Panama arrived at the field hospital just a few minutes after Elinor, tired of waiting, had left.

One of the nurses informed him that if he hurried, he might catch up with her before she reached the women’s barracks.

Without a word, he ran through the narrow streets of tents, out on to the main road that led into town. Just ahead of him, he spied the trim, silhouetted figure of the nurse, strolling along in the moonlight.

It was a beautiful tropical night, and the silver-white clouds in the sky and the full, warm moon casting its pure, white light over the black tops of the silent, old Spanish Mission, built hundreds of years before, filled the heart of the soldier with a romantic fervor. His pulse quickened and his step became more buoyant. It was a perfect setting for the scene he had hoped to enact with Elinor that night.

Here was a man and a woman, alone in a great, intoxicating world of warmth and romance, walking in the shadows of an old, ancestral Mission, the walls of which had looked down upon similar romantic episodes enacted by great Spanish grandees and their ladies, long centuries before.

As he ran breathlessly to catch up with the girl, he thought, “If she will respond to this night and background as I have, the rest will be easy.”

“Elinor, wait a moment,” he shouted.

The girl stopped just before the old Mission gate and waited for Panama, now only a few feet away.

“I thought you had forgotten about me,” she said, holding out her hand which the sergeant grasped eagerly as he reached her side.

“Forget about you? Oh, Elinor, I—I couldn’t ever do that! You see, I only landed a few minutes before Steve told me you were here and——”

“I understand,” she interrupted. “It was selfish of me to ask you to meet me when you must be dead to the world.”

Panama smiled sheepishly as he looked down, conscious of the fact that he was still holding her hand in his. They both felt a trifle uncomfortable when Elinor, emitting a nervous, apologetic laugh, released her hand.

“I’m never too tired to see you,” he said softly. “Besides, I wasn’t a bit anxious to hit the hay anyway.”

He hesitated for a moment and then, summing up enough courage, took her arm as they started down the road past the Mission gate.

“Look at that moon, Panama!” Elinor exclaimed exultantly. “Isn’t it romantic?”

His heart beat faster by leaps and bounds. He thought that now surely was the moment to take her in his arms and whisper all of the things he had been planning to tell her during the six months, but as usual, words failed him and he merely nodded his head, saying, “Yeah, it is sorta nice, ain’t it?”

She sighed deeply and Panama believed she was impatient, waiting for him to speak, though inwardly, she was longing for someone else, a tall, indifferent, handsome boy whose image filled her heart with a million yearnings since the day she had first met him.

They had been walking for more than fifteen minutes with the Marine sergeant remaining inarticulate as ever. Finally Elinor broke the silence by asking where he was taking her.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he replied in a characteristic, blunt fashion. “Any place, it doesn’t matter!”

“Let’s walk down by the tents,” she suggested, hoping that if they went in that direction, Lefty might make a sudden appearance.

“Aw, no,” Williams objected, hoping to keep her on the lonely road so that when he regained his lost courage, there would be no intruders to interrupt their romance. “Let’s keep on goin’ this way, the—er—the scenery is much nicer!”

He stole a sidelong glance at her, fearing that she might further protest to their continuing along the Mission road, but she didn’t speak. Her arm found its way into his and he felt a peculiar sensation up and down his spine.

“Gee, this is swell, ain’t it, Elinor?”

“What is?”

His face flushed a vivid crimson and he was thankful to a dark night for hiding his excited emotions. “Why—er—everything,” he stammered, “the moon and—er—well, everything!”

Just over beyond the Mission, some natives were chanting dreamy Spanish songs of love to the accompaniment of strumming guitars.

“Listen to that lovely music!” Elinor exclaimed, completely enthralled. “It’s all so—so perfectly beautiful!”

“Just like a storybook, ain’t it?” was Panama’s description.

“You’ve spent a lot of time in the tropics, haven’t you, Panama?”

“Three years at the Canal, a year and a half in Haiti and now back here for the second time,” he replied in a dreamy manner. “I think it’s great! This part of the world is just like apple pie to me!”

“Do you like apple pie?” Elinor asked for want of something better to say.

“Sure, when it’s homemade! Don’t you?”

Elinor struggled to suppress a giggle, and with a sombre look, replied, “Why, yes—surely—I guess everybody does.”

“My mother made swell pie,” he explained. “You don’t get much of that sort of thing knockin’ around in this racket. Sometimes I sorta want to quit it all and get a regular job where I can have a home and——”

“Yes, I understand,” she interrupted. “Men want that kind of a life after a certain age, don’t they, Panama?”

“I don’t know about that,” he said, a trifle piqued at her mention of his advancing years, “I ain’t so old!”

She gasped slightly, realizing that she had hurt him by her thoughtless remark and hurried to explain, “Why, of course you’re not! What I meant was——”

“Oh, it’s all right, I don’t mind,” he said. “I don’t mind anything you say!”

They had reached the end of the road by this time, and Panama took the girl’s arm, turning off to the right, making sure that they would take the longest way back to camp.

Just ahead of them was the thatched roof hut of a native family, no different from hundreds of others that dotted the landscape throughout that section of the country.

A proud young mother sat on the doorstep, nursing a dark-skinned infant. As the Marine and the girl approached, she looked up at them and smiled, showing two rows of white, pearly teeth. Panama left the road and walked over to the hut, picking the baby up in his arms as Elinor followed after him.

“Gee, I get a great kick out of all kinds of babies!” he announced with enthusiasm, looking over his shoulder at Elinor, who was standing just behind him. “Do you like kids?”

She nodded her head in affirmation and gently patted the little fellow. “My, but he’s a cute little rascal!”

The hard-boiled sergeant kissed the infant and, with much concern, handed it back to the anxious mother, also taking a coin from his pocket and placing it in the baby’s small hand.

As they started back toward the road, Williams pulled a tropical flower from a bush, and gave it to the girl.

“These flowers remind me of a barber shop,” he explained, at loss to think of a more appropriate comparison, “only they’ve got cologne beat all hollow, ain’t they?”

Elinor’s intuition warned her that it was time to sidetrack Panama’s flow of romantic thoughts and crude manner of expression, so she conveniently changed the trend of conversation by asking about Lefty in an assumed manner of indifference.

“He’s fine and tickled pink with his first taste of campaign duty!” Williams replied.

“Are you living together?”

“Sure thing! We’re pals! Say—listen to that music now. Ain’t it grand?”

She walked a little ahead of him, completely enveloped with the magic of the dreamy, tropical music, listening ecstatically, unmindful of the nervous state Panama was in as he fumbled for the diamond ring through his pockets.

He finally discovered it and brought it out, half hiding it as he struggled to gain enough courage to broach the subject he had promised himself to bring up that night.

As he stopped to rehearse the words over again in his mind, Elinor turned about suddenly and faced him.

“Tell me, Panama, how is Lefty coming along?”

Her sudden manner of direct approach startled him so, that he dropped the ring from his hand and without looking to see where it fell, stammered, “Oh—er—Lefty? Oh, yeah, he’s fine! Sure, he’s over in camp now, workin’!”

He hated to search for the lost ring while Elinor was watching, though he couldn’t very well afford to lose it. Intensely embarrassed, he began to look about the ground as the girl watched him, keenly amused.

“Did you drop something?” she asked.

“No, well, yes—but it’s nothing,” he fabricated, lighting a match and dropping to his knees to search the path more thoroughly, “I’ll find it in a minute.”

Her expression changed to one of interest as she dropped down beside him, helping in the search for whatever the lost object might be.

“Please don’t bother, Elinor,” he begged as he looked up and found her beside him. “Really, it ain’t much and I know just where it dropped.”

Just then, her eyes fell upon a small, sparkling object a few inches from where she was resting on her knees. She reached forward and picked up the ring in her hand, unnoticed by Panama who was still delving into the grass by the roadway.

She rose to her feet and looked at the small diamond, suddenly struck by the realization that he had brought her all the way out here, hoping to gain enough courage to propose. Her eyes softened and she gazed down at Panama tenderly, shaking her head as she sympathized with the man over the futility of his hopes just as she pitied herself over her own failure to win Lefty.

“Panama,” she said sweetly, with a ring of tolerance in her voice.

The man turned about, fumbling nervously with his hands as he noticed the telltale object she was holding in the palm of her outstretched hand.

“Is this what you’ve been looking for?” she asked, pretending to be ignorant of the ring’s true purpose.

“Why, yeah—sure!” he replied, clumsily bringing himself to his feet again and unable to look at her. “I—er—I can’t imagine how it could have fallen out of my pocket!”

“The way we came, past the Mission,” she asked, “that’s the shortest road back, isn’t it?”

“Oh, sure, if you want to go that way,” he announced, putting the ring away in the pocket of his blouse, glad to once more have it out of sight.

“I—I think we’d better,” she said, “I’ve had a long trip and——”

“I understand, and I’m pretty tired now, anyway,” he interrupted, turning about and leading her back the way they had come, still conscious of the faux pas he made regarding the engagement ring, “You know somethin’?”

“What?”

“That ring I lost—” he stammered. “Well, I bought that for—er—my aunt!”

“You don’t say?” Elinor replied, assuming an attitude of complete ignorance. “When did you buy it?”

“Oh—er—before I left Pensacola, I think.”

“As long ago as that?” she asked. “Why, I should think you would have sent it to her by this time.”

“Yeah, I should have, only—well—I just don’t seem to find the time!”

“Then supposing you give me her address and I’ll send it for you,” she suggested mischievously. “If you carry it around with you, you may lose it.”

Panama’s cheeks flushed and he bit his lips, looking at Elinor appealingly and wondering to himself what kind of a jam he was in for now.

“No—I—er—I’ve kept it so long and—well—I guess we’ll he goin’ back soon and——”

“Sergeant Williams!” he heard a familiar voice call, and looking just ahead, saw Steve Graham running toward them.

Though he had never liked this product of the San Francisco pool parlors, at that particular moment, he welcomed the boy’s arrival with open arms, knowing that the intrusion would relieve him of having to make further explanations regarding the ring.

“What do you want, Graham?”

The boy came up alongside of them and seeing Elinor, touched the peak of his cap with his hand as she smiled in acknowledgment.

“Can I see you for a minute, sergeant?”

Panama excused himself and left the girl standing alone as he and Steve walked a little to the side of the row, entering into earnest conversation.

“That mechanic of yours left camp all dolled up in his dress uniform,” the corporal explained. “He was headed for the Cantina and I tried to stop him, but he wouldn’t listen.”

Elinor couldn’t help but overhear what Steve had said and, as she thought of Lefty, mixed up with a lot of native women in a local barroom, helpless under the intoxicating influence of bad liquor, her blood ran cold and her face became chalk white.

“If the military police find out where he’s gone,” Steve went on to explain, “you know where he’ll land!”

Panama’s eyes narrowed and he bit his lips, inwardly furious over Lefty’s blunt disobedience in the face of all that had happened back in the tent.

“Run along, Graham,” he told the boy, in a manner of dismissal, “and forget about what you saw. I’ll have him back in half an hour if I got to drag him!”

Steve grinned with understanding and bowing slightly to Elinor, ran back, up the road to camp, satisfied that he had done his duty by God, country and the Marine Corps.

Elinor stood twitching her fingers from nervousness, waiting for Panama to do something, but as the sergeant continued to remain motionless, merely looking after the disappearing Graham, she came over to his side and tugged at the sleeve of his blouse.

“I couldn’t help but hearing,” she said. “Is Lefty in trouble?”

Panama turned and looked down at her, still livid with rage over the mechanic’s insubordination.

“I told that fool to stay in camp,” he roared. “He’s goin’ to learn who’s boss around here and do as he’s told!”

Fearful for the boy’s safety and worried that his escapade might send him to a military prison, thus ruining any possible chance of winning his wings in the future, she held the angered sergeant’s arm tightly and pleaded: “Don’t be too hard on him, Panama; he doesn’t understand!”

“I’ve got to bring him back or he’ll land in the brig,” Williams explained, his voice softening as he once more became the man and not the hard-boiled sergeant. “You won’t mind, will you?”

Barely able to conceal her personal concern over Lefty’s welfare, she fairly pushed Panama forward, urging him on his way, feeling that there wasn’t a minute to be lost.

“Never mind me,” she said, “I can find my way back alone, only please hurry and get him!”