A Spanish transport, close by, was languidly discharging uniformed troops; lighters of military supplies were being unloaded; the sound of a bugle floated from the shore.  Moored to the docks or anchored in the harbor were several shallow-draught “tin-clad” coast-patrol craft from the staffs of which streamed the red and yellow bars of Spain.

Although there were but a few passengers on the Dunham Castle, they were subjected to a long delay during which suspicious customs men searched their baggage and questioned them.  Finally, however, O’Reilly found himself free to go ashore.  He had passed the ordeal handily, and now he was eager to reach some lodging-place where he could remove that revolver which knocked against his leg so awkwardly at every step.  Once on the dock, he gave his bag to a negro and led the way toward the street.  At the last moment, however, just as he was about to plant his feet upon solid earth, he was halted by two men who rose from a bench where they had been idling.  They carried the tasseled canes of the Secret Service, and O’Reilly felt his heart jump.

With a murmured apology one of them relieved the negro of the valise while the other began to search O’Reilly’s person for concealed weapons.  He began at Johnnie’s shoulders and patted one pocket after another, “fanning” him in the fashion approved of policemen.  Now, too late, the American regretted his refusal to heed the mate’s warning.  It seemed certain that he was in for trouble, but he drew his heels together and stood with the revolver pressed between his legs, praying that those exploratory palms would not encounter it.  When the officer had slapped every pocket, ending at the hips, he nodded; his companion snapped shut the valise, and handed it back to the porter.

O’Reilly paused a moment or two later to wipe the abundant perspiration from his face; even yet his pulse was pounding erratically.  He hoped the future held no more surprises of this sort, for he feared that his nerve might fail him.

El Gran Hotel Europea, Neuvitas’s leading hostelry, belied its name.  It was far from large, and certainly it was anything but European, except, perhaps, in its proprietor’s extravagant and un-American desire to please, at any cost.  The building was old and dirty, the open cafe, fronting upon the sidewalk of the main street, was full of flies, and dust from the unclean roadway lay thick upon its stone-topped tables; moreover, a recognizable odor of decay issued from the patio—­or perhaps from the kitchen behind it.  After O’Reilly’s first meal he was sure it came from the latter place; even suspected that the odor flattered actual conditions.  But it was the best hotel the place afforded, and Senor Carbajal was the most attentive of hosts.

He was a globular, unctuous little man, this Carbajal; he reminded O’Reilly of a drop of oil.  He evinced an unusual interest in the affairs of his American guest, and soon developed a habit of popping into the latter’s room at unexpected moments, ostensibly to see that all was as it should be.  Now there was very little in the room to need attention—­only a bed with a cheese-cloth mosquito-net, a wash-stand, and a towering, smelly clothes-press of Spanish architecture, which looked as if it might have a dark and sinister history.  When, for the third time, he appeared without knocking, O’Reilly suspected something.