sidered, is a very good man, but old and stubborn and impolitic. He
won't be driven even by Celestino Rey, who in turn is not a man to be
denied. He is probably richer than Equatoria, and then Coral City lives
off this institution as Monaco lives off Monte Carlo. He doubtless
commands the whole lower element of the town. The word is, Celestino
Rey intends to run the Island first-hand--if he can't run it through
the powers that are."

All of which Bedient found of interest, inasmuch as he was passing
through the heart of these strange affairs. Having any part in them
seemed unearthly remote. The carriage was taking the gradual rise
behind a pair of fine ponies, and the view behind, over _The Pleiad_ to
the sapphire water, was noble. The horizon, beyond the harbor
distances, was a blazing intensity of light that stung the eyes to
quick contraction. The Captain sat back in the cushions, weary from
talking, but his face was happy, and he took in the exterior, and
something of the inner proportions, of the young man, with a sense of
awe. He did not try to explain yet--even to himself.

The _hacienda_ was slightly over twenty miles interior. Bedient was
entranced by the sunset from the heights. Then the slow ride to the
Carreras House through the darkened hills: the smell of warm earth from
the thick growths by the trail-side; little stars slipping into place
like the glisten of fireflies in a garden, or gems in a maiden's hair;
a scandalously-naked new moon lying low, like an arc of white-hot wire
in the purple twilight, and always behind them, a majestic splash of
jewel-edged crimson which showed the West.

And presently, from a high curve in the road, they saw the lights of
the _hacienda_ bold upon its eminence--and a dark valley between. Into
this night they descended, for the last course of the journey; and as
the ponies clattered upward again, white-coated natives came forth to
meet them. Bedient was further astonished at their volubility and easy
laughter. They spoke a debased Spanish, which the Captain had fallen
into,--as difficult of understanding for one whose medium was pure
Castilian as for one who spoke English. There was that mystery upon the
environs that always comes to one who reaches his destination in the
darkness. And to Bedient the sensation was not wholly of joy. These
were wild hills, not without grandeur, but there was something of
chaos, too, to him who came from the roof of the world. He missed th