Already that seemed ancient history.
The police launch, manned by negro prisoners, with "the Admiral"
in a cushioned arm-chair at the wheel, was soon scudding away
across the sunlit harbor, the breakwater building of the spoil of
Culebra "cut" on our left, ahead the cluster of small islands
being torn to pieces for Uncle Sam's fortifications. The steamer
being not yet sighted, we put in at Naos Island, where the bulky
policeman in charge led us to dinner at the I. C. C. hotel, during
which the noonday blasting on the Zone came dully across to us.
Soon after we were landing at the cement sidewalk of the island--
where I had been a prisoner for a day in January as my welcome to
U. S. territory--and were being greeted by the pocket edition
doctor and the bay-windowed German who had been my wardens on that
occasion.
We found the conspirators at a table in a corridor of the first-
class quarantine station. In the words of Lieutenant Long "they
fully looked the part," being of distinctly merciless cut of jib.
They were roughly dressed and without collars, convincing proof of
some nefarious design, for when the Latin-American entitled to
wear them leaves off his white collar and his cane he must be
desperate indeed.
We "braced" them at once, marching down upon them as they were
murmuring with heads together over a mass of typewritten sheets.
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