“I give you that word of honor,” said Tom, simply.

“And I have only to remind you, senor, that, if you make the mistake of breaking your word, bullets travel fast and several of my men are sharpshooters.”

“I am an American and a gentleman,” Reade returned, with offended dignity.  “My word of honor is not given to be broken.”

“Then you will seat yourself, senor, or stroll about and amuse yourself within the narrow limits of this small camp.”

Tom stepped over, rested his hand on Harry’s shoulder, then dropped to a seat beside his chum.

“Can you beat it?” Tom demanded, in ready American slang.

“It would be hard to, wouldn’t it?” Harry asked, smiling sheepishly.

Pedro Gato turned to regard them with a surly grin.  Though handcuffed, Gato seemed to feel that he was now enjoying his own innings.

For an hour or more the soldiers continued to rest.  All of them, including the lieutenant, who sat stiffly aloof from his men, rolling and smoking cigarettes.

“I see a bully argument against cigarette smoking,” whispered Tom in his chum’s ear.

“What is it?” Harry wanted to know.

“All of these fellows are smoking cigarettes.  I am proud of myself to feel that I don’t belong in their class.”

“A year ago Alf Drew would have felt at home in this cigarette-puffing, sallow-faced lot, wouldn’t be?” grinned Harry.

“I am glad to say that Alf now knows how measly a cigarette smoker looks,” answered Tom.

Alf Drew, as readers of the preceding volume will remember, was a boy addicted to cigarettes, but whom Tom had broken of the stupid habit.  Alf was now employed in the engineering offices of Reade & Hazelton.

“There’s something coming,” announced Reade, presently.  “It sounds like a miniature railroad train.”

“I wish it were a real one, and that we had our baggage aboard,” muttered Harry, with a grimace.

One of the sentries had gone to intercept the approaching object.  Instead the soldier now permitted the approaching object to roll into camp.  It proved to be Don Luis’s big touring car.  In the tonneau sat the mine owner and Dr. Carlos Tisco.

“What is this, Senor Reade?” cried Don Luis Montez, in pretended astonishment.  “In trouble?  Lieutenant, these gentlemen are friends of mine.  May I ask you what this means?”

Tom was not deceived by this by-play.  He snorted mildly while the young army lieutenant explained why he had detained the engineers.

“But these gentlemen are friends and employes,” Don Luis explained.  “What they tell you about Gato is quite true.  Will you oblige me by releasing these gentlemen, Lieutenant.”

The young officer seemed to hesitate.

“It’s all a part of the comedy,” whispered Tom, and Harry nodded.

“I—­I will let these Americanos go, for the present, Don Luis,” suggested the lieutenant, “provided you will take them back to your estate, and agree to be responsible for them if they are wanted.