t the colour of his hair. "Yes,
it is the little Marteen," he cried, "and now the little Marteen swings
into Palma in his great steam yacht. Dios, what a change!"

"And Jose Medina owns two hundred motor-feluccas and employs eighteen
thousand men," answered Hillyard.

Jose Medina held out his hand suddenly with a great burst of cordial,
intimate laughter.

"Yes, we were companions in those days. You helped me to drive my carts
up into the mountains. Good!" He patted Hillyard on the shoulder. "That
makes a difference, eh? Come, we will go in again. Now I shall help
you."

That reserve, that intense reserve of the Spaniard who so seldom admits
another into real intimacy, and makes him acquainted with his private
life, was down now. Hillyard had won. Jose Medina's house and his
chattels were in earnest at Martin Hillyard's disposal. The two men went
back through the house into a veranda above the steep fall of garden and
cliff, where there were chairs in which a man could sit at his ease.

Jose Medina fetched out a box of cigars.

"You can trust these. They are good."

"Who should know if you do not?" answered Hillyard as he took one; and
again Jose Medina patted him on the shoulder, but this time with a
gurgle of delight.

"_El pequeno_ Martin," he said, and he clapped his hands. From some
recess of the house his wife appeared with a bottle of champagne and two
glasses on a tray.

"Now we will talk," said Jose Medina, "or rather I will talk and you
shall listen."

Hillyard nodded his head, as he raised the glass to his lips.

"I have learnt in the last years that it is better to listen than to
talk," said he. "_Salut!_"

CHAPTER XIV

"TOUCHING THE MATTER OF THOSE SHIPS"

It has been said that Hillyard joined a service with its traditions to
create. Indeed, it had everything to create, its rules, its methods, its
whole philosophy. And it had to do this quickly during the war, and just
for the war; since after the war it would cease to be. Certain
conclusions had now been forced by experience quite definitely on
Hillyard's mind. Firstly, that the service must be executive. Its
servants must take their responsibility and act if they were going to
cope with the intrigues and manoeuvres of the Germans. There was no
time for discussions with London, and London was overworked in any case.
The Post Office, except on rare occasions, could not be used; telegrams,
however ingenious the cipher, were dangero