ave got
the reputation of not sticking at much."

"My dear Don Miguel, a statesman in your own islands once evolved the
policy of Thorough. We have adopted the selfsame principle. Nobody and
nothing must stand in the way of our ends. We stand up for humanity in
the mass. _Bourgeois_ society is bound to go under. And to hasten
its downfall any one of our members is proud to offer himself as a
sufferer, or as even a martyr to death, for the Cause. We aim at
producing a state of society in which men may live together in harmony
without laws. You must see that we are merely extreme philanthropists,
and that our motives are pure in the extreme. And, _amigo_, you
must disabuse your mind from the vulgar illusion that we are nothing
but a band of brutal assassins who murder only through sheer lust for
blood."

I started some sort of apology, but he cut me short.

"My dear fellow, you haven't put my back up in the very least. A man is
bound to misunderstand us unless he is on our side; because if he does
understand and appreciate, and has any claim to the title of man, he
could not help being an anarchist. But now let us drop the question and
get to the work of the more immediate present. I am going to the
telegraph office first. Let me accompany you back as far as your
hotel."

"When shall I see you again?" I asked, as we parted at Bustamente's
doorway.

"When I find where the Recipe is."

"And that will occupy how long? A week?"

Taltavull laughed. "You will see me to-morrow afternoon at the latest,"
said he.

Confidence is said to be infectious, but I can't say that my hopes were
very highly excited by Taltavull's sanguineness of success. As to
Haigh, he had scoffed at the idea of tracing up the Recipe from the
first, and all I could tell him about the new power on the scent would
not change his cheerful pessimism. "The whole loaf we are not going to
get, dear boy," was his stated opinion; "and we may as well be
contented with the crumbs we've grabbed, and enjoy 'em accordingly.
There's the dinner bell. Let's go and make merry with the drummers."

However, true to his word, and not a little to our surprise, Taltavull
turned up about four the next afternoon and told us that he had been
successful. There was a little subcutaneous pride to be noted as he
made the announcement, for, after all, he was a human man as well as an
anarchist, and had done a thing which we deemed very nigh impossible.
But he kept this natur