“Taboga,” she said, with eyes sparkling.  “You’ve never been there, but it’s perfectly gorgeous.  Please call a coach, our boat is waiting—­and don’t sit on the lunch.”

Kirk obeyed, and they went clattering down the deserted brick street.  Edith leaned back with a sigh.

“I’m so glad to get away from that hotel for a day.  You’ve no idea how hard it is to be forever entertaining a lot of people you care nothing about, or being entertained by people you detest.  I’ve smiled and smirked and cooed until I’m sick; I want to scowl and grind my teeth and roar.”

“Still politics, I suppose?”

“Yes, indeed; we don’t dare talk about it.  If you only knew it, Kirk, you’ve capsized the political calculations of the Panama Conservative Party.”

“I didn’t know I had ever even rocked the boat.”

“It runs back to your affair with Ramen.”  She glanced toward the coach driver, suggesting the need of reticence.

“Really, did that effect it?”

“Rather.  At any rate, it gave an excuse for setting things in motion.  There had been some doubt about the matter for a long time, and I was only too glad to exert my influence in the right direction, but—­this is a picnic to an enchanted island, and here we are talking politics!  We mustn’t be so serious.  School is out, and it’s vacation.  I want to romp and play and get my face dirty.”

Kirk readily fell in with her mood, and by the time they reached the water-front they were laughing like two children.  Down through a stone arch they went, and out upon a landing beneath the sea wall.  In front of them the placid waters of the bay were shimmering, a myriad of small boats thronged the harbor.  There were coasting steamers, launches, sail-boats, skiffs, and canoes.  Along the shore above the tide-line were rows of schooners fashioned from gigantic tree-trunks and capable of carrying many tons, all squatting upon the mud, their white sails raised to dry like the outstretched wings of resting sea-gulls.

The landing was thronged, and, at sight of the newcomers, loiterers gathered from all sides—­a pirate throng, shouting a dozen dialects and forcing Kirk to battle lustily for his luggage.  Stepping into a skiff, they were rowed to a launch, and a few moments later were gliding swiftly around the long rock-rib that guards the harbor, a copper-hued bandit at the wheel, a Nubian giant at the engine, and an evil, yellow-faced desperado sprawling upon the forward deck.

Looking back, they saw the city spread out in brilliant panorama, clear and beautiful in the morning radiance.  Packed and dense it lay, buttressed by the weather-stained ramparts which legend says were built by the women while their husbands were at war, and backed by the green heights of Ancon, against which the foreign houses nestled.  Set in the foreground, like an ivory carving, was the Government Theatre, while away beyond it loomed the Tivoli.