"By the way, I suppose you're well armed?" asked the Lieutenant in
his high querulous voice, as we drank a last round of ice-water
preparatory to setting out again.
"Em--I've got a fountain pen," I replied. "I haven't been a
policeman twenty minutes yet, and I was appointed in a hurry."
"Fine!" cried "the Admiral" sarcastically, snatching open the door
of a closet beside the desk. "With a warm job like this on hand!
You know what these South Americans are--" with a wink at the
Lieutenant that was meant also for Castillo, who stood with his
felt hat on the back of his head and a far-away look in his eyes.
"Yah, mighty dangerous--around meal time," said the Corporal;
though at the same time he drew from a hip pocket a worn leather
holster containing a revolver, and examined it intently.
Meanwhile "the Admiral" had handed me a massive No. 88 "Colt" with
holster, a box of cartridges, and a belt that might easily have
served as a horse's saddle-girth. When I had buckled it on under
my coat the armament felt like a small boy clinging about my
waist.
We trooped on down a sort of railroad junction with a score of
abandoned wooden houses. It was here I had first landed on the
Zone one blazing Sunday nearly two months before and tramped away
for some miles on a rusty sandy track along a canal already filled
with water till a short jungle path led me into my first Zone
town.
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