“It’s Carson,” he interjected, as he listened.  “They haven’t cut the wires across the river yet.—­Hello, Carson.  Was it a break or a cut? ...  Bully for you....  Yes, move the mules across to the potrero beyond Tamcochin....  Who’s at the water station? ...  Can you still ’phone him? ...  Tell him to keep the tanks full, and to shut off the main to Arico.  Also, to hang on till the last minute, and keep a horse saddled to cut and run for it.  Last thing before he runs, he must jerk out the ’phone....  Yes, yes, yes.  Sure.  No breeds.  Leave full-blooded Indians in charge.  Gabriel is a good hombre.  Heaven knows, once we’re chased out, when we’ll get back....  You can’t pinch down Jaramillo under twenty-five hundred barrels.  We’ve got storage for ten days.  Gabriel’ll have to handle it.  Keep it moving, if we have to run it into the river——­”

“Ask him if he has a launch,” Habert broke in.

“He hasn’t,” was Wemple’s answer.  “The federals commandeered the last one at noon.”

“Say, Carson, how are you going to make your get-away?” Wemple queried.

The man to whom he talked was across the Panuco, on the south side, at the tank farm.

“Says there isn’t any get-away,” Wemple vouchsafed to the other two.  “The federals are all over the shop, and he can’t understand why they haven’t raided him hours ago.”

“...  Who?  Campos?  That skunk! ... all right....  Don’t be worried if you don’t hear from me.  I’m going up river with Davies and Habert....  Use your judgment, and if you get a safe chance at Campos, pot him....  Oh, a hot time over here.  They’re battering our doors now.  Yes, by all means ...  Good-by, old man.”

Wemple lighted a cigarette and wiped his forehead.

“You know Campos, Jose H. Campos,” he volunteered.  “The dirty cur’s stuck Carson up for twenty thousand pesos.  We had to pay, or he’d have compelled half our peons to enlist or set the wells on fire.  And you know, Davies, what we’ve done for him in past years.  Gratitude?  Simple decency?  Great Scott!”

* * * * *

It was the night of April twenty-first.  On the morning of the twenty-first the American marines and bluejackets had landed at Vera Cruz and seized the custom house and the city.  Immediately the news was telegraphed, the vengeful Mexican mob had taken possession of the streets of Tampico and expressed its disapproval of the action of the United States by tearing down American flags and crying death to the Americans.

There was nothing save its own spinelessness to deter the mob from carrying out its threat.  Had it battered down the doors of the Southern Hotel, or of other hotels, or of residences such as Wemple’s, a fight would have started in which the thousands of federal soldiers in Tampico would have joined their civilian compatriots in the laudable task of decreasing the Gringo population of that particular portion of