A. E. W. Mason

“ I answered. "I dread that half-hour in the train for her without a friend at her side. The Quay will be watched, too. She must run the gauntlet alone. Luckily there will be a crowd of harvesters returning to Spain. Luckily, also, she has courage. But it will be the worst of her trials. My absence would be noticed. I can't go."
"No, but I can!" cried Mr. Crowninshield. "An old padre seeing off an old nun to her new mission—eh? Juan Pablo will be gritting his teeth in the morning because I am an American citizen." ”

“ Juan Pablo turned round and leaned against the wall with his hands in his pockets.
"I?" he said. "I shall just stay on alone here until some day someone gets stronger than I am, perhaps, and puts me up against the wall outside——"
"Oh, no!" cried Olivia, interrupting him.
"Well, one never knows," said his Excellency, shrugging his shoulders. He turned to the window and drew aside the curtains. The morning had come. It was broad daylight outside.
"You had better get the Signorita a carriage," he said to the officer at the door. As the man went out, the music from the ballroom floated in. ”

“ Harry Vandeleur shook his head.
"He is at the top of his power. He has won his three-weeks war. The Army has made him President for the second time of the Republic of Maldivia. He has so skilfully organised his elections that he has a Parliament, not merely without an Opposition, but without a single man of any note in it except Don Felipe Halvera. It is not from such that humble people like us can expect gratitude."
Juan Pablo was, in fact, a very remarkable person. ”

“ Juan Pablo resumed. "But I will give you something of equal value."
He led Vandeleur to the window, and waving his hand impressively over the city, he said—
"I will give you the monopoly of green paint in the city of San Paulo."
I stilled a laugh. Harry Vandeleur got red in the face. For, after all, no man likes to look a greater fool than he naturally is. He had, moreover, a special reason for disappointment.
"I don't suppose that there are twenty bucketsful used in San Paulo in the year," he exclaimed bitterly.
"Wait, my friend," said Juan Pablo; "there will be." ”

“ Somewhere, on some pretext, at Trinidad, or at our own port here, La Guya, Harry Vandeleur would be stopped. I was sure of it. The net was closing tightly round Olivia. This morning the affair had seemed so simple—a mere matter of a six hours' journey in a train. Now it began to look rather grim. I stole a glance at Juan Pablo. He was still sitting with his chair tilted back and his hands in his pockets, but he was gazing out of the window, and his face was in repose. I recalled Olivia's phrase: "He is the cruellest of men." ”

“ She jumped in, I shut the door, and the carriage rolled away. I went back into the garden, where Juan Pablo's profile was growing ragged.
Of the next hour or two I have only confused memories. I counted stages in Olivia's progress as I passed from room to room among the guests. Now she would have reached the station; now the train had stopped on the quay at La Guya; now, perhaps, the gangway had been withdrawn and the great ship was warping out into the river. At one o'clock I smoked a cigarette in the garden. From the marquee came the clatter of supper. In the sky the moon was rising. ”

“ He is the cruellest of men."
"I will see you this afternoon," said I; and she passed on. I determined to have it out with Juan Pablo at the earliest possible moment. And within the hour he gave me the opportunity. For he came into the room and said—
"Carlyon, I have not had my letters this morning."
"No, your Excellency," I replied. I admit that my heart began to beat more quickly than usual. "I took the Signorita Halvera to the station, where we were stopped."
"I thought you would," he said, with a grin. "But it is impossible that the Signorita should leave San Paulo." ”

“ He was an impulsive youth, a regular bubble of high spirits.
"I am an ungrateful beast, and that's the truth," he said. "You have done a great deal for me, more than you know."
"Have I?" asked Juan Pablo drily.
"Yes," cried Harry Vandeleur, and out the story tumbled.
He was very anxious to marry Olivia Halvera—daughter, by the way, of Felipe Halvera, Pablo's Minister of the Interior—and Olivia Halvera was very anxious to marry him. Olivia was a dream. He, Harry Vandeleur, was a planter in a small way in Trinidad. Olivia and her father came from Trinidad. ”

“ There are four things I can do for you, and no more. In the first place, I can receive here the Signorita's luggage in small parcels and put it together for her. In the second, I can guarantee that the Ariadne shall not put into La Guya until dusk, and shall leave the same night. In the third, I will have every bale of cargo already loaded into her before the passenger train comes alongside from San Paulo. And in the fourth, I will arrange that the Ariadne shall put to sea the moment the last of her passengers has crossed the gangway. The rest you must do for yourself. ”

“ Crowninshield led the way into his parlour and stood with his finger-tips resting on the table and his long body bent over it. Mr. Crowninshield came from New York City, and I did not beat about the bush with him. I told him exactly the story of Olivia and Juan Pablo.
"She is in great trouble," I concluded. "There is something which I do not understand. But it comes to this. She must escape. The railways are watched, so is her house. There is only one way of escape—and that is on the seventeenth, the night when the Ariadne calls at La Guya and the President gives his party." ”

“ I remember him leaning out of Juan Pablo's window and looking up and down with a discontented eye.
"Wants a coat of green paint, doesn't it?" he said with a sort of jocular eagerness.
Juan Pablo never even winked.
"There ought to be a distinction between this house and all the others," he said gravely. "The President is merely the butler of the citizens. They ought to know at a glance where they can find him."
Harry Vandeleur burst suddenly into a laugh. ”

“ I know now that I never acted with greater cruelty than on that night when I kept her dancing. But even while she danced, there came to me some fear that I had misjudged her. I watched her from a corner of the ballroom. There was a great change in her. Her face seemed to me smaller, her eyes bigger, darker even, and luminous with some haunting look. ”

“ Juan Pablo, to my thinking, was a very great man, but I cannot deny that he strained the loyalty of his friends by this proclamation. Grumblings were loud. No one could discover who had complained of the glare of the streets—for the simple reason that no one had complained at all. However, the order was carried out. Daily the streets of San Paulo grew greener and greener, until the town had quite a restful look, and sank into its background and became a piece with its surroundings. Meanwhile, Harry Vandeleur sat in an office, rubbed his hands, and put up the price of green paint. ”

“ A rivalry between Juan Pablo and Harry Vandeleur would be a troublesome business for her, no doubt. But since she loved Harry Vandeleur, it could be no more than troublesome; and, after all, troublesome things are fairly common in the lives of all of us. ”

“ The conventions are fairly strict in Maldivia. Young ladies do not as a rule drop in casually upon men in the morning, and certainly not upon Presidents. However, conventions are for the unharassed. We drove to the President's. A startled messenger took in Olivia's name, and she was instantly admitted. I went to my office, but I left the door ajar. For down the passage outside of it Olivia would come when she had done with Juan Pablo. ”

“ The passengers will leave San Paulo at half past ten. Good luck!"
I went to the window and looked out over the garden. The marquee was erected, the fairy lights strung upon the trees, a set piece with the portrait of Juan Pablo and a Latin motto—semper fidelis—raised its monstrous joinery against the moon. ”

“ Olivia's hand fell lightly upon mine and pressed.
"My friend! " she said, and her eyes dwelt softly upon mine. Oh, she knew her business as a woman! Then she looked heavenwards.
"A man who helps a woman in trouble—" she began.
"Yes," I interrupted. "He must look up there for his reward. Meanwhile, Signorita, I am envying Harry Vandeleur," and I waved my hand to the green houses. "For he has not only got you, but he has realised his nice little fortune out of green paint."
And all Olivia did was to smile divinely; and all she said was "Harry." But there! ”

“ Twenty-four hours more and, if all went well, Olivia would be out upon the high seas, on her way to Trinidad.- Surely all must go well. I went over in my mind every detail of our preparations. I recognised only one chance of failure—the chance that Mr. Crowninshield in his exuberance might over-act his part. But I was wrong. It was, after all, Olivia who brought our fine scheme to grief.
V.
There is no doubt about it. Women are not reasonable beings. Otherwise Olivia would never have come to the President's party in a white lace coat over a clinging gown of white satin. ”

“ They were addressed to the War Minister of Esmeralda, and they gave details as to where Maldivia was weak where strong, what roads to the capital were unguarded, and for how many provisions could be requisitioned on the way. There was, besides, a memorandum, written, I rejoiced to see, from beginning to end in Don Felipe's own hand—a deadly document naming some twenty people in San Paulo who would need attention when Juan Pablo had been overthrown. It was impossible to misunderstand the phrase. Those twenty citizens of San Paulo were to be shot out of hand against the nearest wall. ”

“ I can trust you. Moreover, you will do the work more speedily than another, for you will be anxious to return."
With a friendly smile he took Harry Vandeleur by the arm and led him into his private study. Harry could not refuse. The mission was one of honour, and would heighten his importance in Don Felipe's eyes. He was, besides, under a considerable obligation to Juan Pablo. He embarked accordingly at La Guya, the port of call half an hour away from the city.
"Look after Olivia for me," he said, as we shook hands upon the deck of the steamer. ”

“ It would be easy to implicate Olivia in the treachery of her father. And the police in Maldivia are not very gentle in their handling of their prisoners, women or men. Still, that risk must be run.
"The Ariadne calls at La Guya in a fortnight," I said. "We must smuggle you out on her." ”

“ This was the Opera House. Beside the Opera House was a little dwelling. I rang the bell, and the door was opened by a tall, lean gentleman in a frock-coat. For the third time that night good luck had stood my friend.
"Mr. Henry P. Crowninshield," I said, "the world-famous impresario I believe?"
"And you, Mr. Carlyon, are the President's private secretary?" he said coldly. ”