“Ichthyosaurus, perhaps,” supplied the Caracunuan, smiling.

“That’s it, whatever it may be.  ‘I’m an ichthyosaurus,’ he says.  ’It’s a very old family, but most of the buttons are off.  Were you ever bitten by one in the fossil state?  Very exhilaratin’, but poisonous,’ he says.  ’So don’t let me keep you any longer from your dinner.’  Of course, I saw then that he was a wrong un, so I cut him dead, and walked away.”

“Served him right,” declared the elderly American, with a solemn twinkle directed at the tall brown man, who, having opened his mouth, now thought better of it, and closed it again, with a grin.

“But he is very kind,” said the native.  “When my brother fell and broke his arm on the mountain, this gentleman found him, took care of him, and brought him in on muleback.”

“Lives up there somewhere, doesn’t he, Mr. Raimonda?” asked the big man.

“In the quinta of a deserted plantation,” replied the Caracunan.

“Wot’s he do?” asked the Englishman.

“Ah, that one does not know, unless Senor Sherwen can tell us.”

“Not I,” said the elderly man.  “Some sort of scientific investigation, according to the guess of the men at the club.”

“You never can tell down here,” observed the Englishman darkly.  “Might be a blind, you know.  Calls himself Perkins.  Dare say it isn’t his name at all.”

“Daughter,” said Mr. Thatcher Brewster at this juncture, in a patient and plaintive voice, “for the fifth and last time, I implore you to pass me the butter, or that which purports to be butter, in the dish at your elbow.”

“Oh, poor dad!  Forgive me!  But I was overhearing some news of an—­ an acquaintance.”

“Do you know any of the gentlemen upon whose conversation you are eavesdropping?”

In financial circles, Mr. Brewster was credited with the possession of a cold blue eye and a denatured voice of interrogation, but he seldom succeeded in keeping a twinkle out of the one and a chuckle out of the other when conversing with his daughter.

“Not yet,” observed that damsel calmly.

“Meaning, I suppose I am to understand—­”

“Precisely.  Haven’t you noticed them looking this way?  Presently they’ll be employing all their strategy to meet me.  They’ll employ it on you.”

Mr. Brewster surveyed the group dubiously.

“In a country such as this, one can’t be too—­too cau—­”

“Too particular, as you were saying,” cut in his daughter cheerfully.  “Men are scarce—­except Fitzhugh, who is rather less scarce than I wish he were lately.  You know,” she added, with a covert glance at the adjoining table, “I wouldn’t be surprised if you found yourself an extremely popular papa immediately after dinner.  It might even go so far as cigars.  Do you suppose that lovely young Caracunan is a bullfighter?”

“No; I believe he’s a coffee exporter.  Less romantic, but more respectable.  Quite one of the gilded youth of Caracuna.  His name is Raimonda.  Fitzhugh knows him.  By the way, where on earth is Fitzhugh?”