ho you are," admitted Peter, "but you can see
that this town is a red-hot incubator for revolutions. Every one in it
thinks of nothing else, and every one thinks you are in deep with your
father against Alvarez, and if we linger here Alvarez will think so,
too. We've got to get back to Porto Cabello where we have a clean bill
of health."

Roddy had stretched himself upon his cot, in preparation for his
afternoon siesta, but he sat upright, his face filled with dismay.

"And not see the Rojas family?" he cried.

Peter growled indignantly.

"See them! How can you see them?" he demanded. "We only drove past
their house, along a public road, and already everybody in town has a
flashlight picture of us doing it."

"But," objected Roddy, "we haven't got our credentials."

"We'll have to do without them," declared Peter. "I tell you, if you
get mixed up with Brother Pino when you get back to Porto Cabello
you'll go to jail. And what chance will we have then of saving General
Rojas? He will stay in prison and die there. As White Mice," announced
Peter firmly, "we have our work to do, and we must not be turned aside
by anybody's revolution, your father's, or Pino Vega's, or anybody's.
We're White Mice, first, last and all the time. Our duty isn't to take
life but to save it." As though suddenly surprised by a new idea Peter
halted abruptly.

"I suppose," he demanded scornfully, "you think you prevented a murder
this morning, and you will be claiming the White Mice medal for saving
life?"

"I certainly will," declared Roddy cheerfully, "and you will have to
certify I earned it, because you saw me earn it."

"But I didn't," declared Peter. "I was under the table."

Roddy closed his eyes and again fell back upon the cot. For so long a
time was he silent that Peter, who had gone out upon the balcony,
supposed him asleep, when Roddy suddenly raised himself on his elbow.

"Anyway," he began abruptly, "we can't leave here until the boat takes
us away, three days from now. I'll bet in three days I'll get all the
credentials we want."

Roddy had been awake since sunrise, the heat was soporific, the events
of the morning exhausting, and in two minutes, unmindful of
revolutions, indifferent to spies, to plots and counter-plots, he was
sleeping happily. But as he slumbered, in two lands, at great
distances apart, he and his affairs were being earnestly considered.
On the twenty-seventh floor of the Forrester Building his fath