hinking, and his heart ached for her. For him to cut the brother
out of his life was not difficult; what it meant to her he could guess.

When the girl raised her eyes they were eloquent with distress.

"He has been so good to me," she said; "always so gentle. He has been
mother and father to me. He is the first person I can remember. When I
was a child he put me to bed, he dressed me, and comforted me. When we
became rich there was nothing he did not wish to give me. I cannot
leave him. He needs me more than ever I needed him. I am all he has.
And there is this besides. Were I to marry, of all the men in the
world it would be harder for him if I married you. For if you succeed
in what you came here to do, the law will punish him, and he will know
it was through you he was punished. And even between you and me there
always would be that knowledge, that feeling."

"That is not fair," cried Everett. "I am not an individual fighting
less fortunate individuals. I am an insignificant wheel in a great
machine. You must not blame me because I-"

With an exclamation the girl reproached him.

"Because you do your duty!" she protested. "Is that fair to me? If for
my sake or my brother you failed in your duty, if you were less
vigilant, less eager, even though we suffer, I could not love you."

Everett sighed happily.

"As long as you love me," he said, "neither your brother nor any one
else can keep us apart."

"My brother," said the girl, as though she were pronouncing a sentence,
"always will keep us apart, and I will always love you."

It was a week before he again saw her, and then the feeling he had read
in her eyes was gone--or rigorously concealed. Now her manner was that
of a friend, of a young girl addressing a man older than herself, one
to whom she looked up with respect and liking, but with no sign of any
feeling deeper or more intimate.

It upset Everett completely. When he pleaded with her, she asked:

"Do you think it is easy for me? But--" she protested, "I know I am
doing right. I am doing it to make you happy."

"You are succeeding," Everett assured her, "in making us both damned
miserable."

For Everett, in the second month of his stay in Amapala, events began
to move quickly. Following the example of two of his predecessors, the
Secretary of State of the United States was about to make a grand tour
of Central America. He came on a mission of peace and brotherly love,
to foster