
commander-in-chief, anyway, and I'm damned if I don't give you a sort
of salute."

Clay laughed like a boy as he swung himself into the saddle. The
officer stepped back and gave the command; the middies raised their
swords and Clay passed between massed rows of his countrymen with their
muskets held rigidly toward him. The housetops rocked again at the
sight, and as he rode out into the brilliant sunshine, his eyes were
wet and winking.

The two boys had drawn up at his side, but MacWilliams had turned in
the saddle and was still looking toward the Palace, with his hand
resting on the hindquarters of his pony.

"Look back, Clay," he said. "Take a last look at it, you'll never see
it after to-day. Turn again, turn again, Dictator of Olancho."

The men laughed and drew rein as he bade them, and looked back up the
narrow street. They saw the green and white flag of Olancho creeping
to the top of the mast before the Palace, the blue-jackets driving back
the crowd, the gashes in the walls of the houses, where Mendoza's
cannonballs had dug their way through the stucco, and the silk
curtains, riddled with bullets, flapping from the balconies of the
opera-house.

"You had it all your own way an hour ago," MacWilliams said, mockingly.
"You could have sent Rojas into exile, and made us all Cabinet
Ministers--and you gave it up for a girl. Now, you're Dictator of
Olancho. What will you be to-morrow? To-morrow you will be Andrew
Langham's son-in-law--Benedict, the married man. Andrew Langham's
son-in-law cannot ask his wife to live in such a hole as this,
so--Goodbye, Mr. Clay. We have been long together."

Clay and Langham looked curiously at the boy to see if he were in
earnest, but MacWilliams would not meet their eyes.

"There were three of us," he said, "and one got shot, and one got
married, and the third--? You will grow fat, Clay, and live on Fifth
Avenue and wear a high silk hat, and some day when you're