dy would believe you." Burke rubbed his chin,
thoughtfully, with his fingers, and looked modestly at the ceiling, and
the two younger boys gazed at him with open-mouthed interest.

"There ain't anything in buried treasure," he said, after a pause,
"except the money that's sunk in the fitting out. It sounds good, but
it's all foolishness."

"All foolishness, eh?" said Clay, encouragingly. "And what did you do
after Balmaceda was beaten?--after I last saw you?"

"Crespo," Burke replied, after a pause, during which he pulled gently
on his pipe. "'Caroline Brewer'--cleared from Key West for Curacao,
with cargo of sewing-machines and ploughs--beached below
Maracaibo--thirty-five thousand rounds and two thousand rifles--at
twenty bolivars apiece."

"Of course," said Clay, in a tone of genuine appreciation. "I might
have known you'd be in that. He says," he explained, "that he assisted
General Crespo in Venezuela during his revolution against Guzman
Blanco's party, and loaded a tramp steamer called the 'Caroline Brewer'
at Key West with arms, which he landed safely at a place for which he
had no clearance papers, and he received forty thousand dollars in our
money for the job--and very good pay, too, I should think," commented
Clay.

"Well, I don't know," Burke demurred. "You take in the cost of leasing
the boat and provisioning her, and the crew's wages, and the cost of
the cargo; that cuts into profits. Then I had to stand off shore
between Trinidad and Curacao for over three weeks before I got the
signal to run in, and after that I was chased by a gun-boat for three
days, and the crazy fool put a shot clean through my engine-room. Cost
me about twelve hundred dollars in repairs."

There was a pause, and Clay turned his eyes to the street, and then
asked, abruptly, "What are you doing now?"

"Trying to get orders for smokeless powder," Burke answered, promptly.
He met Clay's look with eyes as undisturbed as his own. "But they
won't touch it down here," he went on. "It doesn't appeal to 'em.
It's too expensive, and they'd rather see the smoke. It makes them
think--"

"How long did you expect to stay here?" Clay interrupted.

"How long?" repeated Burke, like a man in a witness-box who is trying
to gain time. "Well, I was thinking of leaving by Friday, and taking a
mule-train over to Bogota instead of waiting for the steamer to Colon."
He blew a mouthful of smoke into the air and watched it drifting towar