ell, another of us
was to call at the Bank of London and Rio and the River Plate Bank,
present his letters of introduction and ask in each bank to have the
five thousand pounds or ten thousand pounds ready the next day. They
purposed to call about 11 o'clock, so as to give me time to exchange the
Brazilian bank notes for sovereigns, and to buy my ticket by the
Chimborazo, to secure my stateroom and to take the gold to the steamer,
and, above all, to get my passport vised by the police.

Monday came. We expected a nervous day, not such a paralyzingly nervous
one as it proved to be. In fact, a nervous Tuesday followed a nervous
Monday. My reader must remember that we were in the tropics, with a
blazing sun looking down on us with an intensity that made one long for
Greenland's icy mountains to cool us.

We went into the public park for our last consultation before our
fortune, which never came, was to come.

Mac had in the little morocco case in his pocket two letters each for
L20,000. Certainly no man in the world, save him, could have carried off
such a game played for such high stakes. Handsome in person, faultless
in address, cool in nerve, a master of all the languages spoken in
Rio--Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and French. Above all, he had a
boundless confidence in himself. What an honorable future might have
been his but for his youthful follies! Truly he could have achieved a
wonderful success in any honorable career. Unhappily for him, he, like
thousands of our brainiest youth, had entered the Primrose Way. In our
youthful fire and thoughtlessness we saw only the flowers and heard the
siren's song, but at last the Primrose Way led us down into a gloom
where all the flowers withered and the gay songs turned into dirges.

Looking at his watch Mac jumped up, saying: "It is 10.45 and time to be
off." So he started for the bank, we following at some distance, our
nerves all on the stretch. We felt that our lives and fortunes were
trembling in the balance. The minutes dragged like hours. While watching
we saw several persons enter or leave the bank, and still our friend
delayed his appearance.

To our suspicious minds there appeared to be strange movements about the
bank that boded ill for us. A thousand suspicions born of our fears came
and went through our minds, until at last, unable to endure the
suspense, I entered the bank myself, and stood there, pretending I was
waiting for some one. I sharply scrutinized