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"No doubt General Yozarro will be able to float another loan big enough to provide his navy with a new screw; until then, he may limp along as best he can." At this moment, Mate Horton came forward with the same question. "We might tow them down to Zalapata, even with General Bambos on board, but I am not impressed that it is my duty.
The young woman made no reply, for she saw it would be useless, and her escort added: "Your counsel is good, Miss Starland, but suppose General Bambos should construe such action on my part as unfriendly?" "Surely he cannot do so, unless you enter his territory, and that I am sure you have no thought of doing."
"He has no cause for doing so, which is generally the reason why these wasps sting their neighbors. If they waited for a just cause there would be eternal peace. Ah, my yacht is not due for several days! I would it were here." "What would you do, Major?" "Declare on the side of General Bambos; I shouldn't ask better sport than to blow that crab out of the water."
General Bambos blandly smiled and cordially agreed with the wise sentiments, but laid the blame eternally on the other fellow. If he would only do that which is just, wars would cease and blessed peace would brood forever over all nations and peoples. Major Starland took another tack.
The only ones awake on the Warrenia were those whose duties required them to be alert, and Captain Winton, knowing that General Bambos was absent, held the whistle mute as he went by. If the yacht Warrenia and its crew and passengers had been called upon to pass through a series of stirring incidents while in tropical America, a rare and most gratifying experience now came to them.
"What is his reason for the command?" It was essentially a feminine question, but the soldier did not hesitate with the reply: "War impends between Zalapata and Atlamalco; we are expecting at almost any hour an attack upon Castillo Descanso; the Señorita observes the armed force that has been placed here by General Yozarro; he cannot allow the Señoritas the danger of falling into the hands of the perfidious General Bambos and his barbarians."
To make more emphatic the ebullition of his circulation, General Bambos abruptly stopped speaking and snatched out his perfumed silk handkerchief from beneath the partly unbuttoned breast of his coat, and mopped his lumpy forehead. He had carefully conned his oration, but his surging emotion would not give him pause. The climax leaped from him.
American citizens are not in the habit of surrendering at the demand or whim of any South American nobody." Removing his hat, the Major bowed low and smiled. "Does he speak the truth?" bluntly asked General Yozarro, turning to Bambos. The face of the American flushed at the slur, but he held himself in hand. "He does; he remained at my request," said General Bambos with a nod.
Gradually the boat grew hazy and indistinct, but the throbbing of the engine and the soft wash of the current lingered long after the craft itself had faded from view. "It may be that President Yozarro is afraid President Bambos will forget he has a navy," suggested the American. "He does not mean to attack him, I am sure."
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