y the doorway, the drone of earnest conference sounded a
few minutes, and the figures flashed as suddenly out again into the
world. In the inner office I glanced once more in review through the
"Rules and Regulations." The Zone, too, was now familiar ground, and as
for the third requirement for a policeman--to know the Zone residents
by sight--a strange face brought me a start of surprise, unless it
beamed above the garb that shouted "tourist." Now all I needed was a
few hours of conference and explanation on the duties, rights, and
privileges of policemen; and that of course would come as soon as
leisure again settled down over headquarters.

Musing which I was suddenly startled to my feet by "the Captain"
appearing in the doorway.

"Catch the next train to Balboa;" he said. "You've got four minutes.
You'll find Lieutenant Long on board. Here are the people to look out
for."

He thrust into my hands a slip of paper, from another direction there
was tossed at me a new brass-check and "First-Class Private" police
badge No. 88, and I was racing down through Ancon. In the meadow below
the Tivoli I risked time to glance at the slip of paper. On it were the
names of an ex-president and two ministers of a frowsy little South
American republic during whose rule a former president and his henchmen
had been brutally murdered by a popular uprising in the very capital
itself.

In the first-class coach I found Lieutenant Long, towering so far above
all his surroundings as to have been easily recognized even had he not
been in uniform. Beside him sat Corporal Castillo of the
"plain-clothes" squad, a young man of forty, with a high forehead, a
stubby black mustache, and a chin that was decisive without being
aggressive.

"Now here's the Captain's idea," explained the Lieutenant, as the train
swung away around Ancon hill, "We'll have to take turns mounting guard
over them, of course. I'll have to talk Spanish, and nobody'd have to
look at Castillo more than once to know he was born up in some crack in
the Andes."--Which was one of the Lieutenant's jokes, for the Corporal,
though a Colombian, was as white, sharp-witted, and energetic as any
American on the Zone.--"But no one to look at him would suspect that
Fr--French, is it?"

"Franck."

"Oh, yes, that Franck could speak Spanish. We 'll do our best to
inflate that impression, and when it comes your turn at guard-mount you
can probably let several little things of interest d