ley had listened with dismay to the conversation. The last of the
gold seekers' dug-outs had left in a hurry, and was disappearing
up-stream. And here were he and his partners, stranded at the very
beginning of their journey across to the Pacific! That had been a mean
trick by the long-nosed man. Charley grew hot with anger.

"I should think Maria and Francisco would have waked up," he complained.

"They're awake by this time, and considerably surprised, too," answered
Mr. Grigsby. "As like as not they were covered with their gutta-percha
blankets, from the rain, and the boat drifted away without their
feeling a thing."

The sun had risen. A few of the villagers squatted beside Mr. Grigsby
and Charley and chatted in Spanish. They didn't appear concerned over
the matter. They seemed to think that it was a joke. Presently Mr.
Adams came striding back.

"Nothing new, is there?" he queried. "All right. Breakfast is ready,
anyway. I don't think these people will object to having us as steady
boarders, at two bits apiece."

The breakfast, in the darkened hut where they had slept, was very good:
baked plantains (that looked when whole like a banana, but when served
cooked looked and tasted like squash), boiled rice, butterless bread,
and black coffee again. Charley enjoyed that breakfast--how could he
help it when he was hungry and the food was something new? But his
father rose twice to look at the river. Evidently time was of more
importance than eating.

However, the river brought nothing; and when they all had finished
breakfast and went out together to inspect the river again, it proved
still vacant of the dug-out, and of Maria and Francisco.

"I vow!" chafed Mr. Adams. "This is too bad."

Mr. Grigsby seated himself on the bank.

"I don't wish any snake harm that doesn't deserve it," he said. "But
if a big boa would swallow that long-nosed man and his two cronies I
don't reckon I'd feel especially sorry, except it would be powerful
hard on the snake!"

The village pursued its daily routine. Some of the women washed
clothing in the shallows, although the water seemed dirtier than the
garments. Men and women, both, cut plantains and bananas and
breadfruit, and scratched gardens with crooked sticks. Children played
about, and a few canoes pushed out, to go fishing. But nobody worked
any _too_ fast. The sun beat down hotly, the air was moist and heavy,
monkeys and parrots screamed in the tree