He's very ignorant, you see, and he's sensitive. When he meets
foreigners and can't understand their language, he's always afraid if
they laugh that he's made a break and that they're laughing at HIM. So,
be solemn; look grave; look haughty!"

"I got you!" assented St. Clair. "I'm to 'register' pride."

"Exactly!" said Billy. "The more pride you register, the better for us."

Inwardly cold with alarm, outwardly frigidly polite, Billy presented
"Lieutenant Hardy." He had come, Billy explained, in answer to the call
for help sent by himself to the Secretary of State, which by wireless
had been communicated to the LOUISIANA. Lieutenant Hardy begged him
to say to the president that he was desolate at having to approach His
Excellency so unceremoniously. But His Excellency, having threatened the
life of an American citizen, the captain, of the LOUISIANA was forced to
act quickly.

"And this officer?" demanded President Ham; "what does he want?"

"He says," Billy translated to St. Clair, "that he is very glad to meet
you, and he wants to know how much you earn a week."

The actor suppressed his surprise and with pardonable pride said that
his salary was six hundred dollars a week and royalties on each film.
Billy bowed to the president.

"He says," translated Billy, "he is here to see that I get my ten
thousand francs, and that if I don't get them in ten minutes he will
return to the ship and land marines."

To St. Clair it seemed as though the president received his statement
as to the amount of his salary, with a disapproval that was hardly
flattering. With the heel of his giant fist the president beat upon the
table, his curls shook, his gorilla-like shoulders heaved.

In an explanatory aside Billy made this clear.

"He says," he interpreted, "that you get more as an actor than he gets
as president, and it makes him mad."

"I can see it does myself," whispered St. Clair. "And I don't understand
French, either."

President Ham was protesting violently. It was outrageous, he exclaimed;
it was inconceivable that a great republic should shake the Big Stick
over the head of a small republic, and for a contemptible ten thousand
francs.

"I will not believe," he growled, "that this officer has authority
to threaten me. You have deceived him. If he knew the truth, he would
apologize. Tell him," he roared suddenly, "that I DEMAND that he
apologize!"

Billy felt like the man who, after jauntily forcing the fighting,