“Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; tree frogs rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big mountains dropping gravel in the back yards, and the sea licking the paint off in front—no, sir—a man had better be in God’s country living on free lunch than there.
“The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and then turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles and straw. I wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren’t climbing cocoanut trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw my people. They must have come ashore while I was promenading. A man about fifty, smooth face, heavy eyebrows, dressed in black broadcloth, looking like he was just about to say, ‘Can any little boy in the Sunday school answer that?’ He was freezing on to a grip that weighed like a dozen gold bricks, and a swell girl—a regular peach, with a Fifth Avenue cut—was sitting on a wooden chair. An old black woman was fixing some coffee and beans on a table. The light they had come from a lantern hung on a nail. I went and stood in the door, and they looked at me, and I said:
“‘Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady’s sake, you will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.’
“‘Who are you?’ says the old gent.
“‘O’Day,’ says I, ‘of the Columbia Detective Agency. And now, sir, let me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and take your medicine like a man. Hand ’em back the boodle; and maybe they’ll let you off light. Go back easy, and I’ll put in a word for you. I’ll give you five minutes to decide.’ I pulled out my watch and waited.
“Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and the style she had that Fifth Avenue was made for her.
“‘Come inside,’ she says. ‘Don’t stand in the door and disturb the whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it you want?’
“‘Three minutes gone,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you again while the other two tick off.
“‘You’ll admit being the president of the Republic, won’t you?’
“‘I am,’ says he.