"To President Alvarez,
Dictator of Olancho!"

The cry was drowned in a yell of exultation, and men sprang cheering to
their chairs waving their napkins above their heads, and those who wore
swords drew them and flashed them in the air, and the quiet, lazy
good-nature of the breakfast was turned into an uproarious scene of
wild excitement. Clay pushed back his chair from the head of the table
with an anxious look at the servants gathered about the open door, and
Weimer clutched frantically at Langham's elbow and whispered, "What did
I say? For heaven's sake, how did it begin?"

The outburst ceased as suddenly as it had started, and old General
Rojas, the Vice-President, called out, "What is said is said, but it
must not be repeated."

Stuart waited until after the rest had gone, and Clay led him out to
the end of the veranda. "Now will you kindly tell me what that was?"
Clay asked. "It didn't sound like champagne."

"No," said the other, "I thought you knew. Alvarez means to proclaim
himself Dictator, if he can, before the spring elections."

"And are you going to help him?"

"Of course," said the Englishman, simply.

"Well, that's all right," said Clay, "but there's no use shouting the
fact all over the shop like that--and they shouldn't drag me into it."

Stuart laughed easily and shook his head. "It won't be long before
you'll be in it yourself," he said.

Clay awoke early Friday morning to hear the shutters beating viciously
against the side of the house, and the wind rushing through the palms,
and the rain beating in splashes on the zinc roof. It did not come
soothingly and in a steady downpour, but brokenly, like the rush of
waves sweeping over a rough beach. He turned on the pillow and shut
his eyes again with the same impotent and rebellious sense of
disappointment that he used to feel when he had wakened as a boy and
found it storming on his holiday, and he tried to sleep once more in
the hope that when he again awoke the sun would be shining in his eyes;
but the storm only slackened and did not cease, and the rain continued
to fall with dreary, relentless persistence. The men climbed the muddy
road to the Palms, and viewed in silence the wreck which the night had
brought to their plants and garden paths. Rivulets of muddy water had
cut gutters over the lawn and poured out from under the veranda, and
plants and palms lay bent and broken, with their broad leaves
bedraggled and coated with mud.