d never end, but
about midnight they went jabbering back to their camp. It was the
noisiest night in the history of La Gloria. But the "sugar riot" was
averted, and never took place.

CHAPTER VII.

ADVENTURES AND MISADVENTURES.

Among the dozen women in the camp, the most striking figure was Mrs.
Moller, a Danish widow, who came from one of the states, Pennsylvania, I
believe. I cannot say exactly when she reached La Gloria, but she was
one of the earliest of her sex to arrive, and achieved the distinction
of building the first house in the "city." Speaking of sex, it was not
easy to determine that of Mrs. Moller upon a casual acquaintance. Slight
of figure, with bronzed face and close-cut hair, she wore a boy's cap,
blouse, trousers, a very short skirt, and rubber boots, while her belt
fairly bristled with revolvers and knives. She was a quiet,
imperturbable person, however, and it was difficult to get her to relate
her adventures, which had been somewhat extraordinary.

She first came into La Gloria from Palota, where she landed from a boat
with no other company than her trunk. There was not a living person at
or near Palota, so, deserting her baggage, she started out afoot and
alone, and attempted to make her way along the muddy and difficult trail
nine miles to La Gloria. It was a hard road to travel, with scarcely a
habitation along the way. Late in the afternoon she reached an inhabited
shack, and the Cubans invited her to spend the night. Although weary,
she declined the invitation, and pressed on. Darkness soon overtook her,
but still she kept on through the dense woods. The trail was exceedingly
rough, and she stumbled along among stumps, roots, and muddy gullies.
Every few steps she fell down, and finally becoming exhausted, she was
compelled to spend the night in the heart of the forest. She had no
shelter whatever, and no means of making a fire. She sat in the woods
all night, not being able to go to sleep, her only company being the
mosquitoes. In the morning she found she had lost her way, but at last
struck a Cuban trail, and was overtaken by a native horseman. He kindly
gave her a place in front of him on his pony, and thus she entered the
youthful city of La Gloria.

Nor was this Mrs. Moller's last adventure. She had an extraordinary
faculty for getting into trouble. Her trunk, which she had abandoned at
Palota, was rifled by some one, probably a wandering Cuban, and she
spent much time in