. He found that
every one at that table was regarding him intently. It was evident all
had witnessed the incident. Roddy wondered if it were possible that
the letter came from them. Looking further he observed that the man
who was serving Peter and himself also was regarding him with greater
interest than seemed natural, and that he was not the man who first
had waited upon them.

"You," began Roddy doubtfully, "you are not the waiter who----"

The man shrugged his shoulders.

"That fellow he can't speakety English," he explained. "I speakety
English very good."

The man smiled knowingly, so it seemed to Roddy, impertinently. Roddy
felt uncomfortably convinced that some jest was going on behind his
back, and he resented the thought.

"Yes," he began hotly, "and I will bet you _understand_ it, too."

Under the table Peter kicked violently at his ankles.

"Read your letter," he said.

The envelope bore only the name Rodman Forrester. The letter began
abruptly and was not signed. It read:

"Willemstad is a small place. Every one in it knows every
one else. Therefore, the most conspicuous person in it is
the last person to arrive. You are the last person to
arrive, and, accordingly, everything you do is noted. That
this morning you twice passed the Casa Blanca has been
already reported both by those who guard it and by those who
spy upon it. If you would bring disaster to those you say
you wish to serve, keep on as idiotically as you have
begun."

The rebuke, although anonymous, turned Roddy's cheeks a rosy red, but
he had sufficient self-control to toss the letter to his companion,
and to say carelessly: "He wants us to dine with him."

The waiter, who had been openly listening, moved off in the direction
of the kitchen. A moment later Roddy saw him bear a dish to the
Venezuelan at the head of the long table, and as he proffered it, the
two men whispered eagerly.

When Peter had read the warning he threw it, face down, upon the
table, and with a disturbed countenance pretended to devote his
attention to the salad dressing. Roddy was now grinning with pleasure,
and made no effort to conceal that fact.

"I wouldn't have missed this," he whispered, "for a week in God's
country. Apparently everybody's business is everybody else's business,
and every one spies on every one. It's like the island where they were
too proud to do their own washing, so everybody took in