SUSPICIOUS MOVEMENTS. 



171 



We had often stopped to look around us here and 

 admire the wild beauty otf it all ; but this morning the spell 

 has been broken, the charm of its seclusion and privacy 

 has been rudely shattered. There is a fly in our ointment : 

 for a dirty little black Venezuelan gun-boat, ill kempt 

 and ill conditioned, is steaming backwards and forwards 

 just outside our own private little cove. 



It is, of course, as plain as daylight what she has come 

 for. We see it all in a flash, and are immensely tickled 

 at the thought . We are suspects — ^the Venezuelan govern- 

 ment is doubtful of our bona -fides, and has sent a warship 

 to look us up, and see what our little game is, on this 

 "tight" little island. They have never heard of Chrysotis 

 rothschildi ; and if they had, they would not believe for a 

 second that this puzzling parrot was the only raison d'etre 

 of our being here. Of course we are suspected — a man who 

 gets rich so quickly, at his country's expense, as President 

 Castro, has good reasons to suspect much. 



First we had been to the Testigos Islands ; a place no 

 Venezuelan would dream that any one would visit, 

 without some much deeper motive than we had. Then no 

 one had landed at Cumana, where we had only stayed just 

 long enough to send a boat on shore to get our papers " 

 made out. 



After this, we had gone posting off, helter skelter, to 

 the Laguna del Obispo ; a still more outlandish place ; 

 and from here, after the briefest stay, we had hurried 

 on to the top end of the gulf of Cariaco, where doubtless 

 we had gone to meet and conspire with confederates. 

 From here we had rushed away to Blanquilla — all quite 

 the most inexplicable manoeuvres on the part of an 

 innocent yachting party. 



Clearly we were up to no good. What was it ? Were 

 we trying to run contraband, or looking for hidden 

 treasure ? — or, by the powers ! — ^that's it — ^they're landing 

 arms and ammunition for the faction who are plotting 

 against the government. Later on, when opportunity 

 offers, these malcontents will quietly slip over and dig them 



