and journals of our
expedition.

The sight of Malgares, staring at me in open consternation, caused me to
fix my gaze upon the gray-headed, irascible little man at the head of
the table. We had expected a great show of regalia and the other
trumpery of court display about the Commandant-General. Of this there
was no sign to be seen anywhere in the room. Yet the bearing of the man
at the head of the table and the attitude of all others present in
facing him, told me that this was none less than His Excellency, Don
Nimesio Salcedo, the despotic ruler of provinces greater in total
extent than the United States and all their possessions other than
Louisiana Territory. Yet by now I was so goaded to indignant anger that
I held my head high and met his stern glance with the curtest of bows.

"_Caramba!_" he swore, turning to Malgares. "Whom have we here?"

"Senor Juan Robinson, Your Excellency," explained Malgares--"that most
excellent physician of whom I spoke, the surgeon attached to the
expedition of Lieutenant Don Montgomery Pike."

It was only a fair example of Malgares's noble courtesy and friendliness
to seek thus to mollify in my favor the man whose single word could send
me to the garrotte as a spy. I thanked him with a look.

Salcedo flashed a fiery glance at the luckless Medina. "Why do you bring
him in--_imbecil_? Let him retire."

I turned on my heel, too heated now to care, whatever the tyrant might
have in mind to do. But the moment the door closed behind me, I found
Lieutenant Medina at my elbow, and he was as angry as myself.

"_Satanas!_" he hissed, his little beady eyes snapping with fury. "I
have lost standing with His Excellency by this frightful blunder.
Explain! You told me I was to conduct you in! Explain!"

"_Na-da!_" I drawled. "I did not tell you."

"You said it!" he insisted.

I gave him the Spanish equivalent for our adage not to cry over spilt
milk, adding that I preferred his room to his company. At this he went
off fairly boiling with rage, fearful, I take it, that if he stayed he
would explode, and so draw upon himself the wrath of his lord and
master. As by this time the rabble had dispersed, I was left to my own
bitter reflections.

Surely if Salcedo had not scrupled to seize the records of the
expedition, he would not scruple to treat me as an outright spy. The
best I could forecast from that meant an indefinite confinement in the
terrible Spanish _calabozo_, compared with whic