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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The White Mice, by Richard Harding Davis
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The White Mice
+
+Author: Richard Harding Davis
+
+Illustrator: George Gibbs
+
+Release Date: November 11, 2008 [EBook #27232]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WHITE MICE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by D Alexander and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ THE
+
+ WHITE MICE
+
+ BY
+
+ RICHARD HARDING DAVIS
+
+ ILLUSTRATED BY
+
+ _GEORGE GIBBS_
+
+ CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+ NEW YORK _1912_
+
+
+
+
+ COPYRIGHT, 1909,
+ BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "What does anything matter, when I know--that the end
+is near!"]
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+ "What does anything matter, when I know--that the
+ end is near!"                                        _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                           FACING PAGE
+
+ "_O-i-i-ga_, you Moso! Get a move on! _Pronto!_ If
+ you don't I'll do that myself"                                   20
+
+ "I hear the call of the White Mice," said Peter de
+ Peyster                                                          30
+
+ Under the blow, the masked man staggered drunkenly               70
+
+ Shifting the reins to his left hand, Roddy let the
+ other fall upon his revolver                                    114
+
+ "Now I know why I came to Venezuela!"                           144
+
+ On such a night, Leander swam the Hellespont                    198
+
+ Her fingers traced the sign of the cross                        294
+
+
+
+
+THE WHITE MICE
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+Once upon a time a lion dropped his paw upon a mouse.
+
+"Please let me live!" begged the mouse, "and some day I will do as
+much for you."
+
+"That is so funny," roared the king of beasts, "that we will release
+you. We had no idea mice had a sense of humor."
+
+And then, as you remember, the lion was caught in the net of the
+hunter, and struggled, and fought, and struck blindly, until his
+spirit and strength were broken, and he lay helpless and dying.
+
+And the mouse, happening to pass that way, gnawed and nibbled at the
+net, and gave the lion his life.
+
+The morals are: that an appreciation of humor is a precious thing;
+that God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform, and that
+you never can tell.
+
+In regard to this fable it is urged that, according to the doctrine
+of chances, it is extremely unlikely that at the very moment the lion
+lay bound and helpless the very same mouse should pass by. But the
+explanation is very simple and bromidic.
+
+It is this--that this is a small world.
+
+People who are stay-at-home bodies come to believe the whole world is
+the village in which they live. People who are rolling-stones claim
+that if you travel far enough and long enough the whole world becomes
+as one village; that sooner or later you make friends with every one
+in it; that the only difference between the stay-at-homes and the
+gadabouts is that while the former answer local telephone calls, the
+others receive picture postal-cards. There is a story that seems to
+illustrate how small this world is. In fact, this is the story.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+General Don Miguel Rojas, who as a young man was called the Lion of
+Valencia, and who later had honorably served Venezuela as Minister of
+Foreign Affairs, as Secretary of War, as Minister to the Court of St.
+James and to the Republic of France, having reached the age of sixty
+found himself in a dungeon-cell underneath the fortress in the harbor
+of Porto Cabello. He had been there two years. The dungeon was dark
+and very damp, and at high-tide the waters of the harbor oozed through
+the pores of the limestone walls. The air was the air of a
+receiving-vault, and held the odor of a fisherman's creel.
+
+General Rojas sat huddled upon a canvas cot, with a blanket about his
+throat and a blanket about his knees, reading by the light of a candle
+the story of Don Quixote. Sometimes a drop of water fell upon the
+candle and it sputtered, and its light was nearly lost in the
+darkness. Sometimes so many drops gathered upon the white head of the
+Lion of Valencia that he sputtered, too, and coughed so violently
+that, in agony, he beat with feeble hands upon his breast. And _his_
+light, also, nearly escaped into the darkness.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On the other side of the world, four young Americans, with legs
+crossed and without their shoes, sat on the mats of the tea-house of
+the Hundred and One Steps. On their sun-tanned faces was the glare of
+Yokohama Bay, in their eyes the light of youth, of intelligent
+interest, of adventure. In the hand of each was a tiny cup of acrid
+tea. Three of them were under thirty, and each wore the suit of silk
+pongee that in eighteen hours C. Tom, or Little Ah Sing, the Chinese
+King, fits to any figure, and which in the Far East is the badge of
+the tourist tribe. Of the three, one was Rodman Forrester. His
+father, besides being pointed out as the parent of "Roddy" Forrester,
+the one-time celebrated Yale pitcher, was himself not unfavorably
+known to many governments as a constructor of sky-scrapers,
+breakwaters, bridges, wharves and light-houses, which latter he
+planted on slippery rocks along inaccessible coast-lines. Among his
+fellow Captains of Industry he was known as the Forrester Construction
+Company, or, for short, the "F. C. C." Under that alias Mr. Forrester
+was now trying to sell to the Japanese three light-houses, to
+illuminate the Inner Sea between Kobe and Shimoneseki. To hasten the
+sale he had shipped "Roddy" straight from the machine-shops to
+Yokohama.
+
+Three years before, when Roddy left Yale, his father ordered him
+abroad to improve his mind by travel, and to inspect certain
+light-houses and breakwaters on both shores of the English Channel.
+While crossing from Dover to Calais on his way to Paris, Roddy made a
+very superficial survey of the light-houses and reported that, so far
+as he could see by daylight, they still were on the job. His father,
+who had his own breezy sense of humor, cancelled Roddy's letter of
+credit, cabled him home, and put him to work in the machine-shop.
+There the manager reported that, except that he had shown himself a
+good "mixer," and had organized picnics for the benefit societies, and
+a base-ball team, he had not earned his fifteen dollars a week.
+
+When Roddy was called before him, his father said:
+
+"It is wrong that your rare talents as a 'mixer' should be wasted in
+front of a turning-lathe. Callahan tells me you can talk your way
+through boiler-plate, so I am going to give you a chance to talk the
+Japs into giving us a contract. But, remember this, Roddy," his father
+continued sententiously, "the Japs are the Jews of the present. Be
+polite, but don't appear _too_ anxious. If you do, they will beat you
+down in the price."
+
+Perhaps this parting injunction explains why, from the time Roddy
+first burst upon the Land of the Rising Sun, he had devoted himself
+entirely to the Yokohama tea-houses and the base-ball grounds of the
+American Naval Hospital. He was trying, he said, not to appear too
+anxious. He hoped father would be pleased.
+
+With Roddy to Japan, as a companion, friend and fellow-tourist, came
+Peter de Peyster, who hailed from the banks of the Hudson, and of what
+Roddy called "one of our ancient poltroon families." At Yale, although
+he had been two classes in advance of Roddy, the two had been
+roommates, and such firm friends that they contradicted each other
+without ceasing. Having quarrelled through two years of college life,
+they were on terms of such perfect understanding as to be inseparable.
+
+The third youth was the "Orchid Hunter." His father manufactured the
+beer that, so Roddy said, had made his home town bilious. He was not
+really an orchid hunter, but on his journeyings around the globe he
+had become so ashamed of telling people he had no other business than
+to spend his father's money that he had decided to say he was
+collecting orchids.
+
+"It shows imagination," he explained, "and I have spent enough money
+on orchids on Fifth Avenue to make good."
+
+The fourth youth in the group wore the uniform and insignia of a
+Lieutenant of the United States Navy. His name was Perry, and, looking
+down from the toy balcony of the tea-house, clinging like a
+bird's-nest to the face of the rock, they could see his battle-ship on
+the berth. It was Perry who had convoyed them to O Kin San and her
+delectable tea-house, and it was Perry who was talking shop.
+
+"But the most important member of the ship's company on a submarine,"
+said the sailor-man, "doesn't draw any pay at all, and he has no
+rating. He is a mouse."
+
+"He's a _what_?" demanded the Orchid Hunter. He had been patriotically
+celebrating the arrival of the American Squadron. During tiffin, the
+sight of the white uniforms in the hotel dining-room had increased his
+patriotism; and after tiffin the departure of the Pacific Mail,
+carrying to the Golden Gate so many "good fellows," further aroused
+it. Until the night before, in the billiard-room, he had never met any
+of the good fellows; but the thought that he might never see them
+again now depressed him. And the tea he was drinking neither cheered
+nor inebriated. So when the Orchid Hunter spoke he showed a touch of
+temper.
+
+"Don't talk sea slang to me," he commanded; "when you say he is a
+mouse, what do you mean by a mouse?"
+
+"I mean a mouse," said the Lieutenant, "a white mouse with pink eyes.
+He bunks in the engine-room, and when he smells sulphuric gas escaping
+anywhere he squeals; and the chief finds the leak, and the ship isn't
+blown up. Sometimes, one little, white mouse will save the lives of a
+dozen bluejackets."
+
+Roddy and Peter de Peyster nodded appreciatively.
+
+"Mos' extr'd'n'ry!" said the Orchid Hunter. "Mos' sad, too. I will
+now drink to the mouse. The moral of the story is," he pointed out,
+"that everybody, no matter how impecunious, can help; even you fellows
+could help. So could I."
+
+His voice rose in sudden excitement. "I will now," he cried, "organize
+the Society of the Order of the White Mice. The object of the society
+is to save everybody's life. Don't tell me," he objected scornfully,
+"that you fellows will let a little white mice save twelve hundred
+bluejackets, an' you sit there an' grin. You mus' all be a White Mice.
+You mus' all save somebody's life. An'--then--then we give ourself a
+dinner."
+
+"And medals!" suggested Peter de Peyster.
+
+The Orchid Hunter frowned. He regarded the amendment with suspicion.
+
+"Is't th' intention of the Hon'ble Member from N'York," he asked,
+"that _each_ of us gets a medal, or just th' one that does th'
+saving?"
+
+"Just one," said Peter de Peyster.
+
+"No, we all get 'em," protested Roddy. "Each time!"
+
+"Th' 'men'ment to th' 'men'ment is carried," announced the Orchid
+Hunter. He untwisted his legs and clapped his hands. The paper walls
+slid apart, the little Nezans, giggling, bowing, ironing out their
+knees with open palms, came tripping and stumbling to obey.
+
+"Take away the tea!" shouted the Orchid Hunter. "It makes me nervous.
+Bring us fizzy-water, in larges' size, cold, expensive bottles. And
+now, you fellows," proclaimed the Orchid Hunter, "I'm goin' into
+secret session and initiate you into Yokohama Chapter, Secret Order of
+White Mice. And--I will be Mos' Exalted Secret White Mouse."
+
+When he returned to the ship Perry told the wardroom about it and
+laughed, and the wardroom laughed, and that night at the Grand Hotel,
+while the Japanese band played "Give My Regards to Broadway," which
+Peter de Peyster told them was the American national anthem, the White
+Mice gave their first annual dinner. For, as the Orchid Hunter pointed
+out, in order to save life, one must sustain it.
+
+And Louis Eppinger himself designed that dinner, and the Paymaster,
+and Perry's brother-officers, who were honored guests, still speak of
+it with awe; and the next week's _Box of Curios_ said of it
+editorially: "And while our little Yokohama police know much of
+ju-jitsu, they found that they had still something to learn of the
+short jab to the jaw and the quick getaway."
+
+Indeed, throughout, it was a most successful dinner.
+
+And just to show how small this world is, and that "God moves in a
+mysterious way, His wonders to perform," at three o'clock that
+morning, when the dinner-party in rickshaws were rolling down the
+Bund, singing "We're Little White Mice Who Have Gone Astray," their
+voices carried across the Pacific, across the Cordilleras and the
+Caribbean Sea; and an old man in his cell, tossing and shivering with
+fever, smiled and sank to sleep; for in his dreams he had heard the
+scampering feet of the White Mice, and he had seen the gates of his
+prison-cell roll open.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Forrester Construction Company did not get the contract to build
+the three light-houses. The Japanese preferred a light-house made by
+an English firm. They said it was cheaper. It _was_ cheaper, because
+they bought the working plans from a draughtsman the English firm had
+discharged for drunkenness, and, by causing the revolving light to
+wink once instead of twice, dodged their own patent laws.
+
+Mr. Forrester agreed with the English firm that the Japanese were "a
+wonderful little people," and then looked about for some one
+individual he could blame. Finding no one else, he blamed Roddy. The
+interview took place on the twenty-seventh story of the Forrester
+Building, in a room that overlooked the Brooklyn Bridge.
+
+"You didn't fall down on the job," the fond parent was carefully
+explaining, "because you never were _on_ the job. You didn't even
+_start_. It was thoughtful of you to bring back kimonos to mother and
+the girls. But the one you brought me does not entirely compensate me
+for the ninety thousand dollars you didn't bring back. I would _like_
+my friends to see me in a kimono with silk storks and purple wistarias
+down the front, but I feel I cannot afford to pay ninety thousand
+dollars for a bathrobe.
+
+"Nor do I find," continued the irate parent coldly, "that the honor
+you did the company by disguising yourself as a stoker and helping the
+base-ball team of the _Louisiana_ to win the pennant of the Asiatic
+Squadron, altogether reconciles us to the loss of a government
+contract. I have paid a good deal to have you taught mechanical
+engineering, and I should like to know how soon you expect to give me
+the interest on my money."
+
+Roddy grinned sheepishly, and said he would begin at once, by taking
+his father out to lunch.
+
+"Good!" said Forrester, Senior. "But before we go, Roddy, I want you
+to look over there to the Brooklyn side. Do you see pier number
+eleven--just south of the bridge? Yes? Then do you see a white steamer
+taking on supplies?"
+
+Roddy, delighted at the change of subject, nodded.
+
+"That ship," continued his father, "is sailing to Venezuela, where we
+have a concession from the government to build breakwaters and buoy
+the harbors and put up light-houses. We have been working there for
+two years and we've spent about two million dollars. And some day we
+hope to get our money. Sometimes," continued Mr. Forrester, "it is
+necessary to throw good money after bad. That is what we are doing in
+Venezuela."
+
+"I don't understand," interrupted Roddy with polite interest.
+
+"You are not expected to," said his father. "If you will kindly
+condescend to hold down the jobs I give you, you can safely leave the
+high finance of the company to your father."
+
+"Quite so," said Roddy hastily. "Where shall we go to lunch?"
+
+As though he had not heard him, Forrester, Senior, continued
+relentlessly: "To-morrow," he said, "you are sailing on that ship for
+Porto Cabello; we have just started a light-house at Porto Cabello,
+and are buoying the harbor. You are going for the F. C. C. You are an
+inspector."
+
+Roddy groaned and sank into a chair.
+
+"Go on," he commanded, "break it to me quick! _What_ do I inspect?"
+
+"You sit in the sun," said Mr. Forrester, "with a pencil, and every
+time our men empty a bag of cement into the ocean you make a mark. At
+the same time, if you are not an utter idiot and completely blind, you
+can't help but see how a light-house is set up. The company is having
+trouble in Venezuela, trouble in collecting its money. You might as
+well know that, because everybody in Venezuela will tell you so. But
+that's all you need to know. The other men working for the company
+down there will think, because you are my son, that you know more
+about what I'm doing in Venezuela than they do. Now, understand, you
+don't know anything, and I want you to say so. I want you to stick to
+your own job, and not mix up in anything that doesn't concern you.
+There will be nothing to distract you. McKildrick writes me that in
+Porto Cabello there are no tea-houses, no roads for automobiles, and,
+except for the fire-flies, all the white lights go out at nine
+o'clock.
+
+"Now, Roddy," concluded Mr. Forrester warningly, "this is your chance,
+and it is the last chance for dinner in the dining-car, for you. If
+you fail the company, and by the company I mean myself, _this_ time,
+you can ask Fred Sterry for a job on the waiters' nine at Palm Beach."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Like all the other great captains, Mr. Forrester succeeded through the
+work of his lieutenants. For him, in every part of the world, more
+especially in those parts of it in which the white man was but just
+feeling his way, they were at work.
+
+In Siberia, in British East Africa, in Upper Burmah, engineers of the
+Forrester Construction Company had tamed, shackled and bridged great
+rivers. In the Soudan they had thrown up ramparts against the Nile.
+Along the coasts of South America they had cast the rays of the
+Forrester revolving light upon the face of the waters of both the
+South Atlantic and the Pacific.
+
+They were of all ages, from the boys who had never before looked
+through a transit except across the college campus, to sun-tanned,
+fever-haunted veterans who, for many years, had fought Nature where
+she was most stubborn, petulant and cruel. They had seen a tidal-wave
+crumple up a breakwater which had cost them a half-year of labor, and
+slide it into the ocean. They had seen swollen rivers, drunk with the
+rains, trip bridges by the ankles and toss them on the banks, twisted
+and sprawling; they had seen a tropical hurricane overturn a
+half-finished light-house as gayly as a summer breeze upsets a
+rocking-chair; they had fought with wild beasts, they had fought with
+wild men, with Soudanese of the Desert, with Federated Sons of Labor,
+with Yaqui Indians, and they had seen cholera, sleeping-sickness and
+the white man's gin turn their compounds into pest-camps and
+crematories.
+
+Of these things Mr. Forrester, in the twenty-seven-story Forrester
+sky-scraper, where gray-coated special policemen and elevator-starters
+touched their caps to him, had seen nothing. He regarded these
+misadventures by flood and field only as obstacles to his carrying out
+in the time stipulated a business contract. He accepted them patiently
+as he would a strike of the workmen on the apartment-house his firm
+was building on Fifty-ninth Street.
+
+Sometimes, in order to better show the progress they were making, his
+engineers sent him from strange lands photographs of their work. At
+these, for a moment, he would glance curiously, at the pictures of
+naked, dark-skinned coolies in turbans, of elephants dragging iron
+girders, _his_ iron girders; and perhaps he would wonder if the man
+in the muddy boots and the heavy sun hat was McKenzie. His interest
+went no further than that; his imagination was not stirred.
+
+Sometimes McKenzie returned and, in evening dress, dined with him at
+his up-town club, or at a fashionable restaurant, where the senses of
+the engineer were stifled by the steam heat, the music and the scent
+of flowers; where, through a joyous mist of red candle-shades and
+golden champagne, he once more looked upon women of his own color. It
+was not under such conditions that Mr. Forrester could expect to know
+the real McKenzie. This was not the McKenzie who, two months before,
+was fighting death on a diet of fruit salts, and who, against the sun,
+wore a bath-towel down his spinal column. On such occasions Mr.
+Forrester wanted to know if, with native labor costing but a few yards
+of cotton and a bowl of rice, the new mechanical rivet-drivers were
+not an extravagance. How, he would ask, did salt water and a sweating
+temperature of one hundred and five degrees act upon the new anti-rust
+paint? That was what he wanted to know.
+
+Once one of his young lieutenants, inspired by a marvellous dinner,
+called to him across the table: "You remember, sir, that light-house
+we put up in the Persian Gulf? The Consul at Aden told me, this last
+trip, that before that light was there the wrecks on the coast
+averaged fifteen a year and the deaths from drowning over a hundred.
+You will be glad to hear that since your light went up, three years
+ago, there have been only two wrecks and no deaths."
+
+Mr. Forrester nodded gravely.
+
+"I remember," he said. "That was the time we made the mistake of
+sending cement through the Canal instead of around the Cape, and the
+tolls cost us five thousand dollars."
+
+It was not that Mr. Forrester weighed the loss of the five thousand
+dollars against a credit of lives saved. It was rather that he was not
+in the life-saving business. Like all his brother captains, he was,
+in a magnificent way, mechanically charitable. For institutions that
+did make it a business to save life he wrote large checks. But he
+never mixed charity and business. In what he was doing in the world he
+either was unable to see, or was not interested in seeing, what was
+human, dramatic, picturesque. When he forced himself to rest from his
+labor, his relaxation was the reading of novels of romance, of
+adventure--novels that told of strange places and strange peoples.
+Between the after-dinner hour and bedtime, or while his yacht picked
+her way up the Sound, these tales filled him with surprise. Often he
+would exclaim admiringly: "I don't see how these fellows think up such
+things."
+
+He did not know that, in his own business, there were melodramas,
+romances which made those of the fiction-writers ridiculous.
+
+And so, when young Sam Caldwell, the third vice-president, told Mr.
+Forrester that if the company hoped to obtain the money it had sunk
+in Venezuela it must finance a revolution, Mr. Forrester, without
+question, consented to the expense, and put it down under "Political."
+Had Sam Caldwell shown him that what was needed was a construction-raft
+or a half-dozen giant steam-shovels, he would have furnished the money
+as readily and with as little curiosity.
+
+Sam Caldwell, the third vice-president, was a very smart young man.
+Every one, even men much older than he, said as much, and no one was
+more sure of it than was Sam Caldwell himself. His vanity on that
+point was, indeed, his most prepossessing human quality.
+
+He was very proud of his freedom from those weak scruples that
+prevented rival business men from underbidding the F. C. C. He
+congratulated himself on the fact that at thirty-four he was much more
+of a cynic than men of sixty. He held no illusions, and he rejoiced
+in a sense of superiority over those of his own class in college, who,
+in matters of business, were still hampered by old-time traditions.
+
+If in any foreign country the work of the F. C. C. was halted by
+politicians, it was always Sam Caldwell who was sent across the sea to
+confer with them. He could quote you the market-price on a Russian
+grand-duke, or a Portuguese colonial governor, as accurately as he
+could that of a Tammany sachem. His was the non-publicity department.
+People who did not like him called him Mr. Forrester's jackal. When
+the lawyers of the company had studied how they could evade the law on
+corporations, and had shown how the officers of the F. C. C. could do
+a certain thing and still keep out of jail, Sam Caldwell was the man
+who did that thing.
+
+He had been to Venezuela "to look over the ground," and he had
+reported that President Alvarez must go, and that some one who would
+be friendly to the F. C. C. must be put in his place. That was all Mr.
+Forrester knew, or cared to know. With the delay in Venezuela he was
+impatient. He wanted to close up that business and move his fleet of
+tenders, dredges and rafts to another coast. So, as was the official
+routine, he turned over the matter to Sam Caldwell, to settle it in
+Sam Caldwell's own way.
+
+Two weeks after his talk with his father, Roddy, ignorant of Mr.
+Caldwell's intentions, was in Venezuela, sitting on the edge of a
+construction-raft, dangling his rubber boots in the ocean, and
+watching a steel skeleton creep up from a coral reef into a blazing,
+burning sky. At intervals he would wake to remove his cigarette, and
+shout fiercely: "_O-i-i-ga_, you Moso! Get a move on! _Pronto!_ If you
+don't I'll do that myself."
+
+Every ten minutes El Señor Roddy had made the same threat, and the
+workmen, once hopeful that he would carry it into effect, had grown
+despondent.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the mind of Peter de Peyster there was no doubt that, unless
+something was done, and at once, the Order of the White Mice would
+cease to exist. The call of Gain, of Duty, of Pleasure had scattered
+the charter members to distant corners of the world. Their dues were
+unpaid, the pages of the Golden Book of Record were blank. Without the
+necessary quorum of two there could be no meetings, without meetings
+there could be no dinners, and, incidentally, over all the world
+people continued to die, and the White Mice were doing nothing to
+prevent it. Peter de Peyster, mindful of his oath, of his duty as the
+Most Secret Secretary and High Historian of the Order, shot arrows in
+the air in the form of irate postal-cards. He charged all White Mice
+to instantly report to the Historian the names of those persons whom,
+up to date, they had saved from death.
+
+[Illustration: "_O-i-i-ga_, you Moso! Get a move on! _Pronto!_ If you
+don't I'll do that myself."]
+
+From the battle-ship _Louisiana_, Perry wrote briefly:
+
+     "Beg to report during gale off Finisterre, went to rescue of
+     man overboard. Man overboard proved to be Reagan, gunner's
+     mate, first class, holding long-distance championship for
+     swimming and two medals for saving life. After I sank the
+     third time, Reagan got me by the hair and towed me to the
+     ship. Who gets the assist?"
+
+From Raffles' Hotel, Singapore, the Orchid Hunter cabled:
+
+     "Have saved own valuable life by refusing any longer to
+     drink Father's beer. Give everybody medal."
+
+From Porto Cabello, Venezuela, Roddy wrote:
+
+     "I have saved lives of fifty Jamaica coolies daily by not
+     carrying an axe. If you want to save my life from suicide,
+     sunstroke and sleeping-sickness--which attacks me with
+     special virulence immediately after lunch--come by next
+     steamer."
+
+A week later, Peter de Peyster took the Red D boat south, and after
+touching at Porto Rico and at the Island of Curaçao, swept into Porto
+Cabello and into the arms of his friend.
+
+On the wharf, after the shouts of welcome had died away, Roddy
+inquired anxiously: "As you made the harbor, Peter, did you notice
+any red and black buoys? Those are _my_ buoys. _I_ put them
+there--_myself_. And I laid out that entire channel you came in
+by, all by myself, too!"
+
+Much time had passed since the two friends had been able to insult
+each other face to face.
+
+"Roddy," coldly declared Peter, "if I thought _you_ had charted that
+channel I'd go home on foot, by land."
+
+"Do you mean you think I can't plant deep-sea buoys?" demanded Roddy.
+
+"You can't plant potatoes!" said Peter. "If you had to set up
+lamp-posts, with the street names on them, along Broadway, you would
+put the ones marked Union Square in Columbus Circle."
+
+"I want you to know," shouted Roddy, "that my buoys are the talk of
+this port. These people are just crazy about my buoys--especially the
+red buoys. If you didn't come to Venezuela to see my buoys, why did
+you come? I will plant a buoy for you to-morrow!" challenged Roddy. "I
+will show you!"
+
+"You will _have_ to show me," said Peter.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Peter had been a week in Porto Cabello, and, in keeping Roddy at work,
+had immensely enjoyed himself. Each morning, in the company's gasoline
+launch, the two friends went put-put-putting outside the harbor, where
+Roddy made soundings for his buoys, and Peter lolled in the stern and
+fished. His special pleasure was in trying to haul man-eating sharks
+into the launch at the moment Roddy was leaning over the gunwale,
+taking a sounding.
+
+One evening at sunset, on their return trip, as they were under the
+shadow of the fortress, the engine of the launch broke down. While the
+black man from Trinidad was diagnosing the trouble, Peter was
+endeavoring to interest Roddy in the quaint little Dutch Island of
+Curaçao that lay one hundred miles to the east of them. He chose to
+talk of Curaçao because the ship that carried him from the States had
+touched there, while the ship that brought Roddy south had not. This
+fact irritated Roddy, so Peter naturally selected the moment when the
+launch had broken down and Roddy was both hungry and peevish to talk
+of Curaçao.
+
+"Think of your never having seen Curaçao!" he sighed. "Some day you
+certainly must visit it. With a sea as flat as this is to-night you
+could make the run in the launch in twelve hours. It is a place you
+should see."
+
+"That is so like you," exclaimed Roddy indignantly. "I have been here
+four months, and you have been here a week, and you try to tell _me_
+about Curaçao! It is the place where curaçao and revolutionists come
+from. All the exiles from Venezuela wait over there until there is a
+revolution over here, and then they come across. You can't tell _me_
+anything about Curaçao. _I_ don't have to _go_ to a place to know
+about it."
+
+"I'll bet," challenged Peter, "you don't know about the mother and the
+two daughters who were exiled from Venezuela and live in Curaçao, and
+who look over here every night at sunset?"
+
+Roddy laughed scornfully. "Why, that is the first thing they tell
+you," he cried; "the purser points them out from the ship, and tells
+you----"
+
+"Tells _you_, yes," cried Peter triumphantly, "but I _saw_ them. As we
+left the harbor they were standing on the cliff--three women in
+white--looking toward Venezuela. They told me the father of the two
+girls is in prison here. He was----"
+
+"_Told_ you, yes," mimicked Roddy, "told you he was in prison. I have
+_seen_ him in prison. There is the prison."
+
+Roddy pointed at the flat, yellow fortress that rose above them.
+Behind the tiny promontory on which the fortress crouched was the
+town, separated from it by a stretch of water so narrow that a
+golf-player, using the quay of the custom-house for a tee, could have
+driven a ball against the prison wall.
+
+Daily, from the town, Peter had looked across the narrow harbor toward
+the level stretch of limestone rock that led to the prison gates, and
+had seen the petty criminals, in chains, splash through the pools left
+by the falling tide, had watched each pick up a cask of fresh water,
+and, guarded by the barefooted, red-capped soldiers, drag his chains
+back to the prison. Now, only the boat's-length from them, he saw the
+sheer face of the fortress, where it slipped to depths unknown into
+the sea. It impressed him most unpleasantly. It had the look less of a
+fortress than of a neglected tomb. Its front was broken by wind and
+waves, its surface, blotched and mildewed, white with crusted salt,
+hideous with an eruption of dead barnacles. As each wave lifted and
+retreated, leaving the porous wall dripping like a sponge, it
+disturbed countless crabs, rock scorpions and creeping, leech-like
+things that ran blindly into the holes in the limestone; and, at the
+water-line, the sea-weed, licking hungrily at the wall, rose and fell,
+the great arms twisting and coiling like the tentacles of many
+devilfish.
+
+Distaste at what he saw, or the fever that at sunset drives wise
+Venezuelans behind closed shutters, caused Peter to shiver slightly.
+
+For some moments, with grave faces and in silence, the two young men
+sat motionless, the mind of each trying to conceive what life must be
+behind those rusted bars and moss-grown walls.
+
+"Somewhere, buried in there," said Roddy, "is General Rojas, the Lion
+of Valencia, a man," he added sententiously, "beloved by the people.
+He has held all the cabinet positions, and been ambassador in Europe,
+and Alvarez is more afraid of him than of any other man in Venezuela.
+And why? For the simple reason that he is good. When the people found
+out what a blackguard Alvarez is they begged Rojas to run for
+President against him, and Rojas promised that if, at the next
+election, the people still desired it, he would do as they wished.
+That night Alvarez hauled him out of bed and put him in there. He has
+been there two years. There _are_ healthy prisons, but Alvarez put
+Rojas in this one, hoping it would kill him. He is afraid to murder
+him openly, because the people love him. When I first came here I went
+through the fortress with Vicenti, the prison doctor, on a sort of
+Seeing-Porto-Cabello trip. He pointed out Rojas to me through the
+bars, same as you would point out a monument to a dead man. Rojas was
+sitting at a table, writing, wrapped in a shawl. The cell was lit by a
+candle, and I give you my word, although it was blazing hot outside,
+the place was as damp as a refrigerator. When we raised our lanterns
+he stood up, and I got a good look at him. He is a thin, frail little
+man with white hair and big, sad eyes, with a terribly lonely look in
+them. At least I thought so; and I felt so ashamed at staring at him
+that I bowed and salaamed to him through the bars, and he gave me the
+most splendid bow, just as though he were still an ambassador and I a
+visiting prince. The doctor had studied medicine in New York, so
+probably he talked to me a little more freely than he should. He says
+he warned the commandant of the fortress that unless Rojas is moved to
+the upper tier of cells, above the water-line, he will die in six
+months. And the commandant told him not to meddle in affairs of state,
+that his orders from the President were that Rojas 'must never again
+feel the heat of the sun.'"
+
+Peter de Peyster exclaimed profanely. "Are there no men in this
+country?" he growled. "Why don't his friends get him out?"
+
+"They'd have to get themselves out first," explained Roddy. "Alvarez
+made a clean sweep of it, even of his wife and his two daughters, the
+women you saw. He exiled them, and they went to Curaçao. They have
+plenty of money, and they _could_ have lived in Paris or London. He
+has been minister in both places, and has many friends over there, but
+even though they cannot see him or communicate with him, they settled
+down in Curaçao so that they might be near him.
+
+"The night his wife was ordered out of the country she was allowed to
+say good-by to him in the fortress, and there she arranged that every
+night at sunset she and her daughters would look toward Port Cabello,
+and he would look toward Curaçao. The women bought a villa on the
+cliff, to the left of the harbor of Willemstad as you enter, and the
+people, the Dutch and the Spaniards and negroes, all know the story,
+and when they see the three women on the cliff at sunset it is like
+the Angelus ringing, and, they say, the people pray that the women may
+see him again."
+
+For a long time Peter de Peyster sat scowling at the prison, and Roddy
+did not speak, for it is not possible to room with another man through
+two years of college life and not know something of his moods.
+
+Then Peter leaned toward Roddy and stared into his face. His voice
+carried the suggestion of a challenge.
+
+"I hear something!" he whispered.
+
+Whether his friend spoke in metaphor or stated a fact, Roddy could not
+determine. He looked at him questioningly, and raised his head to
+listen. Save for the whisper of the waves against the base of the
+fortress, there was no sound.
+
+"What?" asked Roddy.
+
+"I hear the call of the White Mice," said Peter de Peyster.
+
+There was a long silence. Then Roddy laughed softly, his eyes half
+closed; the muscles around the lower jaw drew tight.
+
+Often before Peter had seen the look in his face, notably on a
+memorable afternoon when Roddy went to the bat, with three men on
+base, two runs needed to win the championship and twenty thousand
+shrieking people trying to break his nerve.
+
+"I will go as far as you like," said Roddy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Porto Cabello is laid out within the four boundaries of a square.
+The boundary on the east and the boundary on the north of the square
+meet at a point that juts into the harbor. The wharves and the
+custom-house, looking toward the promontory on which stands the
+fortress prison, form the eastern side of the square, and along the
+northern edge are the Aquatic Club, with its veranda over the water,
+the hotel, with its bath-rooms underneath the water, and farther along
+the harbor front houses set in gardens. As his work was in the harbor,
+Roddy had rented one of these houses. It was discreetly hidden by
+mango-trees and palmetto, and in the rear of the garden, steps cut in
+the living rock led down into the water. In a semicircle beyond these
+steps was a fence of bamboo stout enough to protect a bather from the
+harbor sharks and to serve as a breakwater for the launch.
+
+[Illustration: "I hear the call of the White Mice," said Peter de
+Peyster.]
+
+"When I rented this house," said Roddy, "I thought I took it because I
+could eat mangoes while I was in bathing and up to my ears in water,
+which is the only way you can eat a mango and keep your self-respect.
+But I see now that Providence sent me here because we can steal away
+in the launch without any one knowing it."
+
+"If you can move that launch its own length without the whole town
+knowing it," commented Peter, "you will have to chloroform it. It
+barks like a machine gun."
+
+"My idea was," explained Roddy, "that we would row to the fortress.
+After we get the General on board, the more it sounds like a machine
+gun the better."
+
+Since their return in the launch, and during dinner, which had been
+served in the tiny _patio_ under the stars, the White Mice had been
+discussing ways and means. A hundred plans had been proposed,
+criticised, rejected; but by one in the morning, when the candles were
+guttering in the harbor breeze and the Scotch whiskey had shrunk
+several inches, the conspirators found themselves agreed. They had
+decided they could do nothing until they knew in which cell the
+General was imprisoned, and especially the position of his window in
+that cell that looked out upon the harbor; that, with the aid of the
+launch, the rescue must be made from the water, and that the rescuers
+must work from the outside. To get at Rojas from the inside it would
+be necessary to take into their confidence some one of the prison
+officials, and there was no one they dared to trust. Had it been a
+question of money, Roddy pointed out, the friends of Rojas would
+already have set him free. That they had failed to do so proved, not
+that the prison officials were incorruptible, but that their fear of
+the wrath of Alvarez was greater than their cupidity.
+
+"There are several reasons why we should not attempt to bribe any
+one," said Roddy, "and the best one is the same reason the man gave
+for not playing poker. To-morrow I will introduce you to Vicenti, the
+prison doctor, and we'll ask him to take us over the prison, and count
+the cells, and try to mark the one in which we see Rojas. Perhaps we'd
+better have the doctor in to dinner. He likes to tell you what a devil
+of a fellow he was in New York, and you must pretend to believe he
+was. We might also have the captain of the port, and get him to give
+us permission to take the launch out at night. This port is still
+under martial law, and after the sunset gun no boat may move about the
+harbor. Then we must have some harpoons made and get out that
+headlight, and spear eels."
+
+"You couldn't spear an eel," objected Peter, "and if you could I
+wouldn't eat it."
+
+"You don't have to eat it!" explained Roddy; "the eels are only an
+excuse. We want to get the sentries used to seeing us flashing around
+the harbor at night. If we went out there without some excuse, and
+without permission, exploding like a barrel of fire-crackers, they'd
+sink us. So we must say we are out spearing eels."
+
+The next morning Roddy showed a blacksmith how to hammer out tridents
+for spearing eels, and that night those people who lived along the
+harbor front were kept awake by quick-fire explosions, and the glare
+in their windows of a shifting search-light. But at the end of the
+week the launch of the Gringos, as it darted noisily in and out of the
+harbor, and carelessly flashed its search-light on the walls of the
+fortress, came to be regarded less as a nuisance than a blessing. For
+with noble self-sacrifice the harbor eels lent themselves to the
+deception. By hundreds they swarmed in front of the dazzling
+headlight; by dozens they impaled themselves upon the tines of the
+pitchforks. So expert did Roddy and Peter become in harpooning, that
+soon they were able each morning to send to the captain of the port,
+to the commandant, to the prison doctor, to every citizen who objected
+to having his sleep punctuated, a basket of eels. It was noticed that
+at intervals the engine of the launch would not act properly, and the
+gringos were seen propelling the boat with oars. Also, the light
+often went out, leaving them in darkness. They spoke freely of these
+accidents with bitter annoyance, and people sympathized with them.
+
+One night, when they were seated plotting in the _patio_, Roddy was
+overwhelmed with sudden misgivings.
+
+"Wouldn't it be awful," he cried, "if, after we have cut the bars and
+shown him the rope ladder and the launch, he refuses to come with us!"
+
+"Is that _all_ that's worrying you?" asked Peter.
+
+"How is he to know?" persisted Roddy, "that we are not paid by
+Alvarez, that we aren't leading him on to escape so that the sentries
+can have an excuse to shoot him. That has been done before. It is an
+old trick, like killing a man in his cell and giving out that he
+committed suicide. The first thing Rojas will ask us is, who sends us,
+and where are our credentials."
+
+"I guess he will take his chance," said Peter. "He'll see we are not
+Venezuelans."
+
+"That is the very thing that will make him refuse," protested Roddy.
+"Why should he trust himself to strangers--to gringos? No, I tell you,
+we can't go on without credentials." He lowered his voice and glanced
+suspiciously into the dark corners of the _patio_. "And the only
+people who can give them to us," he added, tapping impressively upon
+the table, "live in Curaçao."
+
+With sudden enthusiasm Peter de Peyster sat upright.
+
+"I am on in that scene," he protested.
+
+"I thought of it first," said Roddy.
+
+"We will toss," compromised Peter. "The head of Bolivar, you go. The
+arms of Venezuela, I go, and you stay here and catch eels."
+
+The silver peso rang upon the table, and Roddy exclaimed jubilantly:
+
+"Heads! I go!" he cried. But the effort of Peter to show he was not
+disappointed was so unconvincing that Roddy instantly relented.
+
+"We had better both go!" he amended. "Your headwork is better than
+mine, so you come, too. And if you give me the right signals, I'll try
+to put the ball where you can reach it."
+
+As though in his eagerness he would set forth on the instant, Roddy
+sprang to his feet and stood smiling down at Peter, his face lit with
+pleasurable excitement. Then suddenly his expression grew thoughtful.
+
+"Peter," he inquired, "how old do you think the daughters are?"
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+The next day Roddy and Peter sailed for Willemstad, the chief port and
+the capital of the tiny island colony of Holland. In twelve hours they
+had made their land-fall and were entering the harbor mouth. The sun
+was just rising, and as its rays touched the cliff from which, twelve
+hours later, Señora Rojas and her daughters would look toward Porto
+Cabello, they felt a thrill of possible adventure.
+
+Roddy knew that, as a refuge for revolutionists exiled from Venezuela,
+Willemstad was policed with secret agents of Alvarez, and he knew that
+were these spies to learn that during his visit either he or Peter had
+called upon the family of Rojas they would be reported to Caracas as
+"suspect," and the chance of their saving the Lion of Valencia would
+be at an end. So it became them to be careful.
+
+Before leaving Porto Cabello Roddy had told McKildrick, the foreman of
+the Construction Company's work there, that some boxes of new
+machinery and supplies for his launch had gone astray and that he
+wished permission to cross to Curaçao to look them up. McKildrick
+believed the missing boxes were only an excuse for a holiday, but he
+was not anxious to assert his authority over the son and heir of the
+F. C. C., and so gave Roddy his leave of absence. And at the wharf at
+Porto Cabello, while waiting for the ship to weigh anchor, Roddy had
+complained to the custom-house officials at having to cross to
+Curaçao. He gave them the same reason for the trip, and said it was
+most annoying.
+
+In order to be consistent, when, on landing at Willemstad, three
+soiled individuals approached Roddy and introduced themselves as
+guides, he told them the same story. He was looking for boxes of
+machinery invoiced for Porto Cabello; he feared they had been carried
+on to La Guayra or dropped at Willemstad. Could they direct him to the
+office of the steamship line and to the American Consul? One of the
+soiled persons led him across the quay to the office of the agent, and
+while Roddy repeated his complaint, listened so eagerly that to both
+Peter and Roddy it was quite evident the business of the guide was not
+to disclose Curaçao to strangers, but to learn what brought strangers
+to Curaçao. The agent was only too delighted to serve the son of one
+who in money meant so much to the line. For an hour he searched his
+books, his warehouse and the quays. But, naturally, the search was
+unsuccessful, and with most genuine apologies Roddy left him, saying
+that at the office of the American Consul he would continue his search
+for the lost boxes.
+
+Meanwhile, Peter, in his character of tourist, engaged rooms for them
+at the Hotel Commercial, and started off alone to explore the town.
+
+At the Consulate, the soiled person listened to the beginning of
+Roddy's speech, and then, apparently satisfied he had learned all that
+was necessary, retreated to the outer office.
+
+The Consul promptly rose and closed the door.
+
+The representative of the United States was an elderly man, of unusual
+height, with searching, honest blue eyes under white eyebrows. His
+hair was white, his beard, worn long, was white, and his clothes were
+of white duck.
+
+His name was Sylvanus Cobb Codman, with the added title of captain,
+which he had earned when, as a younger man, he had been owner and
+master of one of the finest whalers that ever cleared the harbor of
+New Bedford. During his cruises he had found the life of the West
+Indies much to his liking, and when, at the age of fifty, he ceased to
+follow the sea, he had asked for an appointment as consul to Porto
+Cabello. Since then, except when at home on leave at Fairhaven, he had
+lived in the Spanish Americas, and at many ports had served the State
+Department faithfully and well. In spite of his age, Captain Codman
+gave a pleasant impression of strength and nervous energy. Roddy felt
+that the mind and body of the man were as clean as his clothes, and
+that the Consul was one who could be trusted.
+
+As Captain Codman seated himself behind his desk he was frowning.
+
+"You must look out for that guide," he said. "He is from Caracas. He
+is an agent of Alvarez. It just shows," he went on impatiently, "what
+little sense these spies have, that he didn't recognize your name. The
+Forrester Construction Company is certainly well enough known. That
+the son of your father should be spied on is ridiculous."
+
+"Then, again," said Roddy mysteriously, "maybe it isn't. I haven't got
+such a clean bill of health. That's why I came to you." With an air
+which he considered was becoming in a conspirator, he lowered his
+voice. "May I ask, sir," he said, "if you are acquainted with Señora
+Rojas, who is in exile here?"
+
+The blue eyes of the Consul opened slightly, but he answered with
+directness, "I am. I have that honor."
+
+"And with her daughters?" added Roddy anxiously.
+
+With dignity the Consul inclined his head.
+
+"I want very much to meet them--her," corrected Roddy. "I am going to
+set her husband free!"
+
+For a moment, as though considering whether he were not confronted by
+a madman, the Consul regarded Roddy with an expression of concern.
+Then, in the deprecatory tone of one who believes he has not heard
+aright, he asked, "You are going to do--_what_?"
+
+"I am going to help General Rojas to escape," Roddy went on
+briskly--"myself and another fellow. But we are afraid he won't trust
+himself to us, so I am over here to get credentials from his wife.
+But, you see, I have first got to get credentials to her. So I came to
+ask you if you'd sort of vouch for me, tell her who I am--and all
+that."
+
+The Consul was staring at him so strangely that Roddy believed he had
+not made himself fully understood.
+
+"You know what I mean," he explained. "Credentials, something he will
+know came from her--a ring or a piece of paper saying, 'These are
+friends. Go with them.' Or a lock of her hair, or--or--you know,"
+urged Roddy in embarrassment--"credentials."
+
+"Are you jesting?" asked the older man coldly.
+
+Roddy felt genuinely uncomfortable. He was conscious he was blushing.
+"Certainly not," he protested. "It is serious enough, isn't it?"
+
+The voice of the Consul dropped to a whisper.
+
+"Who sent you here?" he demanded. Without waiting for an answer he
+suddenly rose. Moving with surprising lightness to the door, he jerked
+it open. But if by this manoeuvre he expected to precipitate the spy
+into the room, he was disappointed, for the outer office was empty.
+The Consul crossed it quickly to the window. He saw the spy
+disappearing into a neighboring wine-shop.
+
+When Captain Codman again entered the inner office he did not return
+to his seat, but, after closing the door, as though to shut Roddy from
+the only means of escape, he stood with his back against it. He was
+very much excited.
+
+"Mr. Forrester," he began angrily, "I don't know who is back of you,
+and," he cried violently, "I don't _mean_ to know. I have been
+American Consul in these Central American countries for fifteen years,
+and I have never mixed myself up with what doesn't concern me. I
+represent the United States government. I don't represent anything
+else. I am not down here to assist any corporation, no matter how
+rich, any junta, any revolutionary party----"
+
+"Here! Wait!" cried Roddy anxiously. "You don't understand! I am not a
+revolution. There is only me and Peter."
+
+"What is that?" snapped the Consul savagely. The exclamation was like
+the crack of a flapping jib.
+
+"You see, it's this way," began Roddy. He started to explain
+elaborately. "Peter and I belong to the Secret Order----"
+
+"Stop!" thundered the Consul. "I tell you I won't listen to you!"
+
+The rebuff was most embarrassing. Ignorant as to how he had offended
+the Consul, and uncertain as to whether the Consul had not offended
+him, Roddy helplessly rubbed his handkerchief over his perplexed and
+perspiring countenance. He wondered if, as a conspirator, he had not
+been lacking in finesse, if he had not been too communicative.
+
+In the corner of the room, in a tin cage, a great green parrot, with
+its head cocked on one side, had been regarding Roddy with mocking,
+malevolent eyes. Now, to further add to his discomfiture, it suddenly
+emitted a chuckle, human and contemptuous. As though choking with
+hidden laughter, the bird gurgled feebly, "Polly, Polly." And then, in
+a tone of stern disapproval, added briskly, "You talk too much!" At
+this flank attack Roddy flushed indignantly. He began to wish he had
+brought Peter with him, to give him the proper signals.
+
+With his hands clinched behind him, and tossing his white beard from
+side to side, the Consul paced the room.
+
+"So that is it!" he muttered. "_That_ is why he left Paris. That
+explains the _Restaurador_. Of course," he added indignantly as he
+passed Roddy, throwing the words at him over his shoulder, "_that_ is
+where the money came from!"
+
+Roddy, now thoroughly exasperated, protested warmly: "Look here," he
+cried, "if you aren't careful you'll tell me something you don't want
+me to know."
+
+The Consul came to an instant pause. From his great height he stood
+staring at his visitor, the placid depths of his blue eyes glowering
+with doubt and excitement.
+
+"I give you my word," continued Roddy sulkily, "I don't know what you
+are talking about."
+
+"Do you mean to tell me," demanded the old man truculently, "that you
+are _not_ Mr. Forrester's son?"
+
+"Certainly I am his son," cried Roddy.
+
+"Then," returned the Consul, "perhaps you will deny he is suing
+Alvarez for two million dollars gold, you will deny that he might get
+it if Alvarez were thrown out, you will deny that a--a certain person
+might ratify the concession, and pay your father for the harbor
+improvements he has already made? You see!" exclaimed the Consul
+triumphantly. "And these missing boxes!" he cried as though following
+up an advantage, "shall I tell you what is in them?" He lowered his
+voice. "Cartridges and rifles! Do you deny it?"
+
+Roddy found that at last he was on firm ground.
+
+"Of course I deny it," he answered, "because there are no boxes.
+They're only an invention of mine to get me to Curaçao. Now, you let
+_me_ talk."
+
+The Consul retreated behind his desk, and as Roddy spoke regarded him
+sternly and with open suspicion. In concluding his story Roddy said:
+"We have no other object in saving General Rojas than that he's an old
+man, that he's dying, and that Peter and I can't sleep of nights for
+thinking of him lying in a damp cell, not three hundred yards from us,
+coughing himself to death."
+
+At the words the eyes of the Consul closed quickly; he pressed his
+great, tanned, freckled fingers nervously against his lip. But
+instantly the stern look of the cross-examiner returned. "Go on," he
+commanded.
+
+"If we have cut in on some one's private wire," continued Roddy, "it's
+an accident; and when you talk about father recovering two million
+dollars you are telling me things I don't know. Father is not a chatty
+person. He has often said to me that the only safe time to talk of
+what you are doing, or are going to do, is when you have done it. So,
+if the Venezuelan government owes the Forrester Construction Company
+two millions and father's making a fight for it, I am probably the
+last person in the world he would talk to about it. All I know is that
+he pays me twenty dollars a week to plant buoys. But out of working
+hours I can do as I please, and my friend and I please to get General
+Rojas out of prison." Roddy rose, smiling pleasantly. "So, if you
+won't introduce me to Señora Rojas," he concluded, "I guess I will
+have to introduce myself."
+
+With an angry gesture the Consul motioned him to be seated. From his
+manner it was evident that Captain Codman was uncertain whether Roddy
+was or was not to be believed, that, in his perplexity, he was
+fearful of saying too much or too little.
+
+"Either," the old man exclaimed angrily, "you are a very clever young
+man, or you are extremely ignorant. Either," he went on with
+increasing indignation, "they have sent you here to test me, or you
+know nothing, and you are blundering in where other men are doing
+work. If you know nothing you are going to upset the plans of those
+men. In any case I will have nothing further to do with you. I wash my
+hands of you. Good-morning."
+
+Then, as though excusing himself, he added sharply, "Besides, you talk
+too much."
+
+Roddy, deeply hurt, answered with equal asperity:
+
+"That is what your parrot thinks. Maybe you are both wrong."
+
+When Roddy had reached the top of the stairs leading to the street,
+and was on the point of disappearing, the Consul called sharply to him
+and followed into the hall.
+
+"Before you go," the old man whispered earnestly, "I want you clearly
+to understand my position toward the Rojas family. When I was Consul
+in Porto Cabello, General Rojas became the best friend I had. Since I
+have been stationed here it has been my privilege to be of service to
+his wife. His daughters treat me as kindly as though I were their own
+grandfather. No man on earth could wish General Rojas free as much as
+I wish it." The voice of Captain Codman trembled. For an instant his
+face, as though swept with sudden pain, twisted in strange lines. "No
+one," he protested, "could wish to serve him as I do, but I warn you
+if you go on with this you will land in prison yourself, and you will
+bring General Rojas to his death. Take my advice--and go back to Porto
+Cabello, and keep out of politics. Or, what is better--go home. You
+are too young to understand the Venezuelans, and, if you stay here,
+you are going to make trouble for many people. For your father, and
+for--for many people."
+
+As though with the hope of finally dissuading Roddy, he added
+ominously, "And these Venezuelans have a nasty trick of sticking a
+knife----"
+
+"Oh, you go to the devil!" retorted Roddy.
+
+As he ran down the dark stairs and out into the glaring street he
+heard faintly the voice of the parrot pursuing him, with mocking and
+triumphant jeers.
+
+The Consul returned slowly to his office, and, sinking into his chair,
+buried his face in his great, knotty hands and bent his head upon the
+table. A ray of sunshine, filtering through the heavy Venetian
+blinds, touched the white hair and turned it into silver.
+
+For a short space, save for the scratching of the parrot at the tin
+bars of his cage, and the steady drip, drip of the water-jar, there
+was no sound; then the voice of the sea-captain, as many times before
+it had been raised in thanksgiving in the meeting-house in Fairhaven,
+and from the deck of his ship as she drifted under the Southern Cross,
+was lifted in entreaty. The blue eyes, as the old man raised them,
+were wet; his bronzed fists fiercely interlocked.
+
+"Oh, Thou," he prayed, "who walked beside me on the waters, make clear
+to me what I am to do. I am old, but I pray Thee to let me live to see
+Thine enemies perish, to see those who love Thee reunited once more,
+happy, at home. If, in Thy wisdom, even as Thou sent forth David
+against Goliath, Thou hast sent this child against Thine enemies, make
+that clear to me. His speech is foolish, but his heart seems filled
+with pity. What he would do, I would do. But the way is very dark. If
+I serve this boy, may I serve Thee? Teach me!"
+
+Outside the Consulate, Roddy found his convoy, the guide, waiting for
+him, and, to allay the suspicion of that person, gave him a cable to
+put on the wire for McKildrick. It read: "No trace of freight; it may
+come next steamer; will wait."
+
+He returned to the agent of the line and told him he now believed the
+freight had been left behind in New York and that he would remain in
+Willemstad until the arrival of the next steamer, which was due in
+three days.
+
+At the hotel he found Peter anxiously awaiting him. Having locked
+themselves in the room the two conspirators sat down to talk things
+over. From what had escaped the Consul, Roddy pointed out certain
+facts that seemed evident: Alvarez had not paid the Forrester
+Construction Company, or, in a word, his father, for the work already
+completed in the last two years. His father, in order to obtain his
+money, was interested in some scheme to get rid of Alvarez and in his
+place put some one who would abide by the terms of the original
+concession. This some one might be Rojas, and then, again, might not.
+As Peter suggested, the Construction Company might prefer to back a
+candidate for president, who, while he might not be so welcome to the
+Venezuelans, would be more amenable to the wishes of the F. C. C. It
+also would probably prefer to assist a man younger than Rojas, one
+more easily controlled, perhaps one less scrupulously honest. It also
+seemed likely that if, by revolution, the men of the Construction
+Company intended to put in the field a candidate of their own, they
+would choose one with whom they could consult daily, not one who,
+while he might once have been a popular idol, had for the last two
+years been buried from the sight of man, and with whom it now was
+impossible to communicate.
+
+The longer they discussed the matter the more sure they became that
+Rojas could not be the man for whom the Construction Company was
+plotting.
+
+"If Rojas isn't the choice of the F. C. C.," argued Roddy, "his being
+free, or in prison, does not interest them in the least. While, on the
+other hand, if Rojas _is_ the candidate father is backing, the sooner
+he is out of prison the better for everybody.
+
+"Anyway," added Roddy, with the airy fatalism of one who nails his
+banner to the mast, "if my father is going to lose two millions
+because you and I set an old man free, then father is going to lose
+two millions."
+
+Having arrived at this dutiful conclusion Roddy proposed that,
+covertly, in the guise of innocent sight-seers, they should explore
+the town, and from a distance reconnoitre the home of Señora Rojas.
+They accordingly hired one of the public landaus of Willemstad and
+told the driver to show them the places of interest.
+
+But in Willemstad there are no particular places of interest. It is
+the place itself that is of interest. It is not like any other port in
+the world.
+
+"It used to be," Roddy pointed out, "that every comic opera had one
+act on a tropical island. Then some fellow discovered Holland, and now
+all comic operas run to blonde girls in patched breeches and wooden
+shoes, and the back drops are 'Rotterdam, Amsterdam, any damn place at
+all.' But this town combines both the ancient and modern schools. Its
+scene is from Miss Hook of Holland, and the girls are out of Bandanna
+Land."
+
+Willemstad is compact and tiny, with a miniature governor and palace.
+It is painted with all the primary colors, and, though rain seldom
+falls on Curaçao Island, it is as clean as though the minute before it
+had been washed by a spring shower and put out in the sun to dry.
+Saint Ann Bay, which is the harbor of Willemstad, is less of a bay
+than a canal. On entering it a captain from his bridge can almost see
+what the people in the houses on either bank are eating for breakfast.
+These houses are modeled like those that border the canals of The
+Hague. They have the same peaked roofs, the front running in steps to
+a point, the flat façades, the many stories. But they are painted in
+the colors of tropical Spanish-America, in pink, yellow, cobalt blue,
+and behind the peaked points are scarlet tiles. Under the southern sun
+they are so brilliant, so theatrical, so unreal, that they look like
+the houses of a Noah's Ark fresh from the toy shop. There are two
+towns: Willemstad, and, joined to it by bridges, Otrabanda. It is on
+the Willemstad side that the ships tie up, and where, from the deck to
+the steamer, one can converse quite easily with the Monsanto brothers
+in their drawing-room, or with the political exiles on the balconies
+of the Hotel Commercial. The streets are narrow and, like the streets
+of Holland, paved with round cobblestones as clean as a pan of rolls
+just ready for the oven. Willemstad is the cleanest port in the West
+Indies. It is the Spotless Town of the tropics. Beyond the town are
+the orange plantations, and the favorite drive is from Willemstad
+through these orange trees around the inner harbor, or the Schottegat,
+to Otrabanda, and so back across the drawbridge of Good Queen Emma
+into Willemstad. It is a drive of little over two hours, and Roddy and
+Peter found it altogether charming.
+
+About three miles outside of Willemstad they came upon the former
+home of a rich Spanish planter, which had been turned into a
+restaurant, and which, once the Groot du Crot, was now the Café
+Ducrot. There is little shade on the Island of Curaçao and the young
+men dived into the shadows of the Ducrot garden as into a cool bath.
+Through orange trees and spreading palmettos, flowering bushes and a
+tangle of vines, they followed paths of pebbles, and wandered in a
+maze in which they lost themselves.
+
+"It is the enchanted garden of the sleeping princess," said Peter.
+"And there are her sleeping attendants," he added, pointing at two
+waiters who were slumbering peacefully, their arms stretched out upon
+the marble-top tables.
+
+It seemed heartless to awaken them, and the young men explored further
+until they found a stately, rambling mansion where a theatrical
+landlord with much rubbing of his hands brought them glasses and
+wonderful Holland gin.
+
+"We must remember the Café Ducrot," said Roddy, as they drove on. "It
+is so quiet and peaceful."
+
+Afterward they recalled his having said this, and the fact caused them
+much amusement.
+
+From the Café Ducrot the road ran between high bushes and stunted
+trees that shaded it in on either side; but could not shade it
+completely. Then it turned toward Otrabanda along the cliff that
+overlooks the sea.
+
+On the land side was a wall of dusky mesquite bushes, bound
+together by tangled vines, with here and there bending above them a
+wind-tortured cocoanut palm. On the east side of the road, at great
+distances apart, were villas surrounded by groves of such hardy trees
+and plants as could survive the sweep of the sea winds. "If we ask the
+driver," whispered Roddy, "who lives in each house, he won't suspect
+we are looking for any one house in particular." Accordingly, as they
+drew up even with a villa they rivaled each other in exclaiming over
+its beauty. And the driver, his local pride becoming more and more
+gratified, gave them the name of the owner of the house and his
+history.
+
+As he approached a villa all of white stucco, with high, white pillars
+rising to the flat roof of the tropics, he needed no prompting, but,
+with the air of one sure of his effect, pulled his horses to a halt
+and pointed with his whip.
+
+"That house, gentle-mans," he said, "belongs to Señora Rojas." Though
+the house was one hundred yards from the road, as though fearful of
+being overheard, the negro spoke in an impressive whisper. "She is
+the lady of General Rojas. He is a great General, gentle-mans, and now
+he be put in prison. President Alvarez, he put that General Rojas in
+prison, down in the water, an' he chain him to the rock, an' he put
+that lady in exile. President Alvarez he be very bad man.
+
+"Every day at six o'clock that lady and the young ladies they stand on
+that cliff and pray for that General Rojas. You like me to drive you,
+gentle-mans, out here at six o'clock," he inquired insinuatingly, "an'
+see those ladies pray?"
+
+"Certainly not!" exclaimed Roddy indignantly.
+
+But Peter, more discreet, yawned and stirred impatiently. "I am just
+dying for something to eat!" he protested. "Let her out, driver."
+
+For appearance's sake they drove nearly to the outskirts of Otrabanda,
+and then, as though perversely, Roddy declared he wanted to drive back
+the way they had come and breakfast at the Café Ducrot.
+
+"Why should we eat in a hot, smelly dining-room," he demanded in tones
+intended to reach the driver, "when we can eat under orange trees?"
+
+Peter, with apparent reluctance, assented.
+
+"Oh, have it your own way," he said. "Personally, I could eat under
+any tree--under a gallows-tree."
+
+For the second time they passed the Casa Blanca, and, while apparently
+intent on planning an extensive breakfast, their eyes photographed its
+every feature. Now, as the driver was not observing them, they were
+able to note the position of the entrances, of the windows, rising
+behind iron bars, from a terrace of white and black marble. They noted
+the wing, used as a stable for horses and carriages, and, what was of
+greater interest, that a hand-rail disappeared over the edge of the
+cliff and suggested a landing-pier below.
+
+But of those who lived in the white palace there was no sign. It hurt
+Roddy to think that if, from the house, the inmates noted the two
+young men in a public carriage, peering at their home, they would
+regard the strangers only as impertinent sighters. They could not know
+that the eyes of the tourists were filled with pity, that, at the
+sight of the villa on the cliff the heart of each had quickened with
+kindly emotions, with excitement, with the hope of possible adventure.
+
+Roddy clutched Peter by the wrist; with the other hand he pointed
+quickly. Through a narrow opening in a thicket that stood a few rods
+from the house Peter descried the formal lines of a tennis court.
+Roddy raised his eyebrows significantly. His smile was radiant,
+triumphant.
+
+"Which seems to prove," he remarked enigmatically, "that certain
+parties of the first part are neither aged nor infirm."
+
+His deduction gave him such satisfaction that when they drew up at the
+Café Ducrot he was still smiling.
+
+Within the short hour that had elapsed since they had last seen the
+Ducrot garden a surprising transformation had taken place. No longer
+the orange grove lay slumbering in silence. No longer the waiters
+dozed beside the marble-topped tables. Drawn up outside the iron fence
+that protected the garden from the road a half-dozen fiery Venezuelan
+ponies under heavy saddles, and as many more fastened to landaus and
+dog-carts, were neighing, squealing, jangling their silver harness,
+and stamping holes in the highway. On the inside, through the heavy
+foliage of the orange trees, came the voice of the maître d'hôtel,
+from the kitchen the fat chef bellowed commands. The pebbles on the
+walks grated harshly beneath the flying feet of the waiters.
+
+Seated at breakfast around a long table in the far end of the garden
+were over twenty men, and that it was in their service the restaurant
+had roused itself was fairly evident. The gentlemen who made up the
+breakfast-party were not the broadly-built, blonde Dutchmen of the
+island, but Venezuelans. And a young and handsome Venezuelan, seated
+at the head of the table, and facing the entrance to the garden, was
+apparently the person in whose honor they were assembled. So much
+younger, at least in looks, than the others, was the chief guest, that
+Peter, who was displeased by this invasion of their sleeping palace,
+suggested it was a coming-of-age party.
+
+It was some time before the signals of the Americans were regarded.
+Although they had established themselves at a table surrounded by
+flowering shrubs, and yet strategically situated not too far distant
+from the kitchen or the café, no one found time to wait upon them, and
+they finally obtained the services of one of the waiters only by the
+expedient of holding tightly to his flying apron. Roddy commanded him
+to bring whatever was being served at the large table.
+
+"That cook," Roddy pointed out, "is too excited to bother with our
+order; but, if there's enough for twenty, there will be enough for two
+more."
+
+Although they were scorned by the waiters, the young men were
+surprised to find that to the gentlemen of the birthday-party their
+coming was of the utmost interest, and, though the tables were much
+too far apart for Roddy to hear what was said, he could see that many
+glances were cast in his direction, that the others were talking of
+him, and that, for some reason, his presence was most disconcerting.
+
+Finally, under pretence of giving an order to his coachman, one of the
+birthday-party, both in going and returning from the gate, walked
+close to their table and observed them narrowly. As he all but paused
+in the gravel walk opposite them, Roddy said with conviction:
+
+"No! Walter Pater never gave the Stoic philosophy a just
+interpretation, while to Euphuism----"
+
+"On the contrary," interrupted Peter warmly, "Oscar Hammerstein is the
+ONLY impressario who can keep the pennant flying over grand opera and
+a roof garden. Believe me----"
+
+With a bewildered countenance the Venezuelan hastily passed on.
+Placidly the two young men continued with their breakfast.
+
+"Even if he _does_ understand English," continued Roddy, "that should
+keep him guessing for a while."
+
+As they, themselves, had no interest in the birthday-party, and as
+they had eaten nothing since early coffee on the steamer, the young
+men were soon deep in the joy of feasting. But they were not long to
+remain in peace.
+
+From the bushes behind them there emerged suddenly and quietly a young
+negro. He was intelligent looking and of good appearance. His white
+duck was freshly ironed, his straw hat sported a gay ribbon. Without
+for an instant hesitating between the two men, he laid a letter in
+front of Roddy. "For Mr. Forrester," he said, and turning, parted the
+bushes and, as quickly as he had come, departed.
+
+Roddy stared at the hedge through which the messenger had vanished,
+and his wandering eyes turned toward the birthday-party. He found that
+every one at that table was regarding him intently. It was evident all
+had witnessed the incident. Roddy wondered if it were possible that
+the letter came from them. Looking further he observed that the man
+who was serving Peter and himself also was regarding him with greater
+interest than seemed natural, and that he was not the man who first
+had waited upon them.
+
+"You," began Roddy doubtfully, "you are not the waiter who----"
+
+The man shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"That fellow he can't speakety English," he explained. "I speakety
+English very good."
+
+The man smiled knowingly, so it seemed to Roddy, impertinently. Roddy
+felt uncomfortably convinced that some jest was going on behind his
+back, and he resented the thought.
+
+"Yes," he began hotly, "and I will bet you _understand_ it, too."
+
+Under the table Peter kicked violently at his ankles.
+
+"Read your letter," he said.
+
+The envelope bore only the name Rodman Forrester. The letter began
+abruptly and was not signed. It read:
+
+     "Willemstad is a small place. Every one in it knows every
+     one else. Therefore, the most conspicuous person in it is
+     the last person to arrive. You are the last person to
+     arrive, and, accordingly, everything you do is noted. That
+     this morning you twice passed the Casa Blanca has been
+     already reported both by those who guard it and by those who
+     spy upon it. If you would bring disaster to those you say
+     you wish to serve, keep on as idiotically as you have
+     begun."
+
+The rebuke, although anonymous, turned Roddy's cheeks a rosy red, but
+he had sufficient self-control to toss the letter to his companion,
+and to say carelessly: "He wants us to dine with him."
+
+The waiter, who had been openly listening, moved off in the direction
+of the kitchen. A moment later Roddy saw him bear a dish to the
+Venezuelan at the head of the long table, and as he proffered it, the
+two men whispered eagerly.
+
+When Peter had read the warning he threw it, face down, upon the
+table, and with a disturbed countenance pretended to devote his
+attention to the salad dressing. Roddy was now grinning with pleasure,
+and made no effort to conceal that fact.
+
+"I wouldn't have missed this," he whispered, "for a week in God's
+country. Apparently everybody's business is everybody else's business,
+and every one spies on every one. It's like the island where they were
+too proud to do their own washing, so everybody took in somebody
+else's washing."
+
+"Who is it from," interrupted Peter irritably, "the Consul?"
+
+Roddy nodded and laughed.
+
+"You may laugh," protested Peter, "but you don't know. You've been in
+Venezuela only four months, and Captain Codman's been here eighteen
+years. These people don't look at things the way we do. We think it's
+all comic opera, but----"
+
+"They're children," declared Roddy tolerantly, "children trying to
+frighten you with a mask on. And old man Codman--he's caught it, too.
+The fact that he's been down here eighteen years is the only thing
+against him. He's lost his sense of humor. The idea," he exclaimed,
+"of spying on us and sending us anonymous warnings. Why doesn't he
+come to the hotel and say what he has to say? Where does he think he
+is--in Siberia?"
+
+Roddy chuckled and clapped his hands loudly for the waiter. He was
+pleasantly at ease. The breakfast was to his liking, the orange trees
+shielded him from the sun, and the wind from the sea stirred the
+flowering shrubs and filled the air with spicy, pungent odors.
+
+"Perhaps the Consul understands them better than you do," persisted
+Peter. "These revolutionists----"
+
+"They're a pack of cards," declared Roddy. "As Alice said to the King
+and Queen, 'You're only a pack of cards.'"
+
+As he was speaking Mr. Von Amberg, the agent of the steamship line,
+with whom that morning he had been in consultation, and one of the
+other commission merchants of Willemstad, came up the gravel walk and
+halted at their table.
+
+Both Von Amberg and his companion had but lately arrived from Holland.
+They were big men, of generous girth, beaming with good health and
+good humor. They looked like Kris Kringles in white duck. In
+continental fashion they raised their Panama hats and bowed profusely.
+They congratulated the young men on so soon having found their way to
+the Café Ducrot, and that Mr. de Peyster, whose name appealed to them,
+had pronounced the cooking excellent, afforded them personal
+satisfaction.
+
+Von Amberg told the young men he had just left cards for the club at
+their hotel, and hoped they would make use of it. His launch, carriage
+and he, himself, were at their disposition.
+
+When Roddy invited the two merchants to join them Von Amberg thanked
+him politely and explained that his table was already laid for
+breakfast. With another exchange of bows the two gentlemen continued
+up the twisting path and disappeared among the bushes.
+
+"_That's_ what I mean!" exclaimed Roddy approvingly. "Now they are
+_our_ people. They have better manners, perhaps, than we have, but
+they're sensible, straight-from-the-shoulder men of business. _They_
+aren't spying on anybody, or sending black-hand letters, or burying
+old men alive in prisons. If they saw a revolution coming they
+wouldn't know what----"
+
+He was interrupted by the sudden reappearance of the men of whom he
+spoke. They were moving rapidly in the direction of the gate, and the
+countenance of each wore an expression of surprise and alarm. While
+his companion passed them quickly, Mr. Von Amberg reluctantly
+hesitated, and, in evident perplexity and with some suspicion, looked
+from one to the other. The waiter had placed the coffee and bottles of
+cognac and of curaçao upon the table; and Roddy hospitably moved a
+chair forward.
+
+"Won't you change your mind," he said, "and try some of the stuff that
+made this island famous?"
+
+In spite of his evident desire to escape, Von Amberg's good manners
+did not forsake him. He bowed and raised his hat in protest.
+
+"I--I should be very pleased--some other time," he stammered, "but now
+I must return to town. I find to-day it is not possible to breakfast
+here. There is a large party--" he paused, and his voice rose
+interrogatively.
+
+"Yes," Roddy replied with indifference. "We found them here. They took
+all the waiters away from us."
+
+The nature of the answer seemed greatly to surprise Von Amberg.
+
+"You--you are not acquainted with those gentlemen?" he inquired.
+
+In the fashion of his country, Roddy answered by another question.
+
+"Who are they?" he asked. "Who is the one whose health they are all
+the time drinking?"
+
+For an instant Von Amberg continued to show complete bewilderment.
+Then he smiled broadly. For him, apparently, the situation now
+possessed an aspect as amusing as it had been disturbing. He made a
+sly face and winked jovially.
+
+"Oh! You Americans!" he exclaimed. "You make good politicians. Do not
+fear," he added hurriedly. "I have seen nothing, and I say nothing. I
+do not mix myself in politics." He started toward the gate, then
+halted, and with one eye closed whispered hoarsely, "It is all right.
+I will say nothing!" Nodding mysteriously, he hurried down the path.
+
+Peter leaned back in his chair and chuckled delightedly.
+
+"There go your sensible business men," he jeered, "running away! Now
+what have you to say?"
+
+Roddy was staring blankly down the path and shook his head.
+
+"You can subpoena me," he sighed. "Why should they be afraid of a
+birthday-party? Why!" he exclaimed, "they were even afraid of _me_! He
+didn't believe that we don't know those Venezuelans. He said," Roddy
+recapitulated, "he didn't mix in politics. That means, of course, that
+those fellows are politicians, and, probably this is their fashion of
+holding a primary. It must be the local method of floating a
+revolution. But why should Von Amberg think we're in the plot, too?
+Because my name's Forrester?"
+
+Peter nodded. "That must be it," he said. "Your father is in deep with
+these Venezuelans, and everybody knows that, and makes the mistake of
+thinking you are also. I wish," he exclaimed patiently, "your father
+was more confiding. It is all very well for him--plotting plots from
+the top of the Forrester Building--but it makes it difficult for any
+one down here inside the firing-line. If your father isn't more
+careful," he protested warmly, "Alvarez will stand us blindfolded
+against a wall, and we'll play blind man's buff with a firing-squad."
+
+Peter's forebodings afforded Roddy much amusement. He laughed at his
+friend, and mocked him, urging him to keep a better hold upon his
+sense of humor.
+
+"You have been down here too long yourself," he said. "You'll be
+having tropic choler next. I tell you, you must think of them as
+children: they're a pack of cards."
+
+"Maybe they are," sighed Peter "but as long as we don't know the
+game----"
+
+From where Peter sat, with his back in their direction, he could not
+see the Venezuelans; but Roddy, who was facing them, now observed that
+they had finished their breakfast. Talking, gesticulating, laughing,
+they were crowding down the path. He touched Peter, and Peter turned
+in his chair to look at them.
+
+At the same moment a man stepped from the bushes, and halting at one
+side of Roddy, stood with his eyes fixed upon the men of the
+birthday-party, waiting for them to approach. He wore the silk cap of
+a chauffeur, a pair of automobile goggles, and a long automobile coat.
+The attitude of the chauffeur suggested that he had come forward to
+learn if his employer was among those now making their departure; and
+Roddy wondered that he had heard no automobile arrive, and that he had
+seen none in Willemstad. Except for that thought, so interested was
+Roddy in the men who had shown so keen an interest in him, that to the
+waiting figure he gave no further consideration.
+
+The Venezuelans had found they were too many to walk abreast. Some had
+scattered down other paths. Others had spread out over the grass. But
+the chief guest still kept to the gravel walk which led to the gate.
+And now Roddy saw him plainly.
+
+Owing to a charming quality of youth, it was impossible to guess the
+man's age. He might be under thirty. He might be forty. He was tall,
+graceful, and yet soldierly-looking, with crisp, black hair clinging
+close to a small, aristocratic head. Like many Venezuelans, he had the
+brown skin, ruddy cheeks, and pointed mustache of a Neapolitan. His
+eyes were radiant, liquid, brilliant. He was walking between two of
+his friends, with a hand resting affectionately on the shoulder of
+each; and though both of the men were older than himself, his notice
+obviously flattered them. They were laughing, and nodding delighted
+approval at what he said, and he was talking eagerly and smiling.
+Roddy thought he had seldom seen a smile so winning, one that carried
+with it so strong a personal appeal. Roddy altogether approved of the
+young man. He found him gay, buoyant, in appearance entirely the
+conquering hero, the Prince Charming. And even though of his charm the
+young man seemed to be well aware, he appeared none the less a
+graceful, gallant, triumphant figure.
+
+As Roddy, mildly curious, watched him, the young man turned his head
+gayly from the friend on his one side to address the one on the
+other. It was but a movement of an instant, but in the short circuit
+of the glance Roddy saw the eyes of the young man halt. As though
+suddenly hypnotized, his lips slowly closed, his white teeth
+disappeared, the charming smile grew rigid. He was regarding something
+to the left of Roddy and above him.
+
+Roddy turned and saw the waiting figure of the chauffeur. He had
+stepped clear of the bushes, and, behind the mask-like goggles, his
+eyes were fixed upon the young Venezuelan. He took a short step
+forward, and his right hand reached up under his left cuff.
+
+Roddy had seen Englishmen in searching for a handkerchief make a
+similar movement, but now the gesture was swift and sinister. In the
+attitude of the masked figure itself there was something prehensible
+and menacing. The hand of the man came free, and Roddy saw that it
+held a weapon.
+
+As the quickest way to get his legs from under the table, Roddy shoved
+the table and everything on it into the lap of Peter. With one spring
+Roddy was beside the man, and as he struck him on the chin, with his
+other hand he beat at the weapon. There were two reports and a sharp
+high cry.
+
+[Illustration: Under the blow, the masked man staggered drunkenly.]
+
+Under the blow the masked man staggered drunkenly, his revolver
+swaying in front of Roddy's eyes. Roddy clutched at it and there was a
+struggle--another report--and then the man broke from him, and with
+the swift, gliding movement of a snake, slipped through the bushes.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Roddy stood staring blankly, unconsciously sucking at a raw spot on
+his finger where the powder had burned it. At his feet the bottle of
+curaçao, from which he had just been drinking, was rolling upon the
+gravel path, its life-blood bubbling out upon the pebbles. He stooped
+and lifted it. Later he remembered wondering how it had come there,
+and, at the time, that so much good liquor had been wasted had seemed
+a most irritating circumstance.
+
+He moved to replace the bottle upon the table and found the table
+overturned, with Peter, his clothes dripping and his eyes aflame,
+emerging from beneath it.
+
+Further up the path the young Venezuelan was struggling in the arms of
+his friends. Fearful that he might still be in danger they were
+restraining him, and he, eager to pursue the man who had fired on him,
+was crying aloud his protests. Others of his friends were racing down
+the different paths, breaking through the bushes, and often, in their
+excitement, seizing upon one another. Huddled together in a group,
+the waiters and coachmen explained, gesticulated, shrieked.
+
+But above the clamor of all, the voice of Peter was the most
+insistent. Leaping from a wreck of plates and glasses, his clothing
+splashed with claret, with coffee, with salad dressing, with the
+tablecloth wound like a kilt about his legs, he jumped at Roddy and
+Roddy retreated before him. Raging, and in the name of profane places,
+Peter demanded what Roddy "meant" by it.
+
+"Look at me!" he commanded. "Look what you did! Look at me!"
+
+Roddy did not look. If he looked he knew he would laugh. And he knew
+Peter was hoping he would laugh so that, at that crowning insult, he
+might fall upon him.
+
+In tones of humble, acute regret Roddy protested.
+
+"I did it, Peter," he stammered hastily. "I did it--to save you. I was
+afraid he would hit you. I had to act quickly----"
+
+"Afraid _he'd_ hit me!" roared Peter. "_You_ hit me! Hit me with a
+table! Look at my new white flannel suit! And look at this!" With his
+fingers he gingerly parted his wet, disheveled hair. "Look at the bump
+on the back of my head. Is _that_ your idea of saving me? I wish," he
+exploded savagely, "I wish he'd shot you full of holes!"
+
+The violent onslaught of Peter was interrupted by one hardly less
+violent from the young Venezuelan. He had freed himself from his
+friends, and, as it now was evident the man who had attempted his life
+had escaped, and that to search further was useless, he ran to thank
+the stranger who had served him. Extravagantly, but with real feeling,
+he wrung both of Roddy's hands. In the native fashion he embraced him,
+shook him by the shoulders, patted him affectionately on the back.
+Eloquently but incoherently in Spanish, French and English he poured
+forth his thanks. He hailed Roddy as his preserver, his _bon amigo_,
+his _brav camarad_. In expressing their gratitude his friends were
+equally voluble and generous. They praised, they applauded, they
+admired; in swift, graceful gestures they reënacted for each other the
+blow upon the chin, the struggle for the revolver, the escape of the
+would-be assassin.
+
+Even Peter, as the only one who had suffered, became a heroic figure.
+
+It was many minutes before the Americans could depart, and then only
+after every one had drunk to them in warm, sweet champagne.
+
+When the glasses were filled the young Venezuelan turned to those
+standing about him on the grass and commanded silence. He now spoke in
+excellent English, but Roddy noted that those of the older men who
+could not understand regarded him with uneasiness.
+
+"I ask you, my friends," cried the Venezuelan, "to drink to the name
+of Forrester. How much," he exclaimed, "does not that name mean to my
+unhappy country. I--myself--that _my_ life should be taken--it is
+nothing; but that it should be saved for my country by one of that
+name is for us an omen--a lucky omen. It means," he cried, the soft,
+liquid eyes flashing, "it means success. It means--" As though
+suddenly conscious of the warning frowns of his friends, he paused
+abruptly, and with a graceful bow, and waving his glass toward Roddy,
+said quietly, "Let us drink to the son of a good friend of
+Venezuela--to Mr. Forrester."
+
+Not until the landau was well on its way to Willemstad did Roddy deem
+it wise to make a certain inquiry.
+
+"What," he asked of the driver, "is the name of the gentleman that the
+other gentleman tried to shoot?"
+
+The driver turned completely in his seat. His eyes were opened wide in
+amazement.
+
+"You don't know that gentleman!" he exclaimed. "I think everybody know
+_that_ gentleman. He be very brave Venezuela gentleman; he be Colonel
+Vega."
+
+As though sure of the effect of that name, the driver paused
+dramatically, but, except that the two Americans looked inquiringly at
+each other, they made no sign.
+
+"Mebbe I better call that gentleman--Pino?" the driver suggested.
+"Everybody call him Pino, just like he be everybody's brother." The
+man showed his teeth broadly, in a delighted grin. "The market womens,
+the sailor mens, the police mens, the black peoples, and the white
+gentlemens, everybodys--call him Pino. Pino he be exiled. If he go to
+his country that President Alvarez he say he shoot him. So Pino go
+over that way," with his whip he pointed to the east. "They say he go
+live in Paris. But yesterday he come in that steamer, and all the
+peoples be waiting at that wharf. Everybody be glad to see Pino."
+
+"Everybody but that man with that gun," suggested Roddy.
+
+The driver rolled his eyes darkly and pursed his lips. "That be bad
+man," he said.
+
+"Did President Alvarez," inquired Roddy pleasantly, "send that bad man
+over here to shoot the too popular Pino?"
+
+Peter uttered a sudden growl of indignation.
+
+"Look where you are driving!" he ordered.
+
+When the negro had turned to his horses Peter stared at Roddy long and
+steadily.
+
+"What that parrot said of you," he declared grimly, "was true."
+
+Those Venezuelans who at once had set forth on their ponies to
+overtake the would-be assassin already had brought word of the attempt
+upon Colonel Vega to Willemstad, and the repose of the peaceful burgh
+was greatly ruffled. The arrival of the young men increased the
+excitement, and, though they fled to their rooms, from their balcony
+overlooking the wharf they could hear their driver, enthroned upon his
+box seat, describing the event to an intent and eager audience.
+
+As Peter was changing into dry clothes he held his watch so that Roddy
+could note the hour.
+
+"How long would you have said we have been living on this island?" he
+asked.
+
+"Oh, at least a week!" exclaimed Roddy. "I have had more excitement
+than I could get in New York in a year, and we haven't been here
+twelve hours!"
+
+"But it is all over now," Peter announced. "We can't stay here. We're
+getting too chummy with this Venezuelan crowd, thanks to you."
+
+"What have I done now?" complained Roddy.
+
+"You can't help being who you are," admitted Peter, "but you can see
+that this town is a red-hot incubator for revolutions. Every one in it
+thinks of nothing else, and every one thinks you are in deep with your
+father against Alvarez, and if we linger here Alvarez will think so,
+too. We've got to get back to Porto Cabello where we have a clean bill
+of health."
+
+Roddy had stretched himself upon his cot, in preparation for his
+afternoon siesta, but he sat upright, his face filled with dismay.
+
+"And not see the Rojas family?" he cried.
+
+Peter growled indignantly.
+
+"See them! How can you see them?" he demanded. "We only drove past
+their house, along a public road, and already everybody in town has a
+flashlight picture of us doing it."
+
+"But," objected Roddy, "we haven't got our credentials."
+
+"We'll have to do without them," declared Peter. "I tell you, if you
+get mixed up with Brother Pino when you get back to Porto Cabello
+you'll go to jail. And what chance will we have then of saving General
+Rojas? He will stay in prison and die there. As White Mice," announced
+Peter firmly, "we have our work to do, and we must not be turned aside
+by anybody's revolution, your father's, or Pino Vega's, or anybody's.
+We're White Mice, first, last and all the time. Our duty isn't to take
+life but to save it." As though suddenly surprised by a new idea Peter
+halted abruptly.
+
+"I suppose," he demanded scornfully, "you think you prevented a murder
+this morning, and you will be claiming the White Mice medal for saving
+life?"
+
+"I certainly will," declared Roddy cheerfully, "and you will have to
+certify I earned it, because you saw me earn it."
+
+"But I didn't," declared Peter. "I was under the table."
+
+Roddy closed his eyes and again fell back upon the cot. For so long a
+time was he silent that Peter, who had gone out upon the balcony,
+supposed him asleep, when Roddy suddenly raised himself on his elbow.
+
+"Anyway," he began abruptly, "we can't leave here until the boat takes
+us away, three days from now. I'll bet in three days I'll get all the
+credentials we want."
+
+Roddy had been awake since sunrise, the heat was soporific, the events
+of the morning exhausting, and in two minutes, unmindful of
+revolutions, indifferent to spies, to plots and counter-plots, he was
+sleeping happily. But as he slumbered, in two lands, at great
+distances apart, he and his affairs were being earnestly considered.
+On the twenty-seventh floor of the Forrester Building his father, with
+perplexed and frowning brows, studied a cablegram; in the Casa Blanca,
+Señora Rojas and her daughters listened in amazement to a marvelous
+tale. Had it not been their faithful friend and jealous guardian, the
+American Consul, who was speaking, they could not have credited it.
+
+At the Forrester Building the cablegram had been just translated from
+the secret code of the company and placed upon the desk of Mr.
+Forrester. It was signed by Von Amberg, and read: "To-day at meeting
+your party, unknown man fired three shots Vega; Young Forrester
+overpowered man; Vega unhurt; man escaped. Understand young Forrester
+not in our confidence. Please instruct."
+
+Three times Mr. Forrester read the cablegram, and then, laying it upon
+his knee, sat staring out of the open window.
+
+Before his physical eyes were deep cañons of office buildings like his
+own, towering crag above crag, white curling columns of smoke from
+busy tugboats, and the great loom of the Brooklyn Bridge with its
+shuttles of clattering cable-cars. But what he saw was his son, alone
+in a strange land, struggling with an unknown man, a man intent on
+murder. With a hand that moved unsteadily the Light-house King lifted
+the desk telephone and summoned the third vice-president, and when Mr.
+Sam Caldwell had entered, silently gave him the cablegram.
+
+Sam Caldwell read it and exclaimed with annoyance:
+
+"Looks to me," he commented briskly, "as though they know why Pino
+came back. Looks as though they had sent this fellow to do him up,
+before we can----"
+
+In a strange, thin voice, Mr. Forrester stopped him sharply.
+
+"If the boy'd been hurt--they'd have said so, wouldn't they?" he
+demanded.
+
+Sam Caldwell recognized his error. Carefully he reread the cablegram.
+
+"Why, of course," he assented heartily. "It says here he overpowered
+the other fellow: says 'Vega unhurt.'"
+
+In the same unfamiliar, strained tone Mr. Forrester interrupted. "It
+doesn't say Roddy is unhurt," he objected.
+
+The young man laughed reassuringly.
+
+"But the very fact they don't say so shows--why, they'd know that's
+what you most want to hear. I wouldn't worry about Roddy. Not for a
+minute."
+
+Embarrassed by his own feeling, annoyed that Sam Caldwell should have
+discovered it, Mr. Forrester answered, "_You_ wouldn't. He isn't
+_your_ son."
+
+He reached for a cable form, and wrote rapidly:
+
+"Von Amberg. Willemstad, Curaçao, W. I. Forrester most certainly not
+in our confidence. Return him Cabello. Is he"--the pen hesitated and
+then again moved swiftly--"unhurt?"
+
+He drew another blank toward him and addressing it to McKildrick,
+wrote: "Why is Forrester in Curaçao? Cable him return. Keep him on
+job, or lose yours."
+
+For a moment Mr. Forrester sat studying the two messages, then he
+raised his eyes.
+
+"I have half a mind," he said, "to order him home. I would, if he
+weren't doing so well down there." With an effort to eliminate from
+his voice any accent of fatherly pride, Mr. Forrester asked coldly:
+"McKildrick reports that he is doing well, doesn't he?"
+
+The third vice-president nodded affirmatively.
+
+"If he comes back here," argued Mr. Forrester, "he'll do nothing but
+race his car, and he'll learn nothing of the business. And then,
+again," he added doubtfully, "while he's down there I don't want him
+to learn too much of the business, not this Pino Vega end of it, or he
+might want to take a hand, and that might embarrass us. Perhaps I had
+better cable him, too."
+
+He looked inquiringly at the third vice-president, but that gentleman
+refused to be drawn.
+
+"He isn't _my_ son," he remarked.
+
+"I am not speaking of him as my son," snapped Mr. Forrester warmly.
+"Speaking of him, not as my son, but as an employee of the company,
+what would _you_ do with him?"
+
+"I'd cable him to mind his own business," answered Sam Caldwell.
+
+For the fraction of a second, under levelled eyebrows, Mr. Forrester
+stared at young Mr. Caldwell, and then, as a sign that the interview
+was at an end, swung in his swivel chair and picked up his letters.
+Over his shoulder he said, "Cable him that."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+While Roddy in Willemstad was slumbering under his mosquito-net, and
+Sam Caldwell in New York was concocting a cablegram, which, he
+calculated, would put Roddy in his proper place, but which, instead,
+put him in a very bad temper, Captain Codman, at Casa Blanca, had
+just finished relating his marvelous tale.
+
+It was the story of how young Forrester, without letters of
+introduction, without credentials, had that morning walked into the
+consulate and announced that, without asking advice, he intended to
+liberate the Lion of Valencia.
+
+Upon the members of the Rojas household the marvelous tale had a
+widely different effect.
+
+To understand why this should be so it is necessary to know something
+of the three women who formed the Rojas household.
+
+Señora Rojas was an American. When she was very young her father, a
+professor at one of the smaller universities in New England, in order
+to study the archives of the Spanish rulers of Venezuela, had visited
+that country, and taken his daughter with him. She was spirited,
+clever, and possessed of the particular type of beauty the Spaniard
+admires. Young Rojas saw her, and at once fell in love with her, and,
+after the death of her father, which occurred in the North, followed
+her there and married her. She then was very young and he an attaché
+in the diplomatic service. Since their marriage, unlike many of his
+countrymen, Rojas had not looked with interest upon any other woman,
+and, with each year of their life together, their affection had grown
+stronger, their dependence upon each other had increased.
+
+In wisdom, in experience, in honors, Rojas had grown rich. In
+countries where his own was only a spot upon the map, Rojas himself,
+the statesman, the diplomat, the man who spoke and read in many
+languages, the charming host with the brilliant wife, was admired,
+sought after. There were three children: the two girls, and a son, a
+lieutenant of artillery, whose death during the revolution of Andreda
+had brought to the family its first knowledge of grief.
+
+Of the two sisters, Lolita, the elder, was like her father--grave,
+gracious, speaking but seldom and, in spite of the years spent in
+foreign capitals, still a Spanish-American. Her interests were in her
+church, her music and the duties of the household.
+
+Of all the names given at her christening to the younger sister, the
+one that survived was Inez. Inez was a cosmopolitan. She had been
+permitted to see too much of the world to make it possible for her
+ever again to sit down tamely behind the iron bars of the Porto
+Cabello drawing-room. She was too much like her American mother; not
+as her mother was now, after thirty years in a Venezuelan's household,
+but as her mother had been when she left the New England college
+town. Unlike her sister, she could not be satisfied with the
+cloister-like life of the young girls of Spanish-America. During the
+time her father had served as minister to Paris she had been at school
+in the convent at Neuilly, but at the time he was transferred to
+London she was of an age to make her bow at court, and old enough to
+move about with a freedom which, had it been permitted her at home,
+would have created public scandal. She had been free to ride in the
+Row, to play tennis, to walk abroad, even through public streets and
+parks, even when it rained, even unattended. She had met men, not
+always as prospective suitors, but as friends and companions.
+
+And there had been a wonderful visit to her mother's country and her
+mother's people, when for a summer she had rejoiced in the friendly,
+inconsequent, out-of-door life of a Massachusetts' seaside colony.
+Once on the North Shore, and later on Cape Cod, she had learned to
+swim, to steer a knockabout, to dance the "Boston," even in
+rubber-soled shoes, to "sit out" on the Casino balcony and hear young
+men, with desperate anxiety, ask if there were any more in South
+America like her. To this question she always replied that there were
+not; and that, in consequence, if the young man had any thoughts on
+the subject, she was the person to whom they should be addressed.
+
+Then, following the calm, uneventful life of the convent, of London
+and its gayeties, of the Massachusetts coast with its gray fogs and
+open, drift-wood fires, came the return to her own country. There,
+with her father, she rode over his plantations among the wild cattle,
+or with her mother and sister sat in the _patio_ and read novels in
+three languages, or sleepily watched the shadow of the tropical sun
+creep across the yellow wall.
+
+And then, suddenly, all of these different, happy lives were turned
+into memories, shadows, happenings of a previous and unreal
+existence. There came a night, which for months later in terrified
+dreams returned to haunt her, a night when she woke to find her
+bed surrounded by soldiers, to hear in the court-yard the sobs
+of her mother and the shrieks of the serving-women, to see her
+father--concerned only for his wife and daughters--in a circle of
+the secret police, to see him, before she could speak with him,
+hurried to a closed carriage and driven away.
+
+Then had begun the two years of exile in Willemstad, the two years of
+mourning, not of quiet grief for one at rest, but anxious, unending
+distress for one alive, one dearly loved, one tortured in mind,
+enduring petty indignities, bodily torments, degradations that killed
+the soul and broke the brave spirit.
+
+To the three women Rojas had been more than husband or father. He had
+been their knight, their idol, their reason for happiness. They alone
+knew how brave he was, how patient, how, beyond imagination,
+considerate. That they should be free to eat and sleep, to work and
+play, while he was punished like a felon, buried alive, unable to
+carry on the work in the world God had given him to do, caused them
+intolerable misery. While he suffered there was no taste in life, and
+the three shut themselves from the world. They admitted only the
+Consul, who had been his friend, and those who, like themselves, were
+exiles, and in whose hatred of Alvarez lay their only hope of again
+seeing the one they loved. Time after time a plan of rescue had
+failed. A plot that promised release had been disclosed and the
+conspirators punished. Hope had left them, and, on the part of their
+friends, had been followed by lethargy.
+
+But within the last three months a new hope had arisen, and with it,
+for the younger daughter, a new distress.
+
+It was whispered that a revolution, backed by great wealth and
+sanctified by the prayers of the people, was to be started near
+Valencia. Its leader in the field was to be young Pino Vega, in
+several campaigns the personal aide-de-camp of General Rojas, a young
+man indebted to his chief for many favors, devoted to him by reason of
+mutual confidence and esteem. If successful, this revolt against
+Alvarez was to put Vega in command of the army, to free Rojas and to
+place him as president at Miraflores. To the women the thought that
+Rojas might become president was intolerable. It was because he had
+consented to be president that he had suffered. The mere thought of
+the office, and of the cruelties that had been practised by the man
+who held it, made it, to the women, terrifying.
+
+For Rojas they wanted neither position nor power. They wanted Rojas
+free. They wanted to hold him close, to touch him, to look into his
+eyes, to see the gentle, understanding smile.
+
+Each felt that there was nothing she could not do, no sacrifice she
+would not make, if once more she could sit beside him, holding his
+hand, waiting in silence for the joy of hearing him speak. And of the
+younger girl the sacrifice has been required. At least a way in which
+she could assist the cause that would lead to the freedom of her
+father had been presented to her. From Paris, Pino Vega had written
+her mother, requesting permission to ask Inez to be his wife.
+
+To the girl, of all the men she knew in Venezuela, Pino was the most
+attractive. They both had lived for years outside of their own country
+and, in consequence, had much in common. He was thirty-seven, older
+than she by fourteen years, but, as has already been pointed out, in
+appearance, in manner, in spirits, he seemed much younger than his
+years. To his detriment nothing could be said that could not have been
+said of the other young men of his class in his country. But the girl
+was not in love with the young man of that class, nor with her
+country.
+
+Her brother had been sacrificed in what to her had seemed but a
+squalid struggle for place between two greedy politicians; her father,
+for the very reason that he had served his country loyally,
+faithfully, and was, in consequence, beloved by the people, had been
+caged like a wild animal. She had no love for her native land. She
+distrusted and feared it.
+
+Night after night, as she paced the walk along the cliff where the
+waves broke at her feet, she shuddered to think of returning to that
+land, only sixty miles from her, that had robbed her of so much that
+had made life beautiful; of all, up to the present, that had made it
+happy. She wished never to see it again. Could her father have been
+returned to her she would have rejoiced that they were exiles. And, as
+she distrusted the country, she distrusted the men of the country, at
+least those of the class to which Vega belonged. She knew them well,
+the born orators, born fighters, born conspirators. To scheme, to
+plot, to organize against the authority of the moment was in their
+blood.
+
+If she thought of a possible husband, and, in a country where a girl
+marries at fifteen, and where her first, if not her only duty in life,
+is to marry, it would have been surprising if she had not, the man she
+considered as a husband was not a Venezuelan. For their deference to
+women, for their courtesy to each other, for their courage as shown in
+their campaigns, for their appreciation of art, of letters, of music,
+she greatly admired her countrymen; but that they themselves created
+nothing, that they scorned labor and all those who labored, made them,
+to Inez, intolerable.
+
+That she was half an American of the North was to her a source of
+secret pride. With satisfaction she remembered young men she had known
+during the summers on the North Shore and Cape Cod, the young men who,
+during the first of the week, toiled and sweltered in their offices,
+and who, when the week-end came, took their pleasures strenuously, in
+exercise and sport. She liked to remember that her American and
+English devotees had treated her as a comrade, as an intelligent,
+thinking creature. They had not talked to her exclusively of the
+beauty of her eyes, her teeth and hair.
+
+She preferred their breathless, "Well played, partner!" to the
+elaborate, "I saw the Señorita at mass this morning. As she raised her
+eyes to Heaven--the angels grew jealous."
+
+When the mother told Inez that Colonel Vega had written, proposing on
+his return to pay his addresses to her, the girl was in genuine
+distress. She protested earnestly.
+
+In thirty years Señora Rojas unconsciously had assimilated the
+thoughts, the habits, the attitude of mind of the women of her adopted
+country, and, when Inez had finished her protest, her mother, seeing
+the consequence from her own point of view, was greatly disturbed. "It
+is most unfortunate," she said. "Pino is selfish; when he learns you
+will not listen to him he will be very angry and he will be less eager
+to help your father. He will think only of himself. If you only could
+have cared----"
+
+"Pino could not be so cruel," said the girl. But she spoke as though
+she were arguing against her own conviction. "He cannot be so vain--so
+spoiled," she protested, "that because one woman fails to fall on her
+knees to him, he must punish her."
+
+The talk between the mother and daughter had taken place a week before
+Colonel Vega's arrival from Paris. On the day his steamer was due,
+Señora Rojas again spoke to Inez.
+
+"After mass this morning," she said, "I consulted Father Paul about
+Pino. He hopes it will be possible for you not to give him a direct
+answer. He says Pino will be leaving us almost at once. He is to land
+north of Porto Cabello, and our people are to join him there. Father
+Paul thinks," the Señora hesitated, and then went on hastily, "you
+might let him go in ignorance. You might ask for time to consider. You
+might even tell him----"
+
+The girl's cheeks flushed crimson and the tears came to her eyes. The
+mother looked away. After an instant's silence she exclaimed bitterly:
+"It is only a lie to a man who has lied to many women! I think of
+nothing," she declared, "but that it would keep him true to your
+father. What else matters!" she broke forth, "I would lie, cheat,
+steal," she cried, "if I could save your father one moment's
+suffering."
+
+The girl took the hand of the elder woman and pressed it to her cheek.
+"I know," she whispered, "I know."
+
+There was a moment's silence. "If it were anything else!" protested
+the girl. "If I could change places with father I would run to do
+it--you know that--but this"--with a gesture of repugnance the girl
+threw out her hands--"to pretend--to care! It is degrading, it makes
+me feel unclean."
+
+"You will make an enemy," asked the mother coldly, "of the only person
+who can bring your father back to us? Sooner than let Pino think you
+care for him, you would let him turn against us? You and Pino," she
+pleaded, "are old friends. Your father is his friend. What more
+natural!" She broke forth hysterically. "I beg of you," she cried, "I
+command you not to make an enemy of Pino. Tell him to wait, tell him
+that now you can think of nothing but your father, but that when your
+father is free, that if he will only set him free--" The mother held
+the girl toward her, searching her eyes. "Promise me," she begged.
+
+Inez regarded her mother unhappily, and turned away.
+
+This, then, on the afternoon of Colonel Vega's arrival at Curaçao was
+the position toward him and toward each other of the three women of
+the Rojas household, and explains, perhaps, why, when that same
+afternoon Captain Codman told them the marvelous tale of Roddy's
+proposition, Señora Rojas and her daughter received the news each in a
+different manner.
+
+Before she had fully understood, Señora Rojas exclaimed with
+gratitude:
+
+"It is the hand of God. It is His hand working through this great
+company."
+
+"Not at all," snapped Captain Codman. "The company has nothing to
+do with it. As far as I can see it is only the wild plan of a
+harum-scarum young man. He has no authority. He's doing it for
+excitement, for an adventure. He doesn't seem to know anything of--of
+what is going on--and, personally, I think he's mad. He and his friend
+are the two men who twice drove past your house this morning. What his
+friend is like I don't know; but Forrester seems quite capable of
+forcing his way in here. He wants what he calls 'credentials.' In
+fact, when I refused to help him, he as much as threatened to come
+here and get them for himself."
+
+The voice of Señora Rojas was shaken with alarm. "He is coming here!"
+she cried. "But if he is seen _here_ they will know at once at
+Caracas, and my husband will suffer. It may mean the end of
+everything." Her voice rose, trembling with indignation. "How dare he!
+How dare he, for the sake of an adventure, risk the life of my
+husband? How can he expect to succeed where our friends have failed,
+and now, when Pino has returned and there is hope."
+
+"I told him that," said the Consul.
+
+"You warned him," insisted the Señora; "you told him he must not come
+near us?"
+
+Inez, who, with her sister, stood eagerly intent behind the chair in
+which their mother was seated, laid her hand soothingly upon the
+Señora's shoulder.
+
+"Is it best," she asked, "to turn the young man away without learning
+what he wishes to do? Living in Porto Cabello, he may know something
+we could not know. Did you find out," she asked the Consul, "in what
+way Mr. Forrester wishes to help us?"
+
+"No," confessed Captain Codman, "I did not. I was so taken aback," he
+explained; "he was so ignorant, so cocksure, that he made me mad. And
+I just ordered him out, and I told him, told him for his own good, of
+course," the Consul added hastily, "that he talked too much."
+
+With critical eyes Inez regarded her old friend doubtfully, and shook
+her head at him.
+
+"And how did he take that?" she asked.
+
+"He told me," answered the Consul, painfully truthful, "that my parrot
+had said the same thing, and that we might both be wrong."
+
+There was an instant's silence, and then Inez laughed. In shocked
+tones her mother exclaimed reprovingly.
+
+"But he comes here," protested the girl, "to do us a service, the
+greatest service, and he is ordered away. Why should we refuse to let
+him help us, to let any one help us. We should make the most of every
+chance that offers."
+
+Señora Rojas turned in her chair and looked steadily at her daughter.
+
+"Your advice is good, Inez," she said, "but it comes strangely from
+you."
+
+At the same moment, as though conjured by her thought, a servant
+announced Colonel Vega, and that gentleman, with several of those who
+had lunched with him at the Café Ducrot, entered the room. In alarm
+Captain Codman waited only to shake hands with the visitors and then
+precipitately departed. But in the meeting of the exiles there was
+nothing that would have compromised him. The reception of Colonel Vega
+by the three women was without outward significance. They greeted
+him, not as a leader of their conspiracy, but as they might have
+received any friend who, after an absence, had returned to them. When
+he bent over the hand of Inez he raised his liquid eyes to hers, but
+the girl welcomed him simply, without confusion.
+
+He decided that her mother could not as yet have told her of his
+wishes. Had she done so he felt sure, in view of the honor he would
+pay her, her embarrassment at meeting him would have been apparent to
+all.
+
+Vega himself elected to tell the ladies of the attack made upon him at
+the Café Ducrot. He made little of it. He let the ladies understand
+that his life, like that of all public men, was always at the mercy of
+assassins. To Roddy he gave full credit.
+
+"Imagine this man reaching for his weapon," he related dramatically,
+"myself too far from him to fall upon him, and my arms resting upon
+the shoulders of my two good friends. Their safety, also, is in my
+mind. But I am helpless. I saw the villain smile confidently. He
+points the weapon. Then the young man springs upon him and the bullets
+pass us harmlessly. Believe me, but for Mr. Forrester all three of us,
+General Pulido, Colonel Ramon and myself, might now be dead."
+
+The two gentlemen designated dismissed the thought with a negligent
+wave of the hand. It suggested that, to soldiers like themselves,
+being dead was an annoyance to which they had grown accustomed.
+
+"Mr. Forrester!" exclaimed Inez, catching at the name.
+
+"Mr. Forrester!" repeated her mother. "But I thought--I was told only
+just now that he knew nothing of our plans."
+
+"That is quite true," Colonel Vega assured her. "He was not with us.
+He was there by accident."
+
+"Let us rather say," corrected Señora Rojas piously, "he was placed
+there by a special Providence to save you."
+
+That the Almighty should be especially concerned in his well-being did
+not appear to Vega as at all unlikely.
+
+He nodded his head gravely.
+
+"It may be so," he admitted.
+
+Through force of habit Señora Rojas glanced about her; but the open
+windows showed the empty garden, and around her, seated in two rows of
+rocking-chairs, the ladies facing the door, the men facing the ladies,
+she saw only friends.
+
+"But why," she asked, "is young Mr. Forrester _not_ in the confidence
+of his father? Can he not trust his own son?"
+
+As though sure of her answer she cast a triumphant glance at the
+daughter who had dared, against Captain Codman and herself, to
+champion Mr. Forrester's son. Pino frowned mysteriously. He did not
+like to say that with any action of the great Mr. Forrester he was not
+acquainted. So he scowled darkly and shook his head.
+
+"It is a puzzle," he said; "the young man is a fine fellow. To him I
+owe my life." He appealed to his friends, who, in time to the sedate
+rocking of the chairs, nodded gravely. "But his father is very
+decided. He cables us to send him at once to Porto Cabello. He
+instructs us not to let him know what we plan to do. I learned that in
+Porto Cabello he is only a workman, or, a little better, the foreman
+of the Jamaica coolies. I do not say so," Pino pointed out, as though
+if he wished he might say a great deal, "but it looks as though he
+were here for some punishment--as though he had displeased his father.
+Or," he demanded, "why should his father, who is so wealthy, give his
+son the wages of a foreman?"
+
+During the visit of the conspirators the traditions of Spanish
+etiquette gave Colonel Vega no opportunity to separate Inez from the
+others; and soon, without having spoken to her alone, he and his
+followers departed.
+
+When they had gone, Inez, as was her custom when she wished to be by
+herself, ordered her pony and rode out on the cliff road toward the
+orange groves. Riding unattended was a breach of Spanish-American
+convention. But her mother permitted it, and, in the eyes of the
+people of Willemstad, her long residence abroad, and the fact that she
+was half American of the North, partially excused it. Every morning at
+sunrise, before the heat of the day, and just before the sun set, Inez
+made these excursions. They were the bright moments of her present
+life. If she did not wish to think, they prevented her from thinking;
+if she did wish to think, they protected her from intrusion, and gave
+her strength and health to bear the grinding anxiety of the other
+hours. They brought back to her, also, memories of rides of former
+days, before her father had been taken from her, when they had trotted
+politely over the tan bark of Rotten Row, or when, with her soldier
+brother, she had chased the wild cattle on the plantation.
+
+Now, with her head bent, with the hand that held the reins lying
+loosely on her knee, she rode at a walk, her body relaxed, her eyes
+seeing nothing. Her mind was intent upon her problem, one in which
+her answer to Pino Vega was but a part. To carry out the plan she had
+in mind she needed a man to help her, and there were two men to whom
+she might appeal. But only one, not both of them, could help her. She
+was determined not to return from her ride until she had decided which
+one it should be.
+
+After an hour, as though she had reached her decision and was fearful
+lest she might reconsider it, she lifted the pony into a gallop and
+raced to Casa Blanca. On arriving there she went directly to her room,
+wrote a note, and returned with it to the stable where the groom was
+just removing the saddle from her pony.
+
+He was an old man, trusted by Inez. As a body servant he had first
+served her brother, then her father, and after the imprisonment of
+General Rojas, had volunteered to follow the women of the family into
+exile. For a moment the girl regarded him earnestly.
+
+"Pedro," she asked, "what would you do to save the master?"
+
+When the man was assured he had understood her he lowered the saddle
+to the ground, and standing erect threw out his arms with his open
+palms toward her. In pantomime he seemed to signify that for the
+purpose she named, his body, his life was at her disposition.
+
+Inez showed him the note.
+
+"You will take this," she said, "to an American, Mr. Forrester. He is
+at one of the hotels. No one must know you are seeking him, no one
+must see you give him this note. Not even my mother must suspect that
+any message has been sent from this house to that gentleman. When he
+has read the note he will say 'yes' or 'no.' If he asks questions you
+will shake your head. As soon as you get your answer come directly to
+me."
+
+She gave him the note and after an impressive delay continued: "There
+is a new plan to save my father. If you deliver this note safely you
+will have taken the first step to set him free. If you blunder, if it
+is found out that Mr. Forrester and one of the Rojas family are
+conspiring together, it will mean greater cruelties for my father; it
+may mean his death."
+
+The girl had spoken in the way she knew would best appeal to the man
+before her. And she was not disappointed. His eyes shone with
+excitement. That he was conspiring, that he was a factor in a plot,
+that the plot had in view the end he so much desired, filled him with
+pleasure and pride. Crossing himself he promised to carry out her
+orders.
+
+As Inez returned to the main portion of the house the sun was just
+sinking into the sea; and, to keep their daily tryst, her mother and
+sister were moving toward the cliff. While the crimson disk descended,
+the three women stood silent and immovable, the face of each turned
+toward the rim of the horizon. As though her eyes could pierce the
+sixty miles that lay between her and her father Inez leaned forward,
+her fingers interlaced, her lips slightly apart. That, at that moment,
+he was thinking of her, that he was looking to where he knew she was
+on guard, and thinking of him, moved her as greatly as though the
+daily ceremony was for the first time being carried forward. A
+wandering breeze, not born of the sea, but of the soil, of tropical
+plants and forests, and warm with sunshine, caressed her face. It came
+from the land toward which her eyes were turned. It was comforting,
+sheltering, breathing of peace. As it touched her she smiled slightly.
+She accepted it as a good omen, as a message sent from across the sea,
+to tell her that in the step she had taken she had done well.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+After their dinner at the hotel, Roddy and Peter strolled down the
+quay and over the tiny drawbridge that binds Otrabanda to Willemstad.
+There, for some time, half-way between the two towns, they loitered
+against the railing of the bridge, smoking and enjoying the cool night
+breeze from the sea. After his long nap Roddy was wakeful. He had been
+told that Willemstad boasted of a _café chantant_, and he was for
+finding it. But Peter, who had been awake since the ship's steward had
+aroused him before sunrise, doubted that there was a _café chantant_,
+and that if it did exist it could keep him from sleep, and announced
+his determination to seek his bed.
+
+Left to himself, Roddy strolled slowly around the narrow limits of the
+town. A few of the shops and two of the cafés were still open,
+throwing bright spaces of light across the narrow sidewalks, but the
+greater number of houses were tightly barred; the streets slumbered in
+darkness. For a quarter of an hour Roddy sauntered idly, and then
+awoke to the fact that he was not alone. Behind him in the shadow, a
+man with his face hidden in a shawl, the sound of his footsteps
+muffled by his rope sandals, was following his wanderings.
+
+Under the circumstances, after the developments of the day, Roddy was
+not surprised, nor was he greatly interested. Even in Porto Cabello,
+at one time or another, every one was beset by spies. And that here,
+in the central office of the revolutionists, Alvarez should be well
+represented was but natural.
+
+Twice, softly and quickly, the man who followed had approached him
+from the rear, and each time, lest he should have some more serious
+purpose than to simply spy upon him, Roddy had stepped into the
+street. But when for the third time the man drew near, his approach
+was so swift that Roddy had no time to move away. The man brushed
+against him, and when he had passed Roddy found a letter had been
+pressed into his hand.
+
+The hour was late, Roddy looked like a tourist, the note had been
+delivered covertly. Roddy concluded it contained an invitation to some
+disreputable adventure, and after calling the man the name associated
+with what Roddy believed to be his ancient and dishonorable
+profession, he tossed the note into the street.
+
+With a cry of dismay the man ran toward it, but Roddy was before him.
+As the note had left his hand his fingers had touched upon heavy,
+waxen seals.
+
+In an instant he had retrieved the note, and, followed eagerly by the
+man, carried it to the light of a gas lamp. The envelope was not
+illuminating, the sealing-wax was stamped with no crest or initials,
+the handwriting was obviously disguised.
+
+After observing that from the shadow the man still watched him, while
+at the same time he kept an anxious lookout up and down the street,
+Roddy opened the note. It read: "You have come to Curaçao for a
+purpose. One who has the success of that purpose most at heart desires
+to help you. To-morrow, just before sunrise, walk out the same road
+over which you drove to-day. Beyond the Café Ducrot the bearer of this
+letter will wait for you with a led horse. Follow him. If you think he
+is leading you into danger, order him to ride in advance, and cover
+him with your revolver. If you will come, say to the bearer,
+'_Vengo_,' if not, '_No Vengo_.' He has orders not to reply to any
+question of yours. If you speak of this to others, or if the bearer of
+this suspects you have arranged for others to follow you, he will only
+lead you back to your hotel, and your chance to right a great wrong
+will have passed."
+
+There was no signature. But as though it were an afterthought, at the
+bottom of the page was written, "Adventures are for the adventurous."
+
+Standing well in the light of the street lamp, with his back to the
+houses, with his face toward the waiting messenger, Roddy read the
+letter three times. But after the first reading his eyes neglected the
+body of the note and raced to the postscript. That was the line that
+beckoned and appealed; to him it seemed that whoever wrote the letter
+doubted he would come to the rendezvous, and was by that line enticing
+him, mocking him, daring him to refuse. It held forth both a promise
+and a challenge.
+
+As to who the writer of the note might be, there were in Roddy's mind
+three explanations. He considered them hastily. Peter was the author
+of the note, and it was a poor joke intended to test him. It was a
+genuine offer from some one who had guessed the object of his visit to
+Curaçao and honestly wished to be of service. It came from the man in
+the mask and his associates, who, resenting his interference of the
+morning, had pleasant thoughts of luring him down a lonely road and
+leaving him lying there. Which of the three suppositions might be
+correct it was impossible to know, but the postscript decided him. He
+beckoned to the messenger, and the man ran eagerly forward. "I will
+come," said Roddy. The man smiled with pleasure, bowed to him, and
+dived into the darkness. As he ran down the street Roddy stood
+listening until the soft patter of the sandals had ceased, and then
+slowly returned to the hotel.
+
+For an hour, still speculating as to who his anonymous friend might
+be, he stood, smoking, upon the balcony. On the quay below him a negro
+policeman dozed against a hawser-post. A group of cargadores,
+stretched at length upon stacks of hides, chattered in drowsy
+undertones. In the moonlight the lamps on the fishing-boats and on the
+bridge, now locked against the outside world, burned mistily, and the
+deck of the steamer moored directly below him was as deserted and
+bare, as uncanny and ghostlike, as the deck of the ship of the Ancient
+Mariner. Except for the chiming of ships' bells, the whisper of the
+running tide, and the sleepy murmur of the longshoremen, the town of
+Willemstad was steeped in sleep and silence. Roddy, finding he could
+arrive at no satisfactory explanation of the note, woke the night
+porter, and telling that official he was off before daybreak to shoot
+wild pigeons, and wanted his coffee at that hour, betook himself to
+his cot. It seemed as though he had not twice tossed on the pillow
+before the night-watchman stood yawning at his side.
+
+Roddy and Peter occupied adjoining rooms, and the door between the two
+was unlocked. When Roddy had bathed, dressed, and, with a feeling of
+some importance, stuck his revolver into his pocket, he opened the
+door, and, still suspicious that his faithful friend was sending him
+on a wild-goose chase, for a few moments stood beside his bed. But
+Peter, deep in the sleep of innocence, was breathing evenly,
+stentoriously. Not without envying him the hours of rest still before
+him, Roddy helped himself to Peter's revolver, left him a line saying
+it was he who had borrowed it, and went out into the dark and empty
+streets.
+
+Half awake and with his hunger only partially satisfied, Roddy now
+regarded his expedition with little favor. He reverted strongly to the
+theory that some one was making a fool of him. He reminded himself
+that if in New York he had received such a note, he either would have
+at once dismissed it as a hoax or turned it over to the precinct
+station-house. But as the darkness changed to gray, and the black bulk
+of the Café Ducrot came into view, his interest quickened. He
+encouraged himself with the thought that while in New York the
+wording of the note would be improbable, hysterical, melodramatic, in
+hot, turbulent Venezuela it was in keeping with the country and with
+the people.
+
+Since setting forth from the hotel a half hour had passed, and as he
+left the Café Ducrot behind him the night faded into the gray-blue
+mist of dawn. Out of the mist, riding slowly toward him, mounted on
+one pony and leading another, Roddy saw the man who on the night
+before had brought him the letter. He was leaning forward, peering
+through the uncertain light. When he recognized Roddy he galloped to
+him, and with evident pleasure but without speaking, handed him the
+reins of the led pony. Then motioning to Roddy to wait, he rode
+rapidly down the road over which the American had just come. Roddy
+settled himself in the saddle, and with a smile of satisfaction beamed
+upon the ghostlike world around him. So far, at least, the adventure
+promised to be genuine. Certainly, he argued, Peter could not have
+prepared a joke so elaborate.
+
+Apparently satisfied that Roddy had brought no one with him, the
+messenger now rejoined him, and with a gesture of apology took the
+lead, and at a smart trot started in the same direction in which Roddy
+had been walking.
+
+Roddy gave his guide a start of fifty feet, and followed. With the
+idea of a possible ambush still in his mind, he held the pony well in
+hand, and in front of him, in his belt, stuck one of the revolvers. He
+now was fully awake. No longer in the darkness was he stumbling on
+foot over the stones and ruts of the road. Instead, the day was
+breaking and he had under him a good horse, on which, if necessary, he
+could run away. The thought was comforting, and the sense of possible
+danger excited him delightfully. When he remembered Peter, sleeping
+stolidly and missing what was to come, he felt a touch of remorse. But
+he had been warned to bring no one with him, and of the letter to
+speak to no one. He would tell Peter later. But, he considered, what
+if there should be nothing to tell, or, if there were, what if he
+should not be alive to tell it? If the men who had planned to
+assassinate Colonel Vega intended to punish him for his interference,
+they could not have selected a place or hour better suited to their
+purpose. In all the world, apparently, he was the only soul awake. On
+either side of him were high hedges of the Spanish bayonet, and back
+of them acres of orange groves. The homes of the planters lay far from
+the highway, and along the sides of the road there were no houses, no
+lodge gates, not even a peon's thatched hut.
+
+Roddy was approaching a sharp turn in the road, a turn to the left at
+almost right angles. It was marked by an impenetrable hedge. Up to
+now, although the hedges would have concealed a regiment, the white
+road itself had stretched before him, straight and open. But now the
+turn shut it from his sight. The guide had reached the corner. Instead
+of taking it, he turned in his saddle and pulled his pony to a walk.
+
+To Roddy the act seemed significant. It was apparent that they had
+arrived at their rendezvous. Sharply, Roddy also brought his pony to
+a walk, and with a heavy pull on the reins moved slowly forward.
+The guide drew to the right and halted. To Roddy's excited imagination
+this manoeuvre could have but one explanation. The man was
+withdrawing himself from a possible line of fire. Shifting the reins
+to his left hand, Roddy let the other fall upon his revolver. Holding
+in the pony and bending forward, Roddy peered cautiously around the
+corner.
+
+What he saw was so astonishing, so unlike what he expected, so utterly
+out of place, that, still leaning forward, still with his hand on his
+revolver, he stared stupidly.
+
+For half a mile the road lay empty, but directly in front of him,
+blocking the way, was a restless, pirouetting pony, and seated upon
+the pony, unmoved either by his gyrations or by the appearance of a
+stranger in her path, was a young girl.
+
+As Roddy had cautiously made his approach he had in his mind a picture
+of skulking Venezuelans with pointed carbines; his ears were prepared
+for a command to throw up his hands, for the slap of a bullet. He had
+convinced himself that around the angle of the impenetrable hedge this
+was the welcome that awaited him. And when he was confronted by a girl
+who apparently was no more a daughter of Venezuela than she was a
+masked highwayman, his first thought was that this must be some
+innocent foreigner stumbling in upon the ambush. In alarm for her
+safety his eyes searched the road beyond her, the hedges on either
+side. If she remained for an instant longer he feared she might be the
+witness to a shocking tragedy, that she herself might even become a
+victim. But the road lay empty, in the hedges of spiked cactus not a
+frond stirred; and the aged man who had led him to the rendezvous sat
+motionless, watchful but undisturbed.
+
+[Illustration: Shifting the reins to his left hand, Roddy let the
+other fall upon his revolver.]
+
+Roddy again turned to the girl and found her closely observing him.
+He sank back in his saddle and took off his hat. Still scanning the
+hedges, he pushed his pony beside hers and spoke quickly.
+
+"Pardon me," he said, "but I think you had better ride on. Some men
+are coming here. They--they may be here now."
+
+That his anxiety was entirely on her account was obvious. The girl
+colored slightly, and smiled. As she smiled, Roddy for the first time
+was looking directly at her, and as he looked his interest in
+assassins and his anxiety as to what they might do passed entirely
+from him. For months he had not seen a girl of his own people, and
+that this girl was one of his own people he did not question. Had he
+first seen her on her way to mass, with a lace shawl across her
+shoulders, with a high comb and mantilla, he would have declared her
+to be Spanish, and of the highest type of Spanish beauty. Now, in her
+linen riding-skirt and mannish coat and stock, with her hair drawn
+back under a broad-brimmed hat of black straw, she reminded him only
+of certain girls with whom he had cantered along the Ocean Drive at
+Newport or under the pines of Aiken. How a young woman so habited had
+come to lose herself in a lonely road in Curaçao was incomprehensible.
+Still, it was not for him to object. That the gods had found fit to
+send her there was, to Roddy, sufficient in itself, and he was
+extremely grateful. But that fact was too apparent. Though he was
+unconscious of it, the pleasure in his eyes was evident. He still was
+too startled to conceal his admiration.
+
+The girl frowned, her slight, boyish figure grew more erect.
+
+"My name is Rojas," she said. "My father is General Rojas. I was told
+you wished to help him, and last night I sent you a note asking you to
+meet me here."
+
+She spoke in even, matter-of-fact tones. As she spoke she regarded
+Roddy steadily. When, the night before, Inez had sent the note, she
+had been able only to guess as to what manner of man it might be with
+whom she was making a rendezvous at daybreak, in a lonely road. And
+she had been more than anxious. Now that she saw him she recognized
+the type and was reassured. But that he was worthy of the secret she
+wished to confide in him she had yet to determine. As she waited for
+him to disclose himself she was to all outward appearances tranquilly
+studying him. But inwardly her heart was trembling, and it was with
+real relief that, when she told him her name, she saw his look of
+admiration disappear, and in his eyes come pity and genuine feeling.
+
+"Oh!" gasped Roddy unhappily, his voice filled with concern. "Oh, I am
+sorry!"
+
+The girl slightly inclined her head.
+
+"I came to ask you," she began, speaking with abrupt directness, "what
+you propose to do?"
+
+It was a most disconcerting question. Not knowing what he proposed to
+do, Roddy, to gain time, slipped to the ground and, hat in hand, moved
+close to the pommel of her saddle. As he did not answer, the girl
+spoke again, this time in a tone more kindly. "And to ask why you wish
+to help us?"
+
+As though carefully considering his reply, Roddy scowled, but made no
+answer. In a flash it had at last come to him that what to Peter and
+to himself had seemed a most fascinating game was to others a
+struggle, grim and momentous. He recognized that until now General
+Rojas had never been to him a flesh-and-blood person, that he had not
+appreciated that his rescue meant actual life and happiness. He had
+considered him rather as one of the pieces in a game of chess, which
+Peter and himself were secretly playing against the Commandant of the
+San Carlos prison. And now, here, confronting him, was a human being,
+living, breathing, suffering, the daughter of this chessman, bone of
+his bone, flesh of his flesh, demanding of the stranger by what right
+he made himself her father's champion, by what right he pushed himself
+into the tragedy of the Rojas family. In his embarrassment Roddy
+decided desperately to begin at the very beginning, to tell the exact
+truth, to omit nothing, and then to throw himself upon the mercy of
+the court.
+
+The gray mist of the morning had lifted. Under the first warm rays of
+the sun, like objects developing on a photographer's plate, the cactus
+points stood out sharp and clear, the branches of the orange trees
+separated, assuming form and outline, the clusters of fruit took on a
+faint touch of yellow. From the palace yard in distant Willemstad
+there drifted toward them the boom of the morning gun.
+
+With his reins over his arm, his sombrero crumpled in his hands, his
+face lifted to the face of the girl, Roddy stood in the road at
+attention, like a trooper reporting to his superior officer.
+
+"We were in the tea-house of the Hundred and One Steps," said Roddy.
+"We called ourselves the White Mice."
+
+Speaking quickly he brought his story down to the present moment. When
+he had finished, Inez, who had been bending toward him, straightened
+herself in the saddle and sat rigidly erect. Her lips and brows were
+drawn into two level lines, her voice came to him from an
+immeasurable distance.
+
+"Then it was a joke?" she said.
+
+"A joke!" cried Roddy hotly. "That's most unfair. If you will only
+give us permission we'll prove to you that it is no joke. Perhaps, as
+I told it, it sounded heartless. I told it badly. What could I
+say--that I am sorry? Could I, a stranger, offer sympathy to you? But
+we _are_ sorry. Ever since Peter proposed it, ever since I saw your
+father----"
+
+The girl threw herself forward, trembling. Her eyes opened wide.
+
+"You saw my father!" she exclaimed. "Tell me," she begged, "did he
+look well? Did he speak to you? When did you--" she stopped suddenly,
+and turning her face from him, held her arm across her eyes.
+
+"It was four months ago," said Roddy. "I was not allowed to speak to
+him. We bowed to each other. That was all."
+
+"I must tell them," cried the girl, "they must know that I have seen
+some one who has seen him. But if they know I have seen you----"
+
+She paused; as though asking advice she looked questioningly at Roddy.
+He shook his head.
+
+"I don't understand," he said.
+
+"My mother and sister don't know that I am here," Inez told him. "If
+they did they would be very angry. No one," she added warningly, "must
+know. They are afraid of you. They cannot understand why you offer to
+help us. And they mistrust you. That is why I had to see you here in
+this way." With a shrug of distaste the girl glanced about her.
+"Fortunately," she added, "you understand."
+
+"Why, yes," Roddy assented doubtfully. "I understand your doing what
+_you_ did, but I don't understand the others. Who is it," he asked,
+"who mistrusts me? Who," he added smiling, "besides yourself?"
+
+"My mother," answered Inez directly, "your consul, Captain Codman,
+Colonel Vega, and----"
+
+In surprise, Roddy laughed and raised his eyebrows.
+
+"Vega!" he exclaimed. "Why should Vega mistrust me?" Knowing what was
+in his mind, the girl made him a formal little bow.
+
+"It is not," she answered, "because you saved his life." In obvious
+embarrassment she added: "It is because you are not in the confidence
+of your father. You can see that that must make it difficult for
+Colonel Vega."
+
+Bewildered, Roddy stared at her and again laughed.
+
+"And what possible interest," he demanded, "can _my_ father have in
+Colonel Vega?"
+
+For a moment, with distrust written clearly in her eyes, the girl
+regarded him reproachfully. Then she asked coldly:
+
+"Do you seriously wish me to think that you do _not_ know that?"
+
+While they had been speaking, even when Inez had made it most evident
+to Roddy that to herself and to her friends he was a discredited
+person, he had smiled patiently. His good humor had appeared
+unassailable. But now his eyes snapped indignantly. He pressed his
+lips together and made Inez an abrupt bow.
+
+"I assure you, I know nothing," he said quickly.
+
+He threw the reins over the neck of the pony, and with a slap on its
+flank drove it across the road within reach of the waiting Pedro. Then
+lifting his hat, and with another bow, he started in the direction of
+Willemstad. Inez, too surprised to speak, sat staring after him. But
+before he had taken a dozen steps, as though she had called him back
+and asked him to explain, he halted and returned. He had entirely
+recovered his good humor, but his manner when he spoke was not
+conciliatory.
+
+"The trouble is this," he said, "your friends are so deep in plots
+that they have lost sight of the thing that counts. While they are
+'mistrusting,' and suspecting, and spying on each other, a man is
+dying. I know that much, anyway. That is all I care to know." As
+though it were an extenuating fact, he added: "It is a question of
+character. It is a Venezuelan way of doing things. But it is not our
+way. It was very kind of you to give me this chance to explain our
+interfering. But I see now--everybody," he added dryly, "has taken
+pains to make it very plain--that we are a nuisance." He paused, and
+to assure her it was not she he was upbraiding, smiled cheerfully. In
+his most confidential manner he continued lightly: "For myself, I have
+always thought there was something to say for the fools who rush in
+where angels fear to tread. I remember once seeing a fool rush into a
+burning building and rescue a child, while I and some other angels
+shouted for ladders." He nodded, and again lifted his hat. "Good-by,"
+he said, "and thank you." Leaving her seated silent in the saddle, he
+walked away.
+
+This time he had turned the bend in the road and had proceeded along
+it some hundred yards, when from behind him he heard approaching at a
+reckless pace the hoof-beats of a pony. Looking back, he saw a
+whirlwind of fluttering skirts and scattered sparks and pebbles. Inez,
+followed by Pedro, drew up even with him; and as she dragged her pony
+to a halt, threw herself free of the pommel and dropped at his feet to
+the road. Had he not caught her by the shoulders she would have
+stumbled into his arms. A strand of hair had fallen across her face,
+her eyes were eager, flashing. She raised her gloved hands
+impulsively, and clasped them before him.
+
+"Please!" she begged. "You must not go. It is true--what you say about
+us, but you must help us. I did not know. I had forgotten. It is three
+years since I talked to any one--any one from your country. I had
+forgotten. It is true; we are suspicious, we are _not_ straightforward
+like you, like the people in the States. But you must not punish us
+for that. Not _me_!"
+
+At all times the face raised to his was beautiful. Now, the delicate
+lips, like those of a child before it breaks into sobs, were
+trembling, the eyes, lifted appealingly, were eloquent with tears.
+
+"You must advise me," said the girl. "You must help me."
+
+She raised her clasped hands higher. She regarded him wistfully,
+"Won't you?" she begged.
+
+Her attack had been swift, masterly; every feminine weapon had been
+brought into effective action; and the surrender of Roddy was sudden,
+and complete. In abject submission he proceeded incoherently:
+
+"My dear young lady!" he cried. "But, my dear young _lady_!"
+
+He was rewarded with a brilliant, blinding smile.
+
+"Then you _will_ help me?" Inez asked.
+
+Roddy recovered himself quickly.
+
+"My Spanish is very bad," he answered, "but what it sounds like in
+English is, 'I am at your feet.'"
+
+The sun now was shining brightly, and in the open road they were as
+conspicuous as though they had stood in a shop window on Broadway.
+Across the road, in the hedge opposite, a gate barred a path that led
+into one of the plantations. Roddy opened the gate, and together,
+followed by Pedro with the ponies, they found a spot where they were
+hidden by the hedge from any one passing on the highway. Inez halted
+in the shade of one of the orange trees. Speaking rapidly, she
+sketched for Roddy a brief history of the various efforts that had
+been made to rescue her father. She explained why these efforts had
+failed. She told him of the revolution led by Pino Vega, and the good
+it was expected to accomplish.
+
+At first the girl spoke in some embarrassment. She knew that to be
+where she was, at that hour, alone with a stranger, was, in the eyes
+of her friends and family, an unpardonable offense. And though she
+resented their point of view, the fact that it existed disquieted her.
+But the man at her side did not seem to consider talking to a girl in
+the open sunshine either as a novel experience or one especially
+disgraceful. Politely, with lowered eyes, he gave to what she said the
+closest attention. The circumstance that they were alone, even the
+fact that she was young and attractive, did not once appear to occur
+to him. Seeing this, Inez with each succeeding moment gained
+confidence in Roddy and in herself and spoke freely.
+
+"That is what we have tried to do," she said. "Now I am going to tell
+you why I asked you to meet me here this morning, and how I believe
+you can help me. Three days ago I received a message from my father."
+
+Roddy exclaimed with interest, but motioned eagerly for her to
+continue.
+
+"It is in cipher," she continued, "but it is his handwriting. It is
+unmistakable. It was given to me when I was at church. I was kneeling
+in the chapel of St. Agnes, which is in the darkest corner of the
+building. At first I was alone, and then a woman came and knelt close
+beside me. She was a negress, poorly dressed, and her face was hidden
+by her shawl. For a moment I thought she was murmuring her prayers,
+and then I found she was repeating certain words and that she was
+talking at me. 'I have a letter, a letter from your father,' she
+whispered. I crowded closer, and she dropped a piece of paper in front
+of me and then got to her feet and hurried away. I followed, but there
+were many people at mass, and when I had reached the street she had
+disappeared. The message she brought me is this: 'Page 54, paragraph
+4.' That is all. It is the second message we have had from my father
+in two years. The first one was by word of mouth, and came a month
+ago. The meaning of that was only too plain. But what this one means I
+cannot imagine, nor," proceeded Inez with distress, "can I see why, if
+he had the chance to write to us, he did not write more openly."
+
+She looked appealingly at Roddy, and paused for him to speak.
+
+"He was afraid the message would be intercepted," said Roddy. "What he
+probably means to do is to send it to you in two parts. The second
+message will be the key that explains this one. He knew if he wrote
+plainly, and it fell into the wrong hands--" Roddy interrupted
+himself, and for a moment remained silent. "'Page 54, paragraph 4,'"
+he repeated. "Has he sent you a book?" he asked. "Has any book come to
+you anonymously?"
+
+The girl shook her head. "No, I thought of that," she said, "but no
+books have come to us that we haven't ordered ourselves."
+
+"What do the others think?" asked Roddy.
+
+The girl colored slightly and shook her head.
+
+"I have not told them. I knew my mother would ask Pino to help her,
+and," she explained, "though I like Pino, for certain reasons I do not
+wish to be indebted to him for the life of my father. Before appealing
+to him I have been trying for two days to find out the meaning of the
+cipher, but I could not do it, and I was just about to show it to my
+mother when Captain Codman told us of your offer. That made me
+hesitate. And then, as between you and Pino, I decided you were better
+able to help us. You live in Porto Cabello, within sight of the
+prison. Pino will be in the field. His revolution may last a month, it
+may last for years. During that time he would do nothing to help my
+father. When you risked being shot yesterday, it seemed to me you
+showed you had spirit, and also, _you_ are from the States, and Pino
+is a Venezuelan, so----"
+
+"You needn't take up the time of the court," said Roddy, "in
+persuading me that I am the man to help you. To save time I will
+concede that. What was the other message you received from your
+father?"
+
+The eyes of the girl grew troubled and her voice lost its eagerness.
+
+"It was charged in a French paper," she said, "that the prisoners in
+San Carlos were being killed by neglect. The French minister is a
+friend of our family, and he asked Alvarez to appoint a committee of
+doctors to make an investigation. Alvarez was afraid to refuse, and
+sent the doctors to examine my father and report on his health. One of
+them told him that Alvarez would permit him to send a message to my
+mother, and to tell her himself whether he was, or was not, ill. This
+is the message that they gave us as coming from my father.
+
+"'I don't know what you gentlemen may decide as to my health,' he
+said, 'but _I_ know that I am dying. Tell my wife that I wish to be
+buried in my native country, and to place upon my tombstone my name
+and this epitaph: "He wrote history, and made history."'" The voice of
+the girl had dropped to a whisper. She recovered herself and
+continued sadly: "Until three days ago that is the only word we have
+received from my father in two years."
+
+The expression on Roddy's face was one of polite incredulity. Seeing
+this, Inez, as though answering his thought, said proudly: "My father
+made history when he arranged the boundary line between British Guiana
+and Venezuela."
+
+Roddy shook his head impatiently.
+
+"I wasn't thinking of that," he said. "I was thinking of the message.
+It doesn't sound a bit like your father," he exclaimed. "Not like what
+_I've_ heard of him."
+
+The eyes of the girl grew anxious with disappointment.
+
+"Do you mean," she asked, "that you think he did _not_ send that
+message?"
+
+"It doesn't sound to me," said Roddy, "like the sort of message he
+would send, knowing the pain it would cause. He isn't the sort of man
+to give up hope, either. Even if it were true, why should he tell your
+mother he is dying? And that epitaph!" cried Roddy excitedly.
+"_That's_ not like him, either! It is not modest." With sudden
+eagerness he leaned toward her. "_Did_ your father write history?" he
+demanded.
+
+Unable to see the purpose of his question, the girl gazed at him in
+bewilderment. "Why, of course," she answered.
+
+"And does any part of it refer to Porto Cabello?"
+
+After a moment of consideration Inez nodded. "The third chapter," she
+said, "tells of the invasion by Sir Francis Drake."
+
+"'Chapter three, page fifty-four, paragraph four!'" shouted Roddy.
+"I'll bet my head on it! Don't you see what he has done?" he cried.
+"He sent you the key before he sent you the cipher. The verbal message
+is the key to the written one. They gave him a chance to send word to
+your mother, and he took it. He told her he was dying only that he
+might give her a direction, apparently about an epitaph, a boastful
+epitaph. He never boasted while he was alive--why should he boast on
+his tombstone? His real message is this: 'Look in the history I wrote
+of Venezuela, on page fifty-four, paragraph four,' and when we have
+found it," cried Roddy, "we'll have found the way to get him out of
+prison!"
+
+Inez was not convinced, but his enthusiasm was most inspiriting.
+
+"We have the history at the house," she cried, "and I know you can
+find it in the Spanish bookstore in Willemstad. I must go at once."
+
+She moved forward, greatly excited, her eyes lit with the happiness of
+this new hope. Roddy ran to bring her pony, and making a bridge of his
+hands lifted her to the saddle. "If I am right about this," he said,
+"I must see you again to-day. Where can I meet you?"
+
+In spite of her eagerness, the girl hesitated. One by one the
+traditions of a lifetime were smashing about her.
+
+"I _must_ tell my mother," she pleaded. "And I know she will not allow
+me----"
+
+"And she'll tell Pino," interrupted Roddy. To detain her, he laid his
+hand upon the reins and shook them sharply.
+
+"Are you helping Pino to win a revolution," he demanded, "or are you
+helping me to get your father out of prison?"
+
+Inez gazed at him in dismay. In her brief twenty-two years no man had
+spoken to her in such a manner. Among her friends she knew of no
+Venezuelan who, no matter what the provocation, would have addressed
+his wife, his sister, his daughter in a tone so discourteous. And yet
+this stranger was treating her, who, as she had been frequently and
+reliably informed, was the loveliest and most lovable of her sex, as
+he might a mutinous younger brother. In spite of the new and serious
+thought that now occupied her mind, this one was also sufficiently
+novel to compel her attention. It both amused and fascinated her. Here
+was at last one man who was working to help her father, and not only
+in order to find favor in her bright eyes. He needed her wits and her
+courage; he wanted her help, but he wanted it as from a comrade, as he
+would have asked it of another man. Unconsciously he was paying her
+the compliment that best pleased her. When she nodded in assent she
+laughed delightedly, partly at him for bullying, partly at herself
+that she should for a moment have resented it.
+
+"I am helping _you_!" she said.
+
+Not understanding why she laughed, Roddy regarded her doubtfully.
+
+Imitating the directness of his manner, Inez spoke quickly. "You can
+keep the pony. It is new to our stable and not known to belong to us.
+To-morrow morning, before sunrise, ride out again, but this time take
+the road to Otrabanda and along the cliff. Be sure to pass our house
+before sunrise. Ride about a mile and turn down a bridle-path to your
+left. That will bring you to the beach. If I cannot go, Pedro will
+meet you. You will get the history my father wrote at Belancourts, in
+Willemstad." For a moment she regarded him with friendly eyes. "If
+you should be right," she exclaimed, "how can I ever thank you?"
+
+Roddy smiled back at her and shook his head.
+
+"I don't know that we were exactly looking for gratitude," he said.
+"Now, go!" he ordered, "for I can't leave until you are well out of
+sight."
+
+With another delightful laugh, that to Roddy was again inexplicable,
+the girl accepted her dismissal. It was her first rendezvous, but, in
+spite of her inexperience, she knew that had it been made with a
+Venezuelan the man would not have been the one first to bring it to an
+end.
+
+Roddy impatiently waited until a quarter of an hour had passed, then
+galloped to Willemstad. On the way he put up the pony at a
+livery-stable in the suburbs, and on foot made his way as quickly as
+possible to the bookstore. What he wanted, he explained, were
+guidebooks and histories of Venezuela. Among those the man showed him
+was one in three volumes, in Spanish, by Señor Don Miguel Rojas.
+Roddy's fingers itched to open it, but he restrained himself and,
+after buying half a dozen other books, returned to his hotel. Peter
+was still asleep, and he could not wait to waken him. Locking himself
+in, he threw the books he did not want upon the floor, and, with
+fingers that were all thumbs, fumbled at the first volume of the
+history until he had found page fifty-four. His eyes ran down it to
+the fourth paragraph. His knowledge of Spanish was slight, but it was
+sufficient. Page fifty-four was the description of an attack from the
+sea by Drake, upon the Fortress of San Carlos. Translated by Roddy,
+paragraph four read as follows: "Seeing that it was no longer possible
+to hold the fortress, the defenders were assembled in the guard-room,
+and from there conducted to the mainland, through the tunnel that
+connects San Carlos with the Fortress of El Morro."
+
+Like a man in a trance, Roddy walked to the adjoining room and shook
+the sleeping Peter by the shoulder. Peter opened his eyes, and the
+look in Roddy's face startled him into instant wakefulness.
+
+"What's wrong?" he demanded.
+
+"Nothing!" said Roddy. Forgetting that to Peter it was unintelligible,
+he pointed with a triumphant finger at paragraph four.
+
+"I have found an underground passage into the cell of General Rojas,"
+he said. "We must go back and dig him out."
+
+In order to avoid the heat, those planters who lived some distance
+from Willemstad were in the habit of rising by candlelight, and when
+the sun rose it found them well advanced upon their journey. So when
+on the following morning Roddy again set forth to meet Inez Rojas,
+the few servants who knew of his early departure accepted it, and the
+excuse he gave of wild-pigeon shooting, as a matter of course.
+
+Without difficulty Roddy found the bridle-path leading down from the
+cliff road to the sea, and after riding for a short distance along the
+beach came upon Inez, guarded by the faithful Pedro. The cliff,
+hollowed at its base by the sea, hung over them, hiding them from any
+one on the cliff road, and the waves, breaking into spray on an outer
+barrier of rock, shut them from the sight of those at sea.
+
+As Inez rose from the rock on which she had been seated and came
+eagerly to meet him, her face was radiant with happiness. Over night
+she appeared to have gained in health and strength, to have grown
+younger, and, were it possible, more beautiful. The satisfaction in
+the eyes of Roddy assured her that he, also, had solved the riddle.
+
+"You have seen the book," she called; "you understand?"
+
+"I think so," replied Roddy. "Anyway, I've got a sort of blueprint
+idea of it. Enough," he added, "to work on."
+
+"I didn't tell my mother," Inez announced. "Nor," she continued, as
+though defying her own misgivings, "do I mean to tell her. Until you
+can get back word to me, until you say that _this_ time you believe we
+may hope, it seems to me it would be kinder to keep her in ignorance.
+But I told Pedro," she added. She flashed a grateful smile at the old
+man, and he bowed and smiled eagerly in return. "And he has been able
+to help me greatly. He tells me," she went on, "that his father, who
+was in the artillery, was often stationed at Morro before it was
+abandoned. That was fifty years ago. The tunnel was then used daily
+and every one knew of it. But when the troops were withdrawn from
+Morro the passage was walled up and each end blocked with stone. In
+San Carlos it opened into the guard-room. El Morro was hardly a
+fortress. It was more of a signal-station. Originally, in the days of
+the pirates, it was used as a lookout. Only a few men were kept on
+guard there, and only by day. They slept and messed at San Carlos.
+Each morning they were assembled in the guard-room, and from there
+marched through the tunnel to El Morro, returning again at sunset."
+
+"I don't know El Morro," said Roddy.
+
+"You have probably seen it," Inez explained, "without knowing it was a
+fort. It's in ruins now. Have you noticed," she asked, "to the right
+of the town, a little hill that overlooks the harbor? It is just
+above the plain where the cattle are corralled until they are shipped
+to Cuba. Well, the ruins of El Morro are on top of that hill. It is
+about a quarter of a mile from San Carlos, so we know that is the
+length of the tunnel. Pedro tells me, for a part of the way it runs
+under the water of the harbor. It was cut through the solid rock by
+the prisoners at San Carlos."
+
+"There must be a lot of people," objected Roddy, "who know of it."
+
+"Fifty years ago they knew of it," returned Inez eagerly, "but,
+remember, for half a century it has virtually ceased to exist. And
+besides, to my people there is nothing unusual in such a tunnel. You
+will find them connected with every fort the Spaniards built along
+this coast, and in Cuba, and on the Isthmus of Panama. All along the
+Spanish Main, wherever there is more than one fort, you will find them
+linked together by tunnels. They were intended to protect the soldiers
+from the fire of the enemy while they were passing from one position
+to another."
+
+The young people had been standing ankle-deep in the soft, moist sand.
+Now the girl moved toward her pony, but Roddy still stood looking out
+to sea. He appeared to have entirely forgotten that Inez was present,
+and to be intently regarding the waves that surged against the rocks,
+and burst into glittering walls of foam. At last, with a serious
+countenance, he came toward her.
+
+"I shall tell the authorities at Porto Cabello," he said, "that they
+ought to build a light-house on El Morro. At any rate, I will ask
+permission to make a survey. As they don't intend to pay father for
+any of his light-houses, they are not likely to object. And as I don't
+intend to build one, father can't object. He will attribute my offer
+to mistaken zeal on behalf of the company. And he will consider it
+another evidence of the fact that I don't understand his business. As
+soon as I find out anything definite I will let you know. And, by the
+way," he asked, "_how_ am I to let you know?"
+
+Inez gave him the address of a fellow-exile from Venezuela, living in
+Willemstad, who was in secret communication with Pedro. Through this
+man letters would reach her safely.
+
+She turned to him in farewell, and held out her hand.
+
+"You must be very careful," she said.
+
+"Trust me!" answered Roddy heartily. "I promise you I'll be as
+mysterious a double-dealer as any Venezuelan that ever plotted a plot.
+I admit," he went on, "that when I came down here I was the frank,
+wide-eyed child, but, I assure you, I've reformed. Your people have
+made me a real Metternich, a genuine Machiavelli. Compared to me now,
+a Japanese business man is as honest and truth-loving as Mrs. Wiggs of
+the Cabbage Patch."
+
+With a grin, Roddy invited the girl to sympathize with his effort to
+conceal the seriousness of their undertaking, but she regarded him
+doubtfully, and frowned. In his heart Roddy felt sorry for her. It
+hurt him to think that any one so charming could not accept his
+theory, that the only way to treat a serious matter was with
+flippancy. But the girl undeceived him.
+
+"You don't understand me," she said quietly. "I didn't mean to be
+careful to protect our interests. I meant you to be careful of
+yourself. If anything were to happen to you through this--" She
+hesitated and looked away from him toward the sea. "Do you imagine,"
+she demanded, "that it is easy for me to ask what I am asking of you?
+_I_ know I have no right to do it. I know the only possible excuse for
+me is that I am not asking it for myself, but for my father--although,
+of course, that _is_ asking it for myself."
+
+"Beauty in distress," began Roddy briskly, "is the one thing----"
+
+"That's what I mean," interrupted the girl gratefully, "the way you
+take it, the way you make it easier for me. Every other man I know
+down here would tell me he was doing it only for me, and he would hope
+I would believe him. But when _you_ say you are helping beauty in
+distress, you are secretly frightened lest I may not have a sense of
+humor--and believe you. I know you are doing this because you feel
+deeply for my father. If I didn't know that, if I didn't feel that
+that were true, all this I have asked of you would be impossible. But
+it is possible, because I know you first tried to save my father of
+your own accord. Because I know now that it is your nature to wish to
+help others. Because you are brave, and you are generous."
+
+But Roddy refused to be ennobled.
+
+"It's because I'm a White Mice," he said. "My oath compels me! How
+would you like," he demanded, frowning, "if we turned you into an
+Honorary White Mouse?"
+
+For an instant, with perplexed eyes and levelled brows, the girl
+regarded him fixedly. Then she smiled upon him. It was the same
+flashing, blinding smile which the morning before had betrayed him
+into her hands, bound and captive. It was a smile that passed swiftly,
+like a flash of sunshine over a garden of gay flowers. It brought out
+unsuspected, ambushed dimples. It did fascinating and wholly
+indefensible things to her lips. It filled her eyes with gracious,
+beautiful meanings. Inez raised her head challengingly.
+
+"You think," she declared, "that I cannot be foolish, too. But I can.
+Let's sit down here on this rock and be quite foolish."
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+"I can be quite as foolish as you," Inez repeated as Roddy continued
+to regard her. "Some day, when this is over, when you have made it all
+come right, we will sit out here and pretend that we have escaped from
+Venezuela, that we are up North in my mother's country--in your
+country. We will play these are the rocks at York Harbor, and we'll be
+quite young and quite happy. Have you ever sat on the rocks at York
+Harbor," she demanded eagerly, "when the spray splashed you, and the
+waves tried to catch your feet?"
+
+Roddy was regarding her in open suspicion. He retreated warily.
+
+"York Harbor!" he murmured. "I discovered it! It is named after me.
+But you! I never imagined you'd been there, and I never imagined you
+could be anything but serious, either. It makes you quite dangerous."
+
+"Dangerous?" murmured the girl.
+
+"One is dangerous," said Roddy, "when one is completely charming."
+
+The girl frowned, and her shoulders moved slightly. "You speak," she
+said, "like a Venezuelan."
+
+But Roddy was in no mood to accept reproof.
+
+"I told you," he said, "I admire the fools who rush in where angels
+fear to tread. There is another man I admire equally, 'the man who
+runs away.' It takes great courage to run away. I must do it now."
+
+He retreated from her. His eyes were filled with a sudden, deep
+delight in her, and a growing wonder. The girl regarded him steadily.
+
+"Come here," she commanded, "and say 'Good-by' to me."
+
+Roddy took the slim, gauntleted hand stretched out to him, and for an
+instant the girl held his hand firmly, and then nodded. The smile this
+time was very near to tears.
+
+"What you are going to do," she said, "is the dangerous thing. You
+don't know how dangerous. If I should not see you again----"
+
+Roddy looked down into her eyes, and laughed from utter happiness.
+
+"You will see _me_ again," he said.
+
+His tone gave to the words a meaning which the girl entirely
+disregarded.
+
+"You will remember," she went on, as though he had not spoken, "that
+we--that I am grateful."
+
+Roddy turned and smiled out at the sunlit sea.
+
+"You have given me," he answered, "other things to remember."
+
+He pulled off his sombrero and took the gauntleted hand in both of
+his. He bowed over it and brushed it with his lips. The girl still
+regarded him steadily, questioningly.
+
+"Good-by," faltered Roddy.
+
+His eyes sought hers wistfully, appealingly, with all that he felt
+showing in them. But her own told him nothing. Roddy released her hand
+with an effort, as though it were bound to his with manacles.
+
+"Now I know," he said gently, "why I came to Venezuela."
+
+The girl made no answer, and silently Roddy mounted and rode away.
+When he had reached the place where the rocks would hide her from
+sight he glanced back. He saw Inez standing beside her pony, leaning
+with her arms across the saddle, looking after him. Then, as he waved
+his hand, she raised hers with a gesture that seemed to Roddy partly a
+farewell, partly a benediction.
+
+The stable at which Roddy had told Pedro he would leave the pony was
+far in the suburbs, and by the time he had walked to Willemstad the
+morning was well advanced.
+
+[Illustration: "Now I know why I came to Venezuela!"]
+
+As he approached the quay he recognized that in his absence some event
+of unusual interest had claimed the attention of the people.
+Everywhere men were gathered in little groups, gesticulating,
+laughing, frowning importantly, and at the hotel Roddy was surprised
+to see, on the balcony leading from his room, Peter and the American
+Consul. The sight of him apparently afforded them great satisfaction,
+and they waved and beckoned to him frantically. Ignoring their last
+meeting, the Consul greeted Roddy as though he were an old friend.
+
+"Have you heard the news?" he demanded. "It is of great local
+interest, and it should interest you. Last night," he explained,
+"President Alvarez declared an amnesty for his political opponents
+living in foreign countries. All exiles may now return to their
+homes."
+
+He pointed at the small passenger steamer lying at the quay directly
+below the window. The _Blue Peter_ was at the fore, and her deck was
+crowded with excited, jubilant Venezuelans.
+
+"You see," explained Captain Codman, "they have lost no time."
+
+In a tone that precluded the possibility of discussion, Peter briskly
+added: "And _we_ are going with them. I have packed your bag and paid
+the bill. We sail in an hour."
+
+The news of the amnesty bewildered Roddy. The wonderful possibilities
+it so suddenly presented thrilled him. They were so important that
+with difficulty he made his voice appear only politely interested.
+
+"And Señora Rojas?" he asked.
+
+"I regret to say," answered Captain Codman, "she decides to take
+advantage of the amnesty. As soon as she can arrange her affairs here
+she will return to Miramar, her home in Porto Cabello."
+
+To Miramar! Roddy turned suddenly to the window, and with unseeing
+eyes stared at the busy harbor. By sight he knew the former home of
+the Rojas family. In his walks he had often passed before its
+yellow-pillared front and windows barred with intricate screens of
+wrought iron. Through the great gates that had hung before Miramar
+since it had been the palace of the Spanish Governor-General, and
+through which four horses could pass abreast, he had peered at the
+beautiful gardens. He had wondered at the moss-covered statues, at the
+orchids on the flamboyant trees, with their flowers of scarlet, at the
+rare plants, now neglected and trailing riotously across the paths,
+choked with unkempt weeds. Not an hour before, when he had parted from
+Inez, he had determined to make sentimental journeys to that same
+house. For she had walked in those gardens, it was through those gates
+she had swept in her carriage to take the air in the Plaza; at night,
+when she slept, some high-ceilinged, iron-barred room of that house
+had sheltered her. He had pictured himself prowling outside the empty
+mansion and uncared-for garden, thinking of the exile, keeping vigil
+in the shadow of her home, freshly resolving to win back her father to
+health and freedom.
+
+And now, by a scratch of the pen, the best that could happen had come
+to him. The house would waken to life. Instead of only the fragrance
+clinging to the vase, the rose itself would bloom again. Again Inez
+would walk under the arch of royal palms, would drive in the Alameda,
+would kneel at Mass in the cool, dark church, while, hidden in the
+shadows, he could stand and watch her. And though, if he hoped to save
+her father, stealth and subterfuge would still be necessary, he could
+see her, perhaps, speak to her; at least by the faithful Pedro he
+could send her written words, flowers, foolish gifts, that were worth
+only the meaning they carried with them.
+
+Feeling very much of a hypocrite, Roddy exclaimed fervently:
+
+"How wonderful for Señora Rojas! To be near him again! Is she happy?
+Does it make it easier for her?"
+
+With a disturbed countenance the Consul nodded gravely.
+
+"Yes," he answered, "she welcomed the change. She believes it means
+for her husband better conditions. She hopes even for his pardon;
+but--" The Consul shook his head impatiently, and with pitying eyes
+looked down upon the excited men on the steamer below them.
+
+"But what?" demanded Roddy.
+
+"I suspect every act of Alvarez," the Consul explained. "This _looks_
+like the act of a generous opponent. But I cannot believe it is that.
+I believe he knows all that is being plotted against him. I believe
+this act of amnesty is only a device to put the plotters where he can
+get his hand on them. He is the spider inviting the flies into his
+parlor."
+
+As the little steamer passed the harbor mouth and pushed her nose
+toward Porto Cabello, Roddy, with Peter at his side, leaned upon the
+starboard rail. Roddy had assured Inez that Peter must be given their
+full confidence, and he now only waited a fitting moment to tell him
+of what had occurred that morning, in so far, at least, as it referred
+to the tunnel.
+
+The eyes of both were turned toward Casa Blanca, now rapidly
+retreating from them. And, as they watched it, the mind of each
+occupied with thoughts of its inmates, they saw a white figure leave
+the house, and, moving slowly, halt at the edge of the cliff.
+
+Roddy, his eyes straining toward the coast-line, took off his hat and
+stood with it clasped in his hands. Peter saw the movement, and to
+hide a smile of sympathy, looked down at the white foam rushing below
+them.
+
+"Roddy," he asked, "what sort of a girl is Inez Rojas?"
+
+His eyes still seeking the figure on the rocks, and without turning
+his head, Roddy answered with startling directness:
+
+"What sort of a girl?" he growled. "The sort of a girl _I_ am going to
+marry!"
+
+More moved than he knew, and thinking himself secure in the excited
+babel about him and in the fact that the others spoke in Spanish,
+Roddy had raised his voice. He was not conscious he had done so until,
+as he spoke, he saw a man leaning on the rail with his back toward
+him, give an involuntary start. Furious with himself, Roddy bit his
+lip, and with impatience waited for the man to disclose himself. For a
+moment the stranger remained motionless, and then, obviously to find
+out who had spoken, slowly turned his head. Roddy found himself
+looking into the glowing, angry eyes of Pino Vega. Of the two men,
+Roddy was the first to recover. With eagerness he greeted the
+Venezuelan; with enthusiasm he expressed his pleasure at finding him
+among his fellow-passengers, he rejoiced that Colonel Vega no longer
+was an exile. The Venezuelan, who had approached trembling with
+resentment, sulkily murmured his thanks. With a hope that sounded more
+like a threat that they would soon meet again, he begged to be allowed
+to rejoin his friends.
+
+"Now you've done it!" whispered Peter cheerily. "And he won't let it
+rest there, either."
+
+"Don't you suppose I know that better than you do," returned Roddy
+miserably. He beat the rail with his fist. "It should not have
+happened in a thousand years," he wailed. "He must not know I have
+ever even seen her."
+
+"He _does_ know," objected Peter, coming briskly to the point. "What
+are you going to do?"
+
+"Lie to him," said Roddy. "He is an old friend of the family. She told
+me so herself. She thought even of appealing to him before she
+appealed to us. If he finds out I have met her alone at daybreak, I
+have either got to tell him why we met and what we are trying to do,
+or he'll believe, in his nasty, suspicious, Spanish-American way, that
+I am in love with her, and that she came there to let me tell her so."
+
+Roddy turned on Peter savagely.
+
+"_Why_ didn't you stop me?" he cried.
+
+"Stop _you_--talking too much?" gasped Peter. "Is that my position? If
+it is, I resign."
+
+The moon that night threw black shadows of shrouds, and ratlines
+across a deck that was washed by its radiance as white as a
+bread-board. In the social hall, the happy exiles were rejoicing
+noisily, but Roddy stood apart, far forward, looking over the ship's
+side and considering bitterly the mistake of the morning. His
+melancholy self-upbraidings were interrupted by a light, alert step,
+and Pino Vega, now at ease, gracious and on guard, stood bowing before
+him.
+
+"I do not intrude?" he asked.
+
+Roddy, at once equally on guard, bade him welcome.
+
+"I have sought you out," said the Venezuelan pleasantly, "because I
+would desire a little talk with you. I believe we have friends in
+common."
+
+"It is possible," said Roddy. "I have been in Porto Cabello about four
+months now."
+
+"It was not of Porto Cabello that I spoke," continued Vega, "but of
+Curaçao." He looked into Roddy's eyes suddenly and warily, as a
+swordsman holds the eyes of his opponent. "I did not understand," he
+said, "that you knew the Rojas family?"
+
+"I do not know them," answered Roddy.
+
+Vega turned his back to the moon, so that his face was in shadow. With
+an impatient gesture he flicked his cigarette into the sea. As though
+he found Roddy's answer unsatisfactory, he paused. He appeared to wish
+that Roddy should have a chance to reconsider it. As the American
+remained silent, Vega continued, but his tone now was openly hostile.
+
+"I have been Chief of Staff to General Rojas for years," he said. "I
+have the honor to know his family well. Señora Rojas treats me as she
+did her son, who was my dearest friend. I tell you this to explain why
+I speak of a matter which you may think does not concern me. This
+morning, entirely against my will, I overheard you speaking to your
+friend. He asked you of a certain lady. You answered boldly you
+intended to marry her." Vega's voice shook slightly, and he paused to
+control it. "Now, you inform me that you are not acquainted with the
+Rojas family. What am I to believe?"
+
+"I am glad you spoke of that," said Roddy heartily. "I saw that you
+overheard us, and I was afraid you'd misunderstand me----"
+
+The Venezuelan interrupted sharply.
+
+"I am well acquainted with your language!"
+
+"You speak it perfectly," Roddy returned, "but you did not understand
+it as I spoke it. The young lady is well known in Willemstad. Our
+Consul, as you are aware, is her friend. He admires her greatly. He
+told me that she is half American. She has been educated like an
+American girl, she rides, she plays tennis. What my friend said to me
+was, 'What sort of a girl is Señorita Rojas?' and I answered, 'She is
+the sort of girl I am going to marry,' meaning she is like the girls
+in my own country, one of our own people, like one of the women I some
+day hope to marry."
+
+Roddy smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Now do you understand?" he asked.
+
+The Venezuelan gave no answering smile. His eyes shone with suspicion.
+Roddy recognized that between his desire to believe and some fact that
+kept him from believing, the man was acutely suffering.
+
+"Tell me, in a word," demanded Vega sharply, "give me your word you do
+not know her."
+
+"I don't see," said Roddy, "that this is any of your damned business!"
+
+The face of Vega checked him. At his refusal to answer, Roddy saw the
+look of jealousy that came into the man's eyes and the torment it
+brought with it. He felt a sudden pity for him, a certain respect as
+for a fellow-sufferer. He himself had met Inez Rojas but twice, but,
+as he had told her, he knew now why he had come to Venezuela. This
+older man had known Inez for years, and to Roddy, arguing from his own
+state of mind regarding her, the fact was evidence enough that Vega
+must love her also. He began again, but now quietly, as he would argue
+with a child.
+
+"I see no reason for making any mystery of it," he said. "I did meet
+Miss Rojas. But I can't say I know her. I met her when she was out
+riding with her groom. I thought she was an American. She needed some
+help, which I was able to give her. That is all."
+
+Vega approached Roddy, leaning forward as though he were about to
+spring on him. His eyes were close to Roddy's face.
+
+"And what was the nature of this help?" he demanded.
+
+"You are impertinent," said Roddy.
+
+"Answer me!" cried the Venezuelan. "I have the right. No one has a
+better right."
+
+He flung up his right arm dramatically, and held it tense and
+trembling, as though it were poised to hurl a weapon.
+
+"You were watched!" he cried hysterically. "I _know_ that you met. And
+you tried to deceive me. Both of you. She will try, also----"
+
+The moonlight disappeared before the eyes of Colonel Vega, and when
+again he opened them he was looking dizzily up at the swaying masts
+and yards. Roddy, with his hand at Vega's throat, was forcing his
+shoulders back against the rail. His free hand, rigid and heavy as a
+hammer, swung above the Venezuelan's face.
+
+"Yesterday," panted Roddy, "I saved your life. If you insult that girl
+with your dirty, Latin mind, so help me--I will _take_ it!"
+
+He flung the man from him, but Vega, choking with pain and
+mortification, staggered forward.
+
+"It is _you_ who insult her," he shrieked. "It is I who protect her.
+Do you know _why_? Do you know what she is to me? She is my promised
+wife!"
+
+For a moment the two men stood, swaying with the gentle roll of the
+ship, staring into each other's eyes. Above the sound of the wind in
+the cordage and the whisper of the water against the ship's side,
+Roddy could hear himself breathing in slow, heavy respirations. Not
+for an instant did he doubt that the man told the truth. Vega had
+spoken with a conviction that was only too genuine, and his statement,
+while it could not justify, seemed to explain his recent, sudden
+hostility. With a sharp effort, Roddy recovered himself. He saw that
+no matter how deeply the announcement might affect him, Vega must
+believe that to the American it was a matter of no possible
+consequence.
+
+"You should have told me this at first," he said quietly. "I thought
+your questions were merely impertinent."
+
+Roddy hesitated. The interview had become poignantly distasteful to
+him. He wished to get away; to be alone. He was conscious that a
+possibility had passed out of his life, the thought of which had been
+very dear to him. He wanted to think, to plan against this new
+condition. In discussing Inez with this man, in this way, he felt he
+was degrading her and his regard for her. But he felt also that for
+her immediate protection he must find out what Vega knew and what he
+suspected. With the purpose of goading him into making some
+disclosure, Roddy continued insolently:
+
+"And I still think they are impertinent."
+
+Roddy's indignation rose and got the upper hand. He cast caution
+aside.
+
+"With us," he continued, "when a woman promises to marry a man--he
+does not spy on her."
+
+"We spied on _you_," protested Vega. "We did not think it would lead
+us to----"
+
+Roddy cut him off with a sharp cry of warning.
+
+"Be careful!" he challenged.
+
+"You met in the road----"
+
+"So I told you," returned Roddy.
+
+"You dismounted and talked with her."
+
+Roddy laughed, and with a gesture of impatience motioned Vega to be
+silent.
+
+"Is that all?" he demanded.
+
+The Venezuelan saw the figure he presented. Back of him were hundreds
+of years of Spanish traditions, in his veins was the blood of
+generations of ancestors by nature suspicious, doubting, jealous. From
+their viewpoint he was within his rights; they applauded, they gave
+him countenance; but by the frank contempt of the young man before him
+his self-respect was being rudely handled. Not even to himself could
+he justify his attitude.
+
+"In my country," he protested, "according to our customs, it was
+enough."
+
+The answer satisfied and relieved Roddy. It told him all he wished to
+know. It was now evident that Vega's agent had seen only the first
+meeting, that he was not aware that Inez followed after Roddy, or
+that the next morning by the seashore they had again met. The American
+brought the interview to an abrupt finish.
+
+"I refuse," said Roddy loftily, "to discuss this matter with you
+further. If the mother of Señorita Rojas wishes it, I shall be happy
+to answer any questions she may ask. I have done nothing that requires
+explanation or apology. I am responsible to no one. Good-night."
+
+"Wait!" commanded Vega. "You will find that here you cannot so easily
+avoid responsibilities. You have struck me. Well, we have other
+customs, which gentlemen----"
+
+"I am entirely at your service," said Roddy. He made as magnificent a
+bow as though he himself had descended from a line of Spanish
+grandees. Vega's eyes lit with pleasure. He was now playing a part in
+which he felt assured he appeared to advantage. He almost was grateful
+to Roddy for permitting him to reëstablish himself in his own esteem.
+
+"My friends shall wait upon you," he said.
+
+"Whenever you like," Roddy answered. He started up the deck and
+returned again to Vega. "Understand me," he whispered, "as long as I'm
+enjoying the hospitality of your country I accept the customs of your
+country. If you'd made such a proposition to me in New York I'd have
+laughed at you." Roddy came close to Vega and emphasized his words
+with a pointed finger. "And understand _this_! We have quarrelled over
+politics. You made an offensive remark about Alvarez; I defended him
+and struck you. You now demand satisfaction. That is what happened.
+And if you drag the name of any woman into this I won't give you
+satisfaction. I will give you a thrashing until you can't stand or
+see."
+
+Roddy found Peter in the smoking-room, and beckoning him on deck, told
+him what he had done.
+
+"You're a nice White Mouse!" cried Peter indignantly. "You're not
+supposed to go about killing people; you're supposed to save lives."
+
+"No one is ever killed in a duel," said Roddy; "I'll fire in the air,
+and he will probably miss me. I certainly hope so. But there will be
+one good result. It will show Alvarez that I'm not a friend of Vega's,
+nor helping him in his revolution."
+
+"You don't have to shoot a man to show you're not a friend of his,"
+protested Peter.
+
+They were interrupted by the hasty approach of Vega's chief advisers
+and nearest friends, General Pulido and Colonel Ramon.
+
+"Pino seems in a hurry," said Roddy. "I had no idea he was so
+bloodthirsty."
+
+"Colonel Vega," began Pulido abruptly, "has just informed us of the
+unfortunate incident. We have come to tell you that no duel can take
+place. It is monstrous. The life of Colonel Vega does not belong to
+him, it belongs to the Cause. We will not permit him to risk it
+needlessly. You, of all people, should see that. You must apologize."
+
+The demand, and the peremptory tone in which it was delivered, caused
+the fighting blood of Roddy's Irish grandfathers to bubble in his
+veins.
+
+"'Must' and 'apologize!'" protested Roddy, in icy tones; "Those are
+difficult words, gentlemen."
+
+"Consider," cried Pulido, "what great events hang upon the life of
+Colonel Vega."
+
+"My own life is extremely interesting to me," said Roddy. "But I have
+done nothing which needs apology."
+
+Colonel Ramon now interrupted anxiously.
+
+"You risked your life for Pino. Why now do you wish to take it? Think
+of his importance to Venezuela, of the happiness he will bring his
+country, and think what his loss would mean to your own father."
+
+"My father!" exclaimed Roddy. "What has my father to do with this?"
+
+The two Venezuelans looked at each other in bewilderment, and then
+back at Roddy sternly and suspiciously.
+
+"Are you jesting?" demanded General Pulido.
+
+"Never been more serious in my life," said Roddy.
+
+The two officers searched his face eagerly.
+
+"It is as Pino says," exclaimed Pulido, with sudden enlightenment. "He
+is telling the truth!"
+
+"Of course I'm telling the truth!" cried Roddy fiercely. "Are you
+looking for a duel, too?"
+
+"Tell him!" cried Pulido.
+
+"But Mr. Forrester's orders!" protested Colonel Ramon.
+
+"He is more dangerous," declared Pulido, "knowing nothing, than he
+would be if he understood."
+
+He cast a rapid glance about him. With a scowl, his eyes finally
+rested upon Peter.
+
+"I'll be within knockout distance if you want me," said that young man
+to Roddy, and moved to the rail opposite.
+
+When he had gone, Pulido bent eagerly forward.
+
+"Do you not know," he demanded, "what it is your father is doing in
+our country?"
+
+Roddy burst forth impatiently, "No!" he protested. "And I seem to be
+the only man in the country who doesn't."
+
+The two officers crowded close to him. In sepulchral tones, Pulido
+exclaimed dramatically. He spoke as though he were initiating Roddy
+into a secret order.
+
+"Then understand," he whispered, "that your father supports Pino Vega
+with five million bolivars; that Vega, whose life you are seeking, is
+the man your father means to make President of Venezuela. Now do you
+understand?"
+
+For a long time Roddy remained silent. Then he exclaimed in tones of
+extreme exasperation:
+
+"I understand," he said, "that, if my father had given me his
+telephone number, he would have saved me a lot of trouble. No wonder
+everybody suspects me."
+
+"And now," declared Pulido anxiously, "you are one of _us_!"
+
+"I am nothing of the sort," snapped Roddy. "If my father does not wish
+to tell me his plans I can't take advantage of what I learn of them
+from strangers. I shall go on," he continued with suspicious meekness,
+"with the work Father has sent me here to do. Who am I, that I should
+push myself into the politics of your great country?"
+
+"And the duel?" demanded Pulido.
+
+"I am sure," hastily interjected Colonel Ramon, "if Colonel Vega
+withdraws his offensive remark about President Alvarez, Mr. Forrester
+will withdraw his blow."
+
+Roddy failed to see how a blow that had left a raw spot on the chin of
+Pino Vega could by mutual agreement be made to vanish. But if to the
+minds of the Spanish-Americans such a miracle were possible, it seemed
+ungracious not to consent to it.
+
+"If I understand you," asked Roddy, "Colonel Vega withdraws his
+offensive remark?"
+
+The seconds of Pino Vega nodded vigorously.
+
+"Then," continued Roddy, "as there was no offensive remark, there
+could have been no blow, and there can be no duel."
+
+Roddy's summing up delighted the Venezuelans, and declaring that the
+honor of all was satisfied, they bowed themselves away.
+
+Next morning at daybreak the fortress of San Carlos rose upon the
+horizon, and by ten o'clock Roddy was again at work, threatening a
+gang of Jamaica coolies. But no longer he swore at them with his
+former wholeheartedness. His mind was occupied with other things. Now,
+between him and his work, came thoughts of the tunnel that for half a
+century had lain hidden from the sight of man; and of Inez, elusive,
+beautiful, distracting, now galloping recklessly toward him down a
+sunlit road, now a motionless statue standing on a white cliff, with
+the waves of the Caribbean bending and bowing before her.
+
+With the return of the exiles to Porto Cabello, that picturesque
+seaport became a place of gay reunions, of banquets, of welcome and
+rejoicing. The cafés again sprang to life. The Alameda was crowded
+with loitering figures and smart carriages, whilst the vigilance and
+activity of the government secret police increased. Roddy found
+himself an object of universal interest. As the son of his father, and
+as one who had prevented the assassination of Pino Vega, the members
+of the government party suspected him. While the fact that in defense
+of Alvarez he had quarrelled with Vega puzzled them greatly.
+
+"If I can't persuade them I am with the government," said Roddy, "I
+can at least keep them guessing."
+
+A week passed before Peter and Roddy were able, without arousing
+suspicion, and without being followed, to visit El Morro. They
+approached it apparently by accident, at the end of a long walk
+through the suburbs, and so timed their progress that, just as the sun
+set, they reached the base of the hill on which the fortress stood.
+They found that on one side the hill sloped gently toward the city,
+and on the other toward the sea. The face toward the city, except for
+some venturesome goats grazing on its scant herbage, was bare and
+deserted. The side that sloped to the sea was closely overgrown with
+hardy mesquite bushes and wild laurel, which would effectually conceal
+any one approaching from that direction. What had been the fortress
+was now only a broken wall, a few feet in height. It was covered with
+moss, and hidden by naked bushes with bristling thorns. Inside the
+circumference of the wall was a broken pavement of flat stones.
+Between these, trailing vines had forced their way, their roots
+creeping like snakes over the stones and through their interstices,
+while giant, ill-smelling weeds had turned the once open court-yard
+into a maze. These weeds were sufficiently high to conceal any one who
+did not walk upright, and while Peter kept watch outside the walled
+ring, Roddy, on his hands and knees, forced his way painfully from
+stone to stone. After a quarter of an hour of this slow progress he
+came upon what once had been the mouth of the tunnel. It was an
+opening in the pavement corresponding to a trap in a roof, or to a
+hatch in the deck of a ship. The combings were of stone, and were
+still intact, as were also the upper stones of a flight of steps that
+led down to the tunnel. But below the level of the upper steps,
+blocking further descent, were two great slabs of stone. They were
+buried deep in a bed of cement, and riveted together and to the walls
+of the tunnel by bands of iron. Roddy signalled for Peter to join him,
+and in dismay they gazed at the formidable mass of rusty iron, cement
+and stone.
+
+"We might as well try to break into the Rock of Gibraltar!" gasped
+Peter.
+
+"Don't think of the difficulties," begged Roddy. "Think that on the
+other side of that barrier an old man is slowly dying. I admit it's
+going to be a tough job. It will take months. But whatever a man has
+put together, a man can pull to pieces."
+
+"I also try to see the bright side of life," returned Peter coldly,
+"but I can't resist pointing out that the other end of your tunnel
+opens into a prison. Breaking into a bank I can understand, but
+breaking into a prison seems almost like looking for trouble."
+
+The dinner that followed under the stars in their own court-yard did
+much to dispel Peter's misgivings, and by midnight, so assured was he
+of their final success, that he declared it now was time that General
+Rojas should share in their confidence.
+
+"To a man placed as he is," he argued, "hope is everything; hope is
+health, life. He must know that his message has reached the outside.
+He must feel that some one is working toward him. He is the entombed
+miner, and, to keep heart in him, we must let him hear the picks of
+the rescuing party."
+
+"Fine!" cried Roddy, "I am for that, too. I'll get my friend Vicenti,
+the prison doctor, to show you over the fortress to-morrow. And we'll
+try to think of some way to give Rojas warning."
+
+They at once departed for the café of the _Dos Hermanos_, where the
+gay youth of Porto Cabello were wont to congregate, and where they
+found the doctor. During the evening he had been lucky at baccarat,
+and had been investing his winnings in sweet champagne. He was in a
+genial mood. He would be delighted to escort the friend of Señor Roddy
+over the fortress, or to any other of the historical places of
+interest for which Porto Cabello was celebrated.
+
+"Where Alvarez punishes traitors," exclaimed Roddy in a loud tone, "is
+what we most desire to see. And," he added, scowling darkly through
+the smoke-laden café, "if we could see others who are still at liberty
+in the same place we would be better pleased."
+
+The remark, although directed at no one in particular, caused a
+sensation, and led several of those who had been for two years in
+exile to hurriedly finish their chocolate ices and seek their homes.
+
+After making an appointment for the morrow with Doctor Vicenti, and
+when they were safe in their own _patio_, Peter protested mildly.
+
+"Your devotion to Alvarez," he said, "is too sudden. You overdo it.
+Besides, it's making an expert liar of you. Don't get the habit."
+
+"As the son of the man who is trying to destroy Alvarez," declared
+Roddy, "my position is extremely delicate. And next week it will be
+more so. McKildrick got a cable to-day saying that Sam Caldwell is
+arriving here by the next boat. His starting for Porto Cabello the
+very moment Vega arrives here means trouble for Alvarez, and that the
+trouble is coming soon. For, wherever you find Sam Caldwell, there you
+will find plotting, bribery, and all uncleanliness. And if I'm to help
+Rojas out of prison I must have nothing to do with Sam. Alvarez
+recognizes no neutrals. The man who is not with him is against him. So
+I must be the friend of Alvarez and of his creatures. For public
+occasions, my hand must be against the F. C. C., against Vega, and
+especially against Sam Caldwell, because everybody knows he is the
+personal agent of my father. Vega's friends know that my father treats
+me as though he could not trust me. The Alvarez crowd must know that,
+too. Even as it is, they think my being down here is a sort of
+punishment. None of them has ever worked in his life, and the idea of
+a rich man's son sweating at a donkey-engine with a gang of Conch
+niggers, means to them only that my father and I have quarrelled. It
+will be my object hereafter to persuade them that that is so. If I
+have to act a bit, or lie a bit, what are a few lies against the
+freedom of such a man as Rojas? So, to-morrow, if you should be so
+lucky as to see Rojas, don't be a bit surprised if I should insult
+that unhappy gentleman grossly. If I do, within an hour the fact will
+be all over the cafés and the plazas, and with Alvarez it would be
+counted to me for righteousness. Much that I may have to do of the
+same sort will make the gentlemen of Vega's party consider me an
+ungrateful son, and very much of a blackguard. They may, in their
+turn, insult me, and want to fight more duels. But it's all in the
+game. To save that old man is my only object for living, my only
+interest. I don't care how many revolutions I tread on. I would
+sacrifice everybody and everything--for him."
+
+After his long speech, Roddy drew a deep breath and glared at Peter as
+though inviting contradiction. But, instead of contradicting him,
+Peter smiled skeptically and moved to his bedroom, which opened upon
+the court-yard. At the door he turned.
+
+"'And the woman,'" he quoted, "'was very fair.'"
+
+The next morning the two Americans met Doctor Vicenti in the
+guard-room of the fortress, and under his escort began a leisurely
+inspection of the prison. They themselves saw to it that it was
+leisurely, and by every device prolonged it. That their interest in
+the one prisoner they had come to see might not be suspected, they
+pretended a great curiosity in the doctor's patients and in all the
+other prisoners. After each visit to a cell they would invite Vicenti
+to give them the history of its inmate. They assured him these little
+biographies, as he related them, were of surpassing brilliancy and
+pathos. In consequence, Vicenti was so greatly flattered that, before
+they reached the cell of General Rojas, each succeeding narrative had
+steadily increased in length, and the young doctor had become
+communicative and loquacious.
+
+When at last they had descended to the lowest tier of cells, Vicenti
+paused and pointed toward an iron-barred double door.
+
+"In there," he whispered to Peter, "is our most distinguished
+political prisoner, General Rojas. There is no one Alvarez would so
+willingly see dead. And, if he keeps him here a month longer, Alvarez
+will have his wish."
+
+"But they say the man is a traitor," protested Roddy.
+
+The doctor shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"In my country," he answered, "every man who is not for the government
+is a traitor."
+
+He directed the turnkey who accompanied them to unlock the gate of the
+cell, and with a gesture invited the Americans to enter. As they did
+so, each dropped his right hand into his outside coat pocket. When it
+came forth again, concealed under each little finger was a tiny roll
+of rice-paper torn from a book of cigarette-wrappers. On each, in
+pencil, was written, "54-4" and the word "Hope." The night previous
+Peter and Roddy had prepared the papers, on the chance that while one
+of them occupied the attention of the guide, the other could slip his
+message to Rojas. Roddy had insisted upon the use of rice-paper,
+because it could be swallowed without indigestion, and instead of the
+word "Hope," had preferred a freehand drawing of an anchor, arguing
+that the anchor was the emblem of hope, and was more picturesque than
+the written word. To this Peter had objected that while they knew an
+anchor signified hope, Rojas might not, and as they were risking their
+lives to get a message to him, it was important he should understand
+it. They compromised on the numerals, which would show Rojas his own
+cipher messages had been received and understood, and the word "Hope"
+was added to put heart into him and strengthen his desire to cling to
+life.
+
+But on entering the cell they saw at once that there would be no
+chance to deliver their message. General Rojas was seated at a table
+some ten feet from them, and the turnkey, who had submitted with ill
+grace to the Americans entering any of the cells, and who seemed
+especially to resent their presence in this one, at once placed
+himself aggressively on guard.
+
+As he did so he commanded sharply: "The visitors will not speak to the
+prisoner."
+
+"That is understood," Vicenti answered.
+
+The Americans saw a room some forty by twenty feet in size, with
+walls, arched ceiling and floor entirely of stone. There were no
+windows, but it was well lighted by candles, and the lanterns carried
+by Vicenti and the turnkey threw a full light into each corner. They
+saw a cot, a table, a chair, a number of shelves loaded to the bending
+point with books and, at one end of the cell, an immense archway. This
+archway had been blocked with stone, roughly hewn and held together by
+cement. At the first glance, it was obvious that this was the other
+entrance to the tunnel. As he beheld its solid front, the heart of
+each of the young men sank in dismay.
+
+General Rojas had risen, and stood shading his eyes from the
+unaccustomed light of the lanterns.
+
+"I have taken the liberty of intruding upon you," Vicenti was saying,
+"because these two gentlemen are interested in the history of the
+fortress."
+
+General Rojas bowed gravely, and with a deprecatory gesture, glanced
+at the turnkey, as though to explain why he did not address them.
+
+"This part of the fortress," Vicenti began hurriedly, "is very old. It
+was built in the sixteenth century, and was, I think, originally the
+messroom. It is now used only for the most important political
+prisoners."
+
+For an instant there was an awkward silence, and then Roddy broke it
+with a laugh, short and contemptuous.
+
+"You mean traitors," he sneered.
+
+General Rojas straightened as suddenly as though Roddy had struck at
+him. The young doctor was no less moved. He turned on the American
+with an exclamation of indignation.
+
+"You forget yourself, sir!" he said.
+
+Though Peter had been warned that Roddy might try by insulting Rojas
+to make capital for himself, his insolence to a helpless old man was
+unpardonable. He felt his cheeks burn with mortification. The turnkey
+alone showed his pleasure, and grinned appreciatively. Roddy himself
+was entirely unashamed.
+
+"I have no sympathy for such men!" he continued defiantly. "A murderer
+takes only human life; a traitor would take the life of his country.
+In the States," he cried hotly, "we make short work with traitors. We
+hang them!"
+
+He wheeled furiously on Peter, as though Peter had contradicted him.
+
+"I say we do," he exclaimed. "It's in the Constitution. It's the law.
+You've read it yourself. It's page fifty-four, paragraph four, of the
+Constitution of the United States. 'Punishment for Traitors.' Page
+fifty-four, paragraph four."
+
+Apparently with sudden remorse at his impetuosity, he turned to the
+doctor.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he exclaimed. "I _did_ forget myself. But to me,
+men like that are intolerable."
+
+Vicenti was not to be mollified.
+
+"Then you had better avoid their presence," he said angrily.
+
+With an impatient gesture he motioned the two Americans into the
+corridor, and in distress approached the prisoner.
+
+"I apologize, sir," he said, "for having subjected you to such an
+incident."
+
+But General Rojas made no answer. To his surprise, Vicenti found that
+the old man was suffering from the scene even more keenly than he had
+feared. Like one suddenly bereft of strength, General Rojas had sunk
+into his chair. His bloodless, delicate hands trembled upon the table.
+Great tears crept down his white, wrinkled face. In the two years
+through which the young doctor had watched his patient he had never
+before seen in his eyes the strange, mad light that now shone there.
+To the medical man, it meant only that the end was nearer than he had
+supposed. Shocked and grieved, the doctor made a movement to withdraw.
+
+"I am deeply sorry," he murmured.
+
+General Rojas raised his head. With an effort he drew over his face
+its customary, deathlike mask.
+
+"It is nothing!" he exclaimed. "What is one more insult, what is one
+more degradation, when I know that my end is near!" He raised his
+voice; it was strangely vigorous, youthful, jubilant; it carried
+through the open bars to the far end of the corridor. "What does
+anything matter," he cried, "when I know--that the end is near!" His
+head sunk upon the table. To hide his tears, the General buried his
+face in his hands.
+
+Outside, in the darkness, Peter clutched Roddy by the hand, and for an
+instant crushed it in his own.
+
+"Do you hear?" he whispered. "He is answering you."
+
+"Yes," stammered Roddy. The excitement or the dampness of the prison
+had set him shivering, and with the back of his hand he wiped the cold
+moisture from his forehead. He laughed mirthlessly. "Yes," he
+answered, "he understood me. And now, we've _got_ to make good!"
+
+That afternoon when the carriages of the aristocracy of Porto Cabello
+were solemnly circling the Plaza, Roddy came upon McKildrick, seated
+on one of the stone benches, observing the parade of local wealth and
+fashion with eyes that missed nothing and told nothing. McKildrick was
+a fine type of the self-taught American. He possessed a thorough
+knowledge of his profession, executive skill, the gift of handling
+men, and the added glory of having "worked his way up." He was tall,
+lean, thin-lipped, between thirty and forty years of age. During
+business hours he spoke only to give an order or to put a question.
+Out of working hours, in his manner to his assistants and workmen, he
+was genially democratic. He had, apparently, a dread of being alone,
+and was seldom seen without one of the younger engineers at his elbow.
+With them he was considered a cynic, the reason given for his cynicism
+being that "the Chief" had tried to "take a fall out of matrimony,"
+and had come out of it a woman-hater. Officially he was Roddy's
+superior, but it never was possible for any one in the pay of the F.
+C. C. to forget that Roddy was the son of his father. Even McKildrick,
+in certain ways, acknowledged it. One way was, in their leisure
+moments, not to seek out Roddy, but to wait for the younger man
+to make advances. On this occasion, after for a brief moment
+contemplating McKildrick severely, Roddy, with an impatient
+exclamation, as though dismissing doubts and misgivings, sat down
+beside him.
+
+"McKildrick," he began impetuously, "I want to ask you an impertinent
+question. It concerns your moral character."
+
+McKildrick grinned appreciatively.
+
+"We court investigation," he said.
+
+"Under what pressure to the square inch," demanded Roddy, "would a
+secret confided to you be liable to burst its boiler?"
+
+"I've never," returned the engineer, "had an accident of that kind."
+
+"Good!" exclaimed Roddy. "Then suppose I said to you, 'McKildrick, I
+know where there's buried treasure, but I don't know how to get it
+out.' You _would_ know. Now, if I led you to the buried treasure,
+would you, as an expert engineer, tell me how to dig it out, and then
+could you forget you'd given that advice and that you'd ever heard of
+the treasure?"
+
+For a moment McKildrick considered this hypothetical case. Then he
+asked: "Which bank are you thinking of opening?"
+
+Roddy rose abruptly.
+
+"I'll show you," he exclaimed.
+
+That Roddy was acting, in spite of secret misgivings, was so evident,
+that McKildrick good-naturedly demurred.
+
+"Better not tell me anything," he protested, "that you'll be sorry for
+when you're sober."
+
+Roddy shook his head, and, not until they had left the suburbs and the
+last fisherman's hut behind them and were on the open coast, did he
+again refer to the subject of their walk. Then he exclaimed suddenly;
+"And I forgot to mention that if Father finds out you advised me you
+will probably lose your job."
+
+McKildrick halted in his tracks.
+
+"It's a pity," he agreed, "that you forgot to mention that. As a rule,
+when I give expert advice I get a fat check for it."
+
+"And what's more," continued Roddy, "if Alvarez finds it out you'll go
+to jail."
+
+"Your piquant narrative interests me strangely," said McKildrick.
+"What else happens to me?"
+
+"But, of course," explained Roddy reassuringly, "you'll tell them you
+didn't know what you were doing."
+
+"How about _your_ telling me what we are doing?" suggested the
+engineer.
+
+"From this point," was Roddy's only reply, "you crawl on your hands
+and knees, or some one may see you."
+
+The engineer bent his tall figure and, following in Roddy's trail,
+disappeared into the laurel bushes.
+
+"Why shouldn't they see me?" he called.
+
+"One looks so silly on his hands and knees," Roddy suggested.
+
+For ten minutes, except for the rustle of the bushes, they pushed
+their way in silence, and then Roddy scrambled over the fallen wall of
+the fort, and pointed down at the entrance to the tunnel.
+
+"The problem is," he said, "to remove these slabs from that
+staircase, and leave it in such shape that no one who is foolish
+enough to climb up here could see that they had been disturbed."
+
+"Do you really think," demanded McKildrick, smiling sceptically, "that
+there _is_ buried treasure under these stones?"
+
+"Yes," answered Roddy anxiously, "a _kind_ of buried treasure."
+
+Cautiously McKildrick raised his head, and, as though to establish his
+bearings, surveyed the landscape. To the north he saw the city; to the
+east, a quarter of a mile away, the fortress, separated from the
+mainland by a stretch of water; and to the south, the wild mesquite
+bushes and laurel through which they had just come, stretching to the
+coast.
+
+"Is this a serious proposition?" he asked.
+
+"It's a matter of life and death," Roddy answered.
+
+McKildrick seated himself on the flight of stone steps, and for some
+time, in silence, studied them critically. He drove the heel of his
+boot against the cement, and, with his eyes, tested the resistance of
+the rusty bars of iron.
+
+"With a couple of men and crowbars, and a pinch of dynamite that
+wouldn't make a noise," he said at last, "I could open that in an
+hour."
+
+"Could you put it back again?" asked Roddy.
+
+There was a long pause.
+
+"I guess," said McKildrick, "you'll have to let me in on the ground
+floor."
+
+The sun had set and the air had turned cold and damp. Roddy seated
+himself beside his chief and pointed at the great slabs at their feet.
+His voice dropped to a whisper.
+
+"It's like this," he began.
+
+When, two hours later, they separated at the outskirts of the city,
+McKildrick had been initiated into the Brotherhood of the White Mice.
+
+They had separated, agreeing that in the future the less they were
+seen together the better. But, in wishing to be alone, Roddy had
+another and more sentimental reason.
+
+Each evening since his return from Curaçao he had made a pilgrimage to
+the deserted home of the Rojas family, and, as the garden of Miramar
+ran down to meet the shore of the harbor, as did the garden of his own
+house, he was able to make the nocturnal visits by rowboat, and
+without being observed. Sometimes he was satisfied simply to lie on
+his oars opposite the empty mansion, and think of the young girl who,
+so soon, was to waken it to life; and again he tied his boat to a
+public wharf a hundred yards down the shore, and with the aid of the
+hanging vines pulled himself to the top of the seawall, and dropped
+into the garden. To a young man very much interested in a young woman,
+of whom he knew so little that it was possible to endow her with every
+grace of mind and character, and whose personal charm was never to be
+forgotten, these melancholy visits afforded much satisfaction. Even to
+pass the house was a pleasing exercise; and, separating from
+McKildrick, he turned his steps to the Alameda, the broad avenue
+shaded by a double line of trees that followed the curve of the
+harbor, and upon which the gates of Miramar opened. As he approached
+the house he saw, with surprise and pleasure, that in the future his
+midnight prowlings were at an end. Miramar was occupied. Every window
+blazed with light. In this light servants were moving hurriedly, and
+in front of the gates the Alameda was blocked with carts loaded with
+trunks and boxes.
+
+Excited by the sight, Roddy hid himself in the shadows of the trees,
+and, unobserved, stood impatiently waiting for a chance to learn if
+the exiles had indeed returned to their own. He had not long to wait.
+In a little figure bustling among the carts, and giving many orders,
+he recognized his friend and ally, Pedro. Roddy instantly stepped into
+the glare of the electric globes until he was sure Pedro had seen
+him, and then again retreated into the shadow. In a moment the old
+servant was at his side.
+
+"Is she here?" demanded Roddy.
+
+Appreciating that in the world there could be only one "she," the
+little man nodded violently.
+
+"Tell her," whispered Roddy, "I have seen her father, that he knows
+what we are trying to do. I must talk with the _señorita_ at once. Ask
+her if she will come to the steps leading from the gardens to the
+wharf at any hour this evening. From my own house I can row there
+without being seen."
+
+Again Pedro nodded happily.
+
+"I will ask the _señorita_ to be there at nine o'clock," he answered,
+"or, I will come myself."
+
+The alternative did not strongly appeal to Roddy, but the mere fact
+that Inez was now in the same city with him, that even at that moment
+she was not a hundred yards from him, was in itself a reward.
+
+He continued on down the Alameda, his head in the air, his feet
+treading on springs.
+
+"Three hours!" his mind protested. "How can I wait three hours?"
+
+In some fashion the hours passed, and at nine, just as over all the
+city the bugles were recalling the soldiers to the barracks, Roddy was
+waiting on the narrow stretch of beach that ran between the harbor and
+the gardens of Miramar.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+At the last moment Roddy had decided against taking the water route,
+and, leaving his rowboat at his own wharf, had, on foot, skirted the
+edge of the harbor. It was high tide, and the narrow strip of shore
+front on which he now stood, and which ran between the garden and the
+Rojas' private wharf, was only a few feet in width. Overhead the moon
+was shining brilliantly, but a procession of black clouds caused the
+stone steps and the tiny summer-house at the end of the wharf to
+appear and disappear like slides in a magic lantern.
+
+In one of the moments of light the figures of a man and a woman loomed
+suddenly in the gateway of the garden. Pedro came anxiously forward,
+and Roddy leaped past him up the steps. He recognized Inez with
+difficulty. In the fashion of the peasant women she had drawn around
+her head and face a fringed, silk shawl, which left only her eyes
+visible, and which hung from her shoulders in lines that hid her
+figure. Roddy eagerly stretched out his hand, but the girl raised her
+own in warning and, motioning him to follow, passed quickly from the
+steps to the wharf. At its farther end was a shelter of thatched palm
+leaves. The sides were open, and half of the wharf was filled with
+moonlight, but over the other half the roof cast a black shadow, and
+into this Inez passed quickly. Roddy as quickly followed. His heart
+was leaping in a delightful tumult. His love of adventure, of the
+picturesque, was deeply gratified. As he saw it, the scene was set for
+romance; he was once more in the presence of the girl who, though he
+had but twice met her, and, in spite of the fact that she had promised
+herself to another man, attracted him more strongly than had any woman
+he had ever known. And the tiny wharf, the lapping of the waves
+against the stone sides, the moonlight, the purpose of their meeting,
+all seemed combined for sentiment, for a display of the more tender
+emotions.
+
+But he was quickly disillusionized. The voice that issued from the
+shadows was brisk and incisive.
+
+"You know," Inez began abruptly, in sharp disapprobation, "this won't
+do at all!"
+
+Had she pushed him into the cold waters of the harbor and left him to
+the colder charity of the harbor sharks, Roddy could not have been
+more completely surprised. He stared at the cloaked figure blankly.
+
+"I _beg_ your pardon!" he stammered.
+
+"You must not expect me to meet you like this," protested the girl;
+"it is impossible. You risk everything."
+
+Bewildered by the nature and the unexpectedness of the attack, Roddy
+murmured incoherently:
+
+"I'm _so_ sorry," he stammered. "I thought you would wish to know."
+
+"What else is there I could so much wish!" protested the girl with
+spirit. "But not in this way."
+
+Roddy hung his head humbly.
+
+"I see," he murmured. "I forgot etiquette. I should have considered
+you."
+
+"I was not thinking of myself!" exclaimed the girl. "A week ago I
+_was_ frightened. Tradition, training, was strong with me, and I _did_
+think too much of how my meeting you would appear to others. But now I
+see it as you see it. I'll risk their displeasure, gossip, scandal,
+all of that, if I can only help my father. But _this_ will not help
+him. This will lead to discovery. You must not come near me, nor visit
+this house. My mother"--the girl hesitated--"it is hard to say," she
+went on quickly, "but my mother more than dislikes you--she regards
+you as our evil genius. She thinks you are doing all in your power to
+spoil the plans of your own father and of Vega. She--we have all heard
+of your striking Vega in defense of Alvarez. Vega is the one man she
+thinks can save my father. She believes you are his enemy. Therefore,
+you are her enemy. And she has been told, also, of the words you used
+to my father when your friend was permitted to visit him." With an
+effort the girl tried to eliminate from her voice the note of obvious
+impatience. "Of course," she added quickly, "the story came to us
+distorted. I could not see your object, but I was sure you had a
+motive. I was sure it was well meant!"
+
+"Well meant!" exclaimed Roddy, but interrupted himself quickly. "All
+right," he said, "go on."
+
+The girl recognized the restraint in his tone.
+
+"You think I am unjust, ungrateful," she protested earnestly, "but,
+believe me, I am not. I want only to impress upon you to be careful
+and to show you where you stand."
+
+"With whom?" asked Roddy.
+
+"With my mother and Vega and with their party."
+
+"I am more interested," said Roddy, "in knowing how I stand with you."
+
+The girl answered quietly: "Oh, we are friends. And you know that I am
+deeply grateful to you because _I_ know what you are trying to do, the
+others do not."
+
+"Suppose we tell them?" said Roddy.
+
+The girl gave a quick exclamation of protest, and Roddy could hear
+rather than see her move from him. They were now quite alone. Lest any
+one coming from the house should discover Roddy, Pedro had been on
+guard at the gate. But he had seen, both above and below the wharf,
+mysterious, moonlit figures loitering at the edge of the water, and in
+order to investigate them he left his post. There was a moment of
+silence. On three sides the moonlight turned the tiny waves into
+thousands of silver mirrors, and from farther up the curving
+coast-line the fires in the wickerwork huts of the fishermen burned
+red. At their feet the water was thick with the phosphorescence,
+shining more brilliantly than the moonlight. And, as schools of
+minnows fled, darting and doubling on their course before some larger
+fish that leaped and splashed in pursuit, the black depths of the
+harbor were lit with vivid streaks, and the drops of water cast into
+the air flashed like sparks from an anvil.
+
+A harbor shark, nosing up stealthily to the wharf, thought himself
+invisible, but the phosphorescence showed his great length and cruel
+head as clearly as though he wore a suit of flame.
+
+"Suppose you tell them?" repeated Roddy.
+
+The girl spoke with evident reluctance.
+
+"I cannot," she said, "and the reason why I cannot is quite foolish,
+absurd. But their minds are full of it. In some way Vega learned of
+our meeting. He believes it was by accident, but, nevertheless, he
+also believes--why I can't imagine--that you are interested in me."
+
+As though fearful Roddy would speak, she continued quickly. She spoke
+in impersonal, matter-of-fact tones that suggested that in the subject
+at hand she herself was in no way involved.
+
+"My mother was already prejudiced against you because she thought
+that, for the sake of adventure, you were risking the life of my
+father. And this last suggestion of Vega's has added to her
+prejudice."
+
+As though waiting for Roddy to make some comment or ask some question,
+the girl hesitated.
+
+"I see," said Roddy.
+
+"No, I am afraid you cannot see," said Inez, "unless you know the
+facts. I am sorry to weary you with family secrets, but, if you know
+them, my mother's prejudice is more easy to understand. Colonel Vega
+wishes to marry me. My mother also desires it. That is why they are
+hostile to you."
+
+The young girl gave an exclamation of impatience.
+
+"It is ridiculous," she protested, "that such an absurd complication
+should be brought into a matter of life and death. But there it is.
+And for that reason it would be folly to tell them of your purpose.
+They would accept nothing from your hands. You must continue to work
+alone, and you must not come near me nor try to speak to me. If it is
+absolutely necessary to communicate with me, write what you have to
+tell me; or, better still, give a verbal message to Pedro." She made
+an abrupt movement. "I must go!" she exclaimed. "I told them I would
+walk in the garden, and they may follow."
+
+At the thought she gave a little gasp of alarm.
+
+"Surely it is not as serious as that?" Roddy objected.
+
+"Quite," returned the girl. "To them, what I am doing now is
+unpardonable. But I was afraid to write you. A letter may sound so
+harsh, it can be so easily misread. I did not wish to offend you, so I
+risked seeing you this way--for the last time."
+
+"For the last time," repeated Roddy.
+
+Inez made a movement to go.
+
+"Wait!" he commanded. "Do you come often to this place?"
+
+"Yes," said the girl, and then, answering the possible thought back of
+the question, she added: "My mother and sister come here with me every
+evening--for the sake of the harbor breeze--at least we used to do so.
+Why?" she demanded.
+
+In her voice was a note of warning.
+
+"I was thinking," said Roddy, "I could row past here in my boat, far
+out, where no one could see me. But I could see you."
+
+Inez gave a quick sigh of exasperation.
+
+"You will _not_ understand!" she exclaimed. "Why," she demanded,
+"after all I have told you, after my taking this risk to make it plain
+to you that you must _not_ see me, do you still persist?"
+
+"As you wish," answered Roddy quietly, but his tone showed that his
+purpose to see her was unchanged. Inez heard him laugh happily. He
+moved suddenly toward her. "Why do I persist?" he asked. His voice,
+sunken to a whisper, was eager, mocking. In it she discerned a new
+note. It vibrated with feeling. "Why do I persist?" he whispered.
+"Because you are the most wonderful person I have ever met. Because if
+I did not persist I'd despise myself. Since I last saw you I have
+thought of nothing but _you_, I have been miserable for the sight of
+_you_. You can forbid me seeing you, but you can't take away from me
+what you have given me--the things you never knew you gave me."
+
+The girl interrupted him sharply.
+
+"Mr. Forrester!" she cried.
+
+Roddy went on, as though she had not spoken.
+
+"I had to tell you," he exclaimed. "Until I told you I couldn't sleep.
+It has been in my head, in my heart, every moment since I saw you. You
+_had_ to know. And this night!" he exclaimed. As though calling upon
+them to justify him he flung out his arms toward the magic moonlight,
+the flashing waves, the great fronds of the palms rising above the
+wall of the garden. "You have given me," he cried, "the most beautiful
+thing that has come into my life, and on a night like this I _had_ to
+speak. I had to thank you. On such a night as this," Roddy cried
+breathlessly, "Jessica stole from Shylock's house to meet her lover.
+On such a night as this Leander swam the Hellespont. And on this night
+I had to tell you that to me you are the most wonderful and beautiful
+woman in the world."
+
+How Inez Rojas, bewildered, indignant, silent only through
+astonishment, would have met this attack, Roddy never knew, for Pedro,
+leaping suddenly from the shore, gave her no time to answer.
+Trembling with excitement, the Venezuelan spoke rapidly.
+
+"You must go!" he commanded. He seized Roddy by the arm and tried to
+drag him toward the garden. "The police! They surround the house."
+
+With his free hand he pointed at two figures, each carrying a lantern,
+who approached rapidly along the shore from either direction.
+
+"They are spying upon all who enter. If they find _you_!" In an agony
+of alarm the old man tossed up his hands.
+
+Under his breath Roddy cursed himself impotently for a fool. He saw
+that again he would compromise the girl he had just told he held in
+high regard, that he would put in jeopardy the cause for which he had
+boasted to her he would give his life. Furious, and considering only
+in what way he could protect Inez, he stood for a moment at a loss.
+From either side the swinging lanterns drew nearer. In his rear his
+retreat was cut off by the harbor. Only the dark shadows of Miramar
+offered a refuge.
+
+"Quick!" commanded Inez. "You must hide in the garden." Her voice was
+cold with displeasure. "When they have gone Pedro will tell you and
+you will leave. And," she added, "you will see that you do not
+return."
+
+The words sobered Roddy. They left him smarting, and they left him
+quite cool. After her speech he could not accept the hospitality of
+the garden. And his hiding there might even further compromise her. He
+saw only one way out; to rush the nearest policeman and in the
+uncertain light, hope, unrecognized, to escape. But even that chance
+left the police free to explain, in their own way, why the Señorita
+Rojas was in the company of a man who fled before them.
+
+"Do you hear?" whispered Inez. "Hide yourself!"
+
+With a cry of dismay Pedro forced Roddy into the shadow.
+
+"It is too late!" he exclaimed.
+
+Standing in the gateway of the garden, clearly illuminated by the
+moonlight, stood Señora Rojas, with her arm in that of Pino Vega.
+
+In spite of himself, Roddy emitted an excited chuckle. In the presence
+of such odds his self-reproaches fell from him. He felt only a
+pleasing thrill of danger. This was no time for regrets or
+upbraidings. The situation demanded of him only quick action and that
+he should keep his head. As Roddy now saw it, he was again the
+base-runner, beset in front and rear. He missed only the shouts and
+cheers of thousands of partisans. The players of the other side were
+closing in and shortening the distance in which he could turn and run.
+They had him in a trap, and, in another instant, the ball would touch
+him. It was quite time, Roddy decided, to "slide!" Still hidden by the
+shadow of the thatched roof, he dropped at the feet of Inez, and,
+before she could understand his purpose, had turned quickly on his
+face and lowered himself into the harbor. There was a faint splash and
+a shower of phosphorescence. Roddy's fingers still clung to the edge
+of the wharf, and Inez, sinking to her knees, brought her face close
+to his.
+
+"Come back!" she commanded. "Come back! You will drown!" She gave a
+sudden gasp of horror. "The sharks!" she whispered. "You could not
+live a moment." With both hands she dragged at his sleeve.
+
+Roddy cast a quick glance at the moon. A friendly cloud was hastening
+to his aid. He saw that if, for a moment longer, he could remain
+concealed, he would under cover of the brief eclipse, be able to swim
+to safety. He drew free of Inez, and, treading water, fearful even to
+breathe, watched the lanterns of the police halt at the wharf.
+
+The voice of Señora Rojas rose in anxious inquiry.
+
+"Is that you, Inez?" she called.
+
+There was no reply. Concerned as to what struggle of conscience might
+not be going on in the mind of the girl, Roddy threw his arm across
+the edge of the wharf and drew his shoulders clear of the water. In
+the shadow Inez was still kneeling, her face was still close to his.
+
+"Answer her!" commanded Roddy. "I'm all right." He laughed softly,
+mockingly. He raised his head nearer. "'On such a night,'" he
+whispered, "'Leander swam the Hellespont.' Why? Because he loved her!"
+
+With an exclamation, partly of exasperation, partly of relief at
+finding the man did not consider himself in danger, Inez rose to her
+feet and stepped into the moonlight.
+
+"Yes, I am here," she called. "I am with Pedro."
+
+At the same moment the black cloud swept across the moon, and, with
+the stealth and silence of a water rat, Roddy slipped from the wharf
+and struck out toward the open harbor.
+
+At the gate the two policemen raised their lanterns and swung them in
+the face of Señora Rojas.
+
+Vega turned upon them fiercely.
+
+"What are you doing here?" he demanded. "Do you wish to know who I am?
+Well, I am Colonel Vega. Report that to your chief. Go!"
+
+With a gesture he waved the men to one side, and, saluting sulkily,
+they moved away.
+
+When they had gone Señora Rojas sighed with relief, but the hand that
+rested upon the arm of Vega trembled.
+
+"My dear lady!" he protested. "When I am here no harm can come."
+
+Vega hoped that Inez had heard him. He trusted, also, that she had
+observed the manner in which he had addressed the police, and how,
+awed by his authority, they had slunk away. But Inez had not observed
+him.
+
+With her hands pressed against her breast, her eyes filled with fear,
+she was watching in fascinated horror a thin ripple of phosphorescence
+that moved leisurely and steadily out to sea.
+
+[Illustration: On such a night, Leander swam the Hellespont.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the _patio_ of Roddy's house Peter was reclining in a
+steamer-chair. At his elbow was a long drink, and between his fingers
+a long cigar. Opposite him, in another chair, was stretched young
+Vicenti. At midnight, on his way home from visiting a patient, the
+doctor, seeing a light in the court-yard of Roddy's house, had
+clamored for admittance. To Peter the visit was most ill-timed. Roddy
+had now been absent for four hours, and the imagination of his friend
+was greatly disturbed. He knew for what purpose Roddy had set forth,
+and he pictured him pierced with a bullet as he climbed the garden
+wall, or a prisoner behind the bars of the _cartel_. He was in no mood
+to entertain visitors, but the servants were in bed, and when Vicenti
+knocked, Peter himself had opened the door. On any other night the
+doctor would have been most welcome. He was an observing young man,
+and his residence in the States enabled him to take the point of view
+of Peter and Roddy, and his comments upon their country and his own
+were amusing. For his attack upon General Rojas he had been greatly
+offended with Roddy, but the American had written him an apology, and
+by this late and informal visit Vicenti intended to show that they
+were again friends.
+
+But, for Peter, it was a severe test of self-control. Each moment his
+fears for Roddy's safety increased, and of his uneasiness, in the
+presence of the visitor, he dared give no sign. It was with a feeling
+of genuine delight that he heard from the garden a mysterious whistle.
+
+"Who's there?" he challenged.
+
+"Is anybody with you?" The voice was strangely feeble, but it was the
+voice of Roddy.
+
+"Our friend Vicenti," Peter cried, warningly.
+
+At the same moment, Roddy, clad simply in his stockings, and dripping
+with water, stood swaying in the doorway.
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" protested Peter.
+
+Roddy grinned foolishly, and unclasping his hands from the sides of
+the door, made an unsteady start toward the table on which stood the
+bottles and glasses.
+
+"I want a drink," he murmured.
+
+"You want quinine!" cried Vicenti indignantly. "How dared you go
+swimming at night! It was madness! If the fever----"
+
+He flew into the hall where he had left his medicine-case, and Peter
+ran for a bathrobe. As they returned with them there was a crash of
+broken glass, and when they reached the _patio_ they found Roddy
+stretched at length upon the stones.
+
+At the same moment a little, old man sprang from the garden and knelt
+beside him. It was Pedro.
+
+"He is dead!" he cried, "he is dead!"
+
+His grief was so real that neither Peter nor Vicenti could suppose he
+was other than a friend, and without concerning himself as to how he
+had been so suddenly precipitated into the scene, Vicenti, as he
+poured brandy between Roddy's teeth, commanded Pedro to rub and beat
+his body. Coughing and choking, Roddy signalized his return to
+consciousness by kicking the little man in the stomach.
+
+"Ah, he lives!" cried Pedro. He again dropped upon his knees and,
+crossing himself, prayed his thanks.
+
+Roddy fell into the bathrobe and into the steamer chair. Sighing
+luxuriously, he closed his eyes.
+
+"Such a fool, to faint," he murmured. "So ashamed. Made a bet--with
+harbor sharks. Bet them, could not get me. I win." He opened his eyes
+and stared dully at Pedro. "Hello!" he said, "there's good old Pedro.
+What you doing here, Pedro?"
+
+The old man, now recovered from his fear on Roddy's account, was in
+fresh alarm as to his own, and, glancing at Vicenti, made a movement
+to escape into the garden.
+
+Roddy waved Vicenti and Peter into the hall.
+
+"Go away," he commanded. "He wants to talk to me."
+
+"But I must not leave you," protested the doctor. "Now I am here as
+your physician, not as your guest."
+
+"A moment," begged Roddy, "a moment." His eyes closed and his head
+fell back. Pedro bent over him.
+
+"She sent me," he whispered eagerly. "She could not sleep. She must
+know to-night if you live. I hid myself in your garden, and I wait and
+I wait. But you do not come, and I despair. And then," cried the old
+man joyfully, "the miracle! Now my mistress can sleep in peace."
+
+Roddy lay so still that had it not been for his sharp breathing Pedro
+would have thought he had again fainted. With a sudden, sharp cry
+Roddy opened his eyes. His clenched fists beat feebly on the arms of
+the chair.
+
+"It's a lie!" he shouted fiercely, "it's a lie!" His eyes were wide
+and staring. Vicenti, returning hastily, looked into them and, with an
+exclamation, drew back.
+
+"The fever!" he said.
+
+Roddy was shouting wildly.
+
+"It's a lie!" he cried. "She did _not_ send you. She does not care
+whether I drown or live. She loves Pino Vega. She will marry----"
+
+Peter, with his arm around Roddy's neck, choked him, and held his hand
+over his mouth.
+
+"Be still," he entreated, "for God's sake, be still!" He looked
+fearfully at Vicenti, but the young doctor, though his eyes were wide
+with astonishment, made an impatient gesture.
+
+"Help me get him to bed," Vicenti commanded briskly. "Take his other
+arm."
+
+With the strength the fever lent him, Roddy hurled the two men from
+him.
+
+"She and Vega--they stood on the wharf," he shouted, "you understand?
+They laughed at me. And then the sharks smelt me out and followed; and
+I couldn't hide because the harbor was on fire. I struck at them and
+screamed, but I couldn't shake them off; they dived and turned; they
+crept up on me stealthily, in great circles. They were waiting for me
+to drown. Whichever way I swam I saw them, under me, on every side!
+They lit the water with great streaks of flame. And she and Vega
+pointed me out and laughed."
+
+"Stop him!" shrieked Peter. "You _must not_ listen! Give him morphine!
+Dope him! Stop him!"
+
+Roddy wrenched his wrists free and ran to Pedro, clutching him by the
+shoulders.
+
+"But _we'll_ save him!" he cried. "_We'll_ set him free! Because he is
+an old man. Because he is a great man. Because he is her father. We'll
+make him President!" His voice soared exultantly. "To hell with Vega!"
+he shouted. "To hell with Alvarez!" He flung up his arms into the
+air. "Viva Rojas!" he cried.
+
+Peter turned on Vicenti and shook his fist savagely in his face.
+
+"What you've heard," he threatened, "you've heard under the seal of
+your profession."
+
+But the eyes that looked into his were as wild as those of the man
+driven with fever. The face of the Venezuelan was jubilant, exalted,
+like that of a worshipping fanatic.
+
+"The truth!" he whispered breathlessly, "the truth!"
+
+"The boy is raving mad," protested Peter. "He doesn't mean it. You
+have heard nothing!"
+
+From the servants' quarters there came the sound of hurrying
+footsteps.
+
+In alarm, Vicenti glanced in that direction, and then came close to
+Peter, seizing him by the arm.
+
+"If he's mad," he whispered fiercely, "then _I_ am mad, and I know ten
+thousand more as mad as he."
+
+When the sun rose dripping out of the harbor, Vicenti and Peter walked
+into the garden.
+
+"I can leave him now," said the doctor. He looked at Peter's white
+face and the black rings around his eyes, and laughed. "When he
+wakes," he said, "he will be in much better health than you or I."
+
+"He certainly gave us a jolly night," sighed Peter, "and I shall never
+thank you enough for staying by me and Pedro. When a man I've roomed
+with for two years can't make up his mind whether I am I or a shark,
+it gets on my nerves."
+
+A few hours later, in another garden half a mile distant, Pedro was
+telling his young mistress of the night just past. The tears stood in
+his eyes and his hands trembled in eloquent pantomime.
+
+"He is so like my young master, your brother," he pleaded, "so brave,
+so strong, so young, and, like him, loves so deeply."
+
+"I am very grateful," said the girl gently. "For my father and for me
+he risked his life. I am grateful to him--and to God, who spared him."
+
+Pedro lowered his eyes as he repeated: "And he loves so deeply."
+
+The girl regarded him steadily.
+
+"What is it you wish to say?" she demanded.
+
+"All through the night I sat beside him," answered the old man
+eagerly, "and in his fever he spoke only one name."
+
+The girl turned from him and for a moment stood looking out into the
+harbor.
+
+"Then the others heard?" she said.
+
+Pedro, with a deprecatory gesture, bowed. With sudden vehemence, with
+a gesture of relief, the girl flung out her arms.
+
+"I'm glad," she cried. "I am _tired_ of secrets, tired of deceit. I am
+glad they know. It makes me proud! It makes me happy!"
+
+During the long night, while Roddy had tossed and muttered, Vicenti
+talked to Peter frankly and freely. He held back nothing. His
+appointment as prison doctor he had received from Alvarez, but it was
+impossible for any one to be long in close contact with General Rojas
+and not learn to admire and love him. And for the past year Vicenti
+had done all in his power to keep life in the older man and to work
+for his release. But General Rojas, embittered by past experience, did
+not confide in him, did not trust him. In spite of this, the doctor
+had continued working in his interests. He assured Peter that the
+adherents of Rojas were many, that they were well organized, that they
+waited only for the proper moment to revolt against Alvarez, release
+Rojas, and place him in power. On their programme Vega had no place.
+They suspected his loyalty to his former patron and chief, they feared
+his ambition; and they believed, were he to succeed in making himself
+President, he would be the servant of Forrester, and of the other
+foreigners who desired concessions, rather than of the people of
+Venezuela. The amnesty, Vicenti believed, had been declared only that
+Alvarez might entice Vega to Venezuela, where, when he wished, he
+could lay his hands on him. When he had obtained evidence that Vega
+was plotting against him he would submit this evidence to the people
+and throw Vega into prison.
+
+"Vega knows his danger," added Vicenti, "and, knowing it, he must mean
+to strike soon--to-day--to-morrow. We of the Rojas faction are as
+ignorant of his plans as we hope he is of ours. But in every camp
+there are traitors. No one can tell at what hour all our secrets may
+not be made known. Of only one thing you can be certain: matters
+cannot continue as they are. Within a week you will see this country
+torn by civil war, or those who oppose Alvarez, either of our party or
+of Vega's, will be in prison."
+
+When Roddy, rested and refreshed and with normal pulse and mind, came
+to luncheon, Peter confided to him all that Vicenti had told him.
+
+"If all that is going to happen," was Roddy's comment, "the sooner we
+get Rojas free the better. We will begin work on the tunnel to-night."
+
+The attacking party consisted of McKildrick, Roddy, and Peter. When
+the day's task on the light-house was finished and the other workmen
+had returned to the city, these three men remained behind and,
+placing crowbars, picks, and sticks of dynamite in Roddy's launch,
+proceeded to a little inlet a half-mile below El Morro. By seven
+o'clock they had made their way through the laurel to the fortress,
+and while Roddy and Peter acted as lookouts McKildrick attacked the
+entrance to the tunnel. He did not, as he had boasted, open it in an
+hour, but by ten o'clock the iron bars that held the slabs together
+had been cut and the cement loosened. Fearful of the consequences if
+they returned to the city at too late an hour, the tools and dynamite
+were hidden, rubbish and vines were so scattered as to conceal the
+evidence of their work, and the launch landed the conspirators at
+Roddy's wharf.
+
+"We shall say," explained Roddy, "that we have been out spearing eels,
+and I suggest that we now go to the _Dos Hermanos_ and say it."
+
+They found the café, as usual, crowded. Men of all political opinions,
+officers of the army and the custom-house, from the tiny warship in
+the harbor, Vegaistas, and those who secretly were adherents of Rojas,
+were all gathered amicably together. The Americans, saluting
+impartially their acquaintances, made their way to a table that
+remained empty in the middle of the room. They had hardly seated
+themselves when from a distant corner an alert young man, waving his
+hand in greeting, pushed his way toward them. They recognized the
+third vice-president of the Forrester Construction Company, Mr. Sam
+Caldwell.
+
+Mr. Caldwell had arrived that afternoon. He was delighted at being
+free of the ship. At the house of Colonel Vega he had dined well, and
+at sight of familiar faces he was inclined to unbend. He approached
+the employees of the company as one conferring a favor and assured of
+a welcome. He appreciated that since his arrival he was the man of the
+moment. In the crowded restaurant every one knew him as the
+representative of that great corporation that had dared to lock horns
+with the government. As he passed the tables the officers of that
+government followed him with a scowl or a sneer; those of the
+Vegaistas, who looked upon him as the man who dealt out money,
+ammunition and offices, with awe. How the secret supporters of Rojas
+considered him was soon to appear.
+
+"This," Roddy whispered in a quick aside, "is where I renounce the F.
+C. C. and all its works."
+
+"Don't be an ass!" entreated Peter.
+
+Roddy rose and, with his hands sunk in his pockets, awaited the
+approach of the third vice-president.
+
+"Well, boys, here I am!" called that young man heartily. He seemed to
+feel that his own surprise at finding himself outside the limits of
+Greater New York must be shared by all. But, as though to see to whom
+this greeting was extended, Roddy turned and glanced at his
+companions.
+
+McKildrick rose and stood uncomfortably.
+
+"Well, Roddy," exclaimed Sam Caldwell genially, "how's business?"
+
+Roddy's eyebrows rose.
+
+"'Roddy?'" he repeated, as though he had not heard aright. "Are you
+speaking to me?"
+
+Sam Caldwell was conscious that over all the room there had come a
+sudden hush. A waiter, hurrying with a tray of jingling glasses, by
+some unseen hand was jerked by the apron and brought to abrupt
+silence. In the sudden quiet Roddy's voice seemed to Caldwell to have
+come through a megaphone. The pink, smooth-shaven cheeks of the
+newcomer, that were in such contrast to the dark and sun-tanned faces
+around him, turned slowly red.
+
+"What's the idea?" he asked.
+
+"You sent me a cable to Curaçao," Roddy replied, "telling me to mind
+my own business."
+
+It had never been said of Sam Caldwell that he was an unwilling or
+unworthy antagonist. He accepted Roddy's challenge promptly. His
+little, piglike eyes regarded Roddy contemptuously.
+
+"I did," he retaliated, "at your father's dictation."
+
+"Well, my business hours," continued Roddy undisturbed, "are between
+eight and five. If you come out to the light-house to-morrow you will
+see me minding my own business and bossing a gang of niggers, at
+twenty dollars a week. Outside of business hours I choose my own
+company."
+
+Caldwell came closer to him and dropped his voice.
+
+"Are you sober?" he demanded.
+
+"Perfectly," said Roddy.
+
+Caldwell surveyed him grimly.
+
+"You are more out of hand than we thought," he commented. "I have
+heard some pretty strange tales about you this afternoon. Are they
+true?"
+
+"You have your own methods of finding out," returned Roddy. He waved
+his hand toward the table. "If you wish to join these gentlemen I am
+delighted to withdraw."
+
+Caldwell retreated a few steps and then turned back angrily.
+
+"I'll have a talk with you to-morrow," he said, "and to-night I'll
+cable your father what you are doing here."
+
+Roddy bowed and slightly raised his voice, so that it reached to every
+part of the room.
+
+"If you can interest my father," he said, "in anything that concerns
+his son I shall be grateful."
+
+As Caldwell made his way to the door, and Roddy, frowning gravely,
+sank back into his chair, the long silence was broken by a babble of
+whispered questions and rapid answers. Even to those who understood
+no English the pantomime had been sufficiently enlightening.
+Unobtrusively the secret agents of Alvarez rose from the tables and
+stole into the night. A half-hour later it was known in Caracas that
+the son of Mr. Forrester had publicly insulted the representative of
+his father, the arch-enemy of the government, and had apparently
+ranged himself on the side of Alvarez. Hitherto the _Dos Hermanos_ had
+been free from politics, but as Roddy made his exit from the café, the
+officers of the army chose the moment for a demonstration. Revolution
+was in the air, and they desired to declare their loyalty. Rising to
+their feet and raising their glasses to Roddy they cried, "Bravo,
+bravo! Viva Alvarez!"
+
+Bowing and nodding to them and wishing them good-night, Roddy hurried
+to the street.
+
+Under the lamps of the Alameda McKildrick regarded him quizzically.
+
+"And what do you gain by that?" he asked.
+
+"Well, I force Sam into the open," declared Roddy, "and I'm no longer
+on the suspect list. Look at my record! I've insulted everybody. I
+have insulted Rojas, insulted Vega, insulted Caldwell, all enemies of
+Alvarez. So now the Alvarez crowd will love me. Now they trust me! If
+they caught me digging the tunnel and I told them I was building a
+light-house, they'd believe me. If I insult a few more people they'll
+give me the Order of Bolivar."
+
+The next morning Roddy attended Mass. But he was not entirely
+engrossed in his devotions. Starting from the front entrance of the
+church he moved slowly nearer and nearer to the altar, and, slipping
+from the shelter of one pillar to another, anxiously scanned the rows
+of kneeling women. He found the mantilla a baffling disguise, and as
+each woman present in the church wore one, and as the hair of each was
+black, and as the back of the head of one woman is very much like that
+of another, it was not until the worshippers had turned to leave that
+he discovered the Señorita Inez Rojas. In her black satin dress, with
+her face wreathed by the black lace mantilla, Roddy thought he had
+never seen her look more beautiful.
+
+After her explicit commands that he should not attempt to see her
+again he was most anxious she should not learn how soon he had
+disobeyed her; and that she was walking with her sister and mother
+made it still more necessary that he should remain unnoticed.
+
+But in his eagerness and delight in the sight of her he leaned far
+forward. Inez, at that instant raising her eyes, saw him. Of the two
+Roddy was the more concerned. The girl made no sign of recognition,
+but the next moment, with an exclamation, she suddenly unclasped her
+hands, and, as though to show they were empty, held them toward her
+mother and sister. Leaving them, she returned hurriedly toward the
+altar. Señora Rojas and the sister continued on their way toward the
+door, exchanging greetings with the women of their acquaintance, whom,
+after an absence of two years, they now met for the first time. Seeing
+them thus engaged Inez paused and, turning, looked directly at Roddy.
+Her glance was not forbidding, and Roddy, who needed but little
+encouragement, hastened to follow. The church was very dark. The
+sunlight came only through the lifted curtains at the farthest
+entrance, and the acolytes were already extinguishing the candles
+that had illuminated the altar. As Inez, in the centre of the church,
+picked her way among the scattered praying-chairs, Roddy, in the side
+aisle and hidden by the pillars, kept pace with her.
+
+Directly in front of the altar Inez stooped, and, after picking up a
+fan and a prayer-book, stood irresolutely looking about her. Roddy
+cautiously emerged from the side aisle and from behind the last of the
+long row of pillars. Inez came quickly toward him. The last of the
+acolytes to leave the altar, in their haste to depart, stumbled and
+tripped past them, leaving them quite alone. Concealed by the great
+pillar from all of those in the far front of the church, Inez gave
+Roddy her hand. The eyes that looked into his were serious, penitent.
+
+"I am so sorry," she begged; "can you forgive me?"
+
+"Forgive you!" whispered Roddy. His voice was filled with such delight
+that it was apparently a sufficient answer. Inez, smiling slightly,
+withdrew her hand, and taking from inside her glove a folded piece of
+paper, thrust it toward him.
+
+"I brought this for you," she said.
+
+Roddy seized it greedily.
+
+"For me!" he exclaimed in surprise. As though in apology for the
+question he raised his eyes appealingly. "How did you know," he
+begged, "that I would be here?"
+
+For an instant, with a frown, the girl regarded him steadily. Then her
+cheeks flushed slightly and her eyes grew radiant. She flashed upon
+him the same mocking, dazzling smile that twice before had left him in
+complete subjection.
+
+"How did you know," she returned, "_I_ would be here?"
+
+She moved instantly from him, but Roddy started recklessly in pursuit.
+
+"Wait!" he demanded. "Just what does that mean?"
+
+With an imperative gesture the girl motioned him back, and then, as
+though to soften the harshness of the gesture, reassured him in a
+voice full of consideration.
+
+"The note will tell you," she whispered, and, turning her back on him,
+hurried to the door.
+
+Roddy allowed her sufficient time in which to leave the neighborhood
+of the church, and while he waited, as the most obvious method of
+expressing his feelings, stuffed all the coins in his pockets into the
+poor-box. From the church he hastened to an empty bench in the
+Alameda, and opened the note. He was surprised to find that it came
+from Mrs. Broughton, the wife of the English Consul at Porto Cabello.
+She was an American girl who, against the advice of her family, had
+married an Englishman, and one much older than herself. Since their
+marriage he had indulged and spoiled her as recklessly as any American
+might have done, and at the same time, in his choice of a wife, had
+continued to consider himself a most fortunate individual. Since his
+arrival at Porto Cabello Roddy had been a friend of each. For hours he
+would play in the garden with their children, without considering it
+necessary to inform either the father or mother that he was on the
+premises; and on many evenings the Broughtons and himself sat in his
+_patio_ reading the American periodicals, without a word being spoken
+by any one of them until they said good-night. But since his return
+from Curaçao, Roddy had been too occupied with coming events to
+remember old friends.
+
+The note read:
+
+     "DEAR MR. FORRESTER: My husband and I have not seen you for
+     ages, and the children cry for 'Uncle Roddy.' Will you and
+     Mr. De Peyster take tea with us day after to-morrow? The
+     only other friend who is coming _will give you this note_."
+
+The Broughtons had been stationed at Porto Cabello for five years,
+and, as Roddy now saw, it was most natural that in the limited social
+life of Porto Cabello the two American girls should be friends. That
+he had not already thought of the possibility of this filled him with
+rage, and, at the same time, the promise held forth by the note
+thrilled him with pleasure. He leaped to his feet and danced
+jubilantly upon the gravel walk. Tearing the note into scraps he
+hurled them into the air.
+
+"Mary Broughton!" he exclaimed ecstatically, "you're a brick!"
+
+Such was his feeling of gratitude to the lady, that he at once sought
+out a confectioner's and sent her many pounds of the candied fruits
+that have made Venezuela famous, and that, on this occasion, for
+several days made the Broughton children extremely ill.
+
+That night the attack on the barricade to the tunnel was made with a
+vigor no cement nor rusty iron could resist. Inspired by the thought
+that on the morrow he would see Inez, and that she herself wished to
+see him, and anxious to give her a good report of the work of rescue,
+Roddy toiled like a coal-passer. His energy moved McKildrick and Peter
+to endeavors equally strenuous, and by nine o'clock the great stone
+slabs were wedged apart, and on the warm-scented night air and upon
+the sweating bodies of the men there struck a cold, foul breath that
+told them one end of the tunnel lay open.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+Roddy was for at once dashing down the stone steps and exploring the
+tunnel, but McKildrick held him back.
+
+"You couldn't live for a moment," he protested, "and it may be days
+before we can enter." In proof of what he said, he lit one wax match
+after another, and as he passed each over the mouth of the tunnel
+Roddy saw the flame sicken and die.
+
+"That has been a tomb for half a century," McKildrick reminded him.
+"Even if a strong, young idiot like you could breathe that air, Rojas
+couldn't."
+
+"All the same, I am going down," said Roddy.
+
+"And I tell you, you are not!" returned McKildrick.
+
+Roddy, jubilant and grandly excited, laughed mockingly.
+
+"'Am _I_ the Governor of these Isles, or is it an Emilio Aguinaldo?'"
+he demanded. "This is _my_ expedition, and I speak to lead the forlorn
+hope."
+
+Exclaiming with impatience, McKildrick brought a rope and, making a
+noose, slipped it under Roddy's arms.
+
+"All we ask," he said grimly, "is that when you faint you'll fall with
+your head toward us. Otherwise we will bump it into a jelly."
+
+Roddy switched on the light in his electric torch and, like a diver
+descending a sea-ladder, moved cautiously down the stone steps.
+Holding the rope taut, Peter leaned over the opening.
+
+"When the snakes and bats and vampires get you," he warned, "you'll
+wish you were back among the sharks!"
+
+But Roddy did not hear him. As though warding off a blow he threw his
+hands across his face and dropped heavily.
+
+"Heave!" cried Peter.
+
+The two men sank their heels in the broken rubbish and dragged on the
+rope until they could lay violent hands on Roddy's shoulders. With
+unnecessary roughness they pulled him out of the opening and let him
+fall.
+
+When Roddy came to he rose sheepishly.
+
+"We'll have to postpone that expedition," he said, "until we can count
+on better ventilation. Meanwhile, if any gentleman wants to say 'I
+told you so,' I'll listen to him."
+
+They replaced the slabs over the mouth of the tunnel, but left wide
+openings through which the air and sunlight could circulate, and,
+after concealing these openings with vines, returned to Roddy's house.
+There they found Vicenti awaiting them. He was the bearer of important
+news. The adherents of Colonel Vega, he told them, were assembling in
+force near Porto Cabello, and it was well understood by the government
+that at any moment Vega might join them and proclaim his revolution.
+That he was not already under arrest was due to the fact that the
+government wished to seize not only the leader, but all of those who
+were planning to leave the city with him. The home of Vega was
+surrounded, and he himself, in his walks abroad, closely guarded. That
+he would be able to escape seemed all but impossible.
+
+"At the same time," continued Vicenti, "our own party is in readiness.
+If Vega reaches his followers and starts on his march to the capital
+we will start an uprising here in favor of Rojas. If we could free
+Rojas and show him to the people, nothing could save Alvarez. Alvarez
+knows that as well as ourselves. But without artillery it is
+impossible to subdue the fortress of San Carlos. We can take this
+city; we can seize the barracks, the custom-house, but not San Carlos.
+There also is this danger; that Alvarez, knowing without Rojas our
+party would fall to pieces, may at the first outbreak order him to be
+shot."
+
+Roddy asked Vicenti, as the physician of Rojas, if he thought Rojas
+were strong enough to lead a campaign.
+
+"He is not," declared Vicenti, "but we would not ask it of him. Let
+him only show himself and there will be no campaign. Even the
+government troops would desert to him. But," he added with a sigh,
+"why talk of the impossible! The troops that hold San Carlos are bound
+to Alvarez. He has placed there only those from his own plantation; he
+has paid them royally. And they have other reasons for fighting to the
+death. Since they have been stationed at Porto Cabello their conduct
+has been unspeakable. And the men of this town hate them as much as
+the women fear them. Their cruelty to the political prisoners is well
+known, and they understand that if an uprising started here where
+Rojas has lived, where he is dearly loved, they need expect no mercy.
+They will fight, not to protect San Carlos, but for their lives."
+
+Vicenti spoke with such genuine feeling that had Roddy felt free to do
+so he would have told him of the plan to rescue Rojas. But both Peter
+and McKildrick had warned him that until the last moment no one, save
+themselves, must learn the secret of the tunnel.
+
+So, while they thanked Vicenti for his confidences, they separated for
+the night without having made him any return in kind.
+
+The next morning, Sam Caldwell, under the guidance of McKildrick, paid
+an official visit to the light-house on which the men of the F. C. C.
+were then at work. When his tour of inspection was finished he
+returned to the wheel-house of the tug that had brought him across the
+harbor, and sent for Roddy. Roddy appeared before him in his
+working-clothes. They consisted of very few garments, and those were
+entirely concealed by the harbor mud. Caldwell, in cool, clean duck
+and a flamboyant Panama hat, signified with a grin that he enjoyed the
+contrast. He did not like Roddy, and Roddy treated him with open
+insolence. They were nearly of the same age and for years had known
+each other, but they had always been at war. As son of the president
+of the company, every chance had been given Roddy to advance his own
+interests. And it was not so much that he had failed to be of service
+to the company, as that he had failed to push himself forward, that
+caused Caldwell to regard him with easy contempt.
+
+On his side, Roddy considered Caldwell the bribe-giver and keeper of
+the corruption fund for the company, and, as such, beneath his royal
+notice. It therefore followed that in his present position of brief
+authority over Roddy, Caldwell found a certain enjoyment. This he
+concealed beneath the busy air of a man of affairs.
+
+"I have a cable here from your father, Roddy," he began briskly.
+"Translated, the part that refers to you reads, 'Tell Forrester take
+orders from you or leave service company. If refuses, furnish return
+passage, month's wages.'"
+
+After a pause, Roddy said: "I take it that is in answer to a cable
+from you."
+
+"Exactly," assented Caldwell. "I informed your father you were
+insubordinate to my authority, and that I had been reliably informed
+you were hostile to our interests. What you do as an individual
+doesn't count for much, but as the son of your father, apparently down
+here at least, it does. Why you made that play at me last night I
+don't know, and I haven't time to find out. I am not here to teach you
+manners. But when you butt in and interfere with the business of the
+company I must take notice. You've either got to stop working against
+us, or go home. Which do you want to do? And before you answer,"
+Caldwell added, "you ought to know that, as it is, you don't stand
+very high at headquarters. When your father got word you'd been
+fighting Vega, our friend, in defense of Alvarez, the man that's
+robbing us, that's giving us all this trouble, he was naturally pretty
+hot. He said to me: 'Roddy isn't down there to mix up in politics, but
+if he does, he must mix up on our side. I can't take money from the
+company to support my son, or any one else, who is against it.' That's
+what your father said to me. Now, as I understand it, although it is
+none of my business, you are dependent on him, and I advise----"
+
+"As you say," interrupted Roddy, "it's none of your business. The
+other proposition," he went on, "that I can't take money from the
+company and work _against_ it, is fair enough. What you call my work
+against it was begun before I knew it was in any way opposed to the
+company's interests. Now that I do know, I quite agree that either I
+must give up my outside job or quit working for you." Roddy reached to
+the shoulder of his flannel shirt, and meditatively began to unroll
+his damp and mud-soaked sleeve. "I guess I'll quit now!" he said.
+
+The answer was not the one Caldwell expected or desired. As an
+employee of the company Roddy was not important, but what he was doing
+as an individual, which had so greatly excited Vega, was apparently
+of much importance. And what it might be Sam Caldwell was anxious to
+discover. He had enjoyed his moment of triumph and now adopted a tone
+more conciliatory.
+
+"There's no use getting hot about it," he urged. "Better think it
+over."
+
+Roddy nodded, and started to leave the wheel-house.
+
+"Have thought it over," he said.
+
+As Caldwell saw it, Roddy was acting from pique and in the belief that
+his father would continue to supply him with funds. This Caldwell knew
+was not the intention of Mr. Forrester. He had directed Caldwell to
+inform Roddy that if he deliberately opposed him he must not only seek
+work elsewhere, but that he did not think he should continue to ask
+his father for support. Caldwell proceeded to make this quite plain to
+Roddy, but, except that the color in his face deepened and that his
+jaw set more firmly, Roddy made no sign.
+
+"Very well, then," concluded Caldwell, "you leave me no other course
+than to carry out your father's direction. I'll give you a month's
+wages and pay your passage-money home."
+
+"I'm not going home," returned Roddy, "and I don't want any money I
+haven't worked for. The company isn't discharging me," he added with
+a grin, "as it would a cook. I am discharging the company."
+
+"I warn you your father won't stand for it," protested Caldwell.
+
+Roddy turned back, and in a serious tone, and emphasizing his words
+with a pointed forefinger, spoke earnestly.
+
+"Sam," he said, "I give you my word, father is in wrong. _You_ are in
+wrong. You're both backing the wrong stable. When this row starts your
+man Vega won't run one, two, three."
+
+"You mean Rojas?" said Caldwell.
+
+"I mean Rojas," replied Roddy. "And if you and father had trusted me I
+could have told you so three months ago. It would have saved you a lot
+of money. It isn't too late even now. You'd better listen to me."
+
+Caldwell laughed comfortably.
+
+"Rojas is a back number," he said. "He's an old man, and a dead one.
+And besides--" He hesitated and glanced away.
+
+"Well?" demanded Roddy.
+
+"And, besides," continued Caldwell slowly, picking his words, "Vega is
+going to marry his daughter, and so we win both ways. And Vega is
+amenable to reason. _He_ will help us." As though in a sudden burst
+of confidence he added ingratiatingly, "And you could help your
+father, too, if you liked. If you'll tell me what the Rojas party mean
+to do I'll set you right with your father. What do you say?"
+
+"What do I say, you poor, little--thing!" Roddy roared. Then he
+laughed shortly and shrugged his shoulders. "I'll say this much," he
+added. "If I were sure you couldn't swim I'd throw you into the
+harbor."
+
+"So you could pull me out," laughed Caldwell. "Why don't you? You know
+you were always a grand-stand actor, Roddy. Think how heroic it would
+be," he taunted, "to rescue the hated enemy, to save my life!"
+
+Roddy, unmoved, regarded him thoughtfully.
+
+"It would be an awful thing to have on one's conscience," he said, and
+left the wheel-house.
+
+When, at five o'clock that same afternoon, Roddy found himself sitting
+opposite Inez Rojas in a properly appointed drawing-room, guarded by a
+properly appointed chaperon and with a cup of tea on his knee, the
+situation struck him not only as delightful, but comic. With inward
+amusement he thought of their other meetings: those before sunrise,
+and the one by moonlight when Inez had told him he was seeing her for
+the last time, and when policemen threatened his advance and sharks
+cut off his retreat. From a smile in the eyes of the girl herself
+Roddy guessed that she also found the meeting not without its humorous
+side. Roddy soon discovered he could not adjust his feelings to the
+exigencies of an afternoon call. After doing his duty as an adopted
+uncle to the Broughton children and to his hostess and her tea and to
+Peter, in permitting him ten minutes' talk with Inez, he brought that
+interview to an abrupt end.
+
+"Miss Rojas," he exclaimed, "you haven't seen Mrs. Broughton's garden
+in two years, have you? Such a lot of things grow up in two years. Let
+me introduce them to you."
+
+Giving her no chance to demur, Roddy strode out of the French windows
+into the garden, and, as Inez with an apologetic bow to the others
+followed, Peter moved to a chair beside Mrs. Broughton and held out
+his empty cup.
+
+"There's a certain subtlety about Roddy's methods," he remarked, "that
+would easily deceive the deaf, dumb and blind."
+
+The garden was full of rare trees, plants and flowers brought from
+every island of the Caribbean Sea, but Roddy did not pause to observe
+them. He led the way to a bench under a cluster of young bamboo trees
+and motioned to the girl to sit down. When she had done so he seated
+himself sideways on the bench and gazed at her. His eyes were filled
+with happiness.
+
+"It's quite too wonderful to be true," he said contentedly.
+
+Inez Rojas turned to the tropical splendor of the garden.
+
+"Yes," she answered. "Everything grows so fast here. The change is
+quite wonderful."
+
+Roddy shook his head at her disappointedly.
+
+"You mustn't do that," he reproved her gravely; "when you know what I
+mean you mustn't pretend to think I mean something else. It's not
+honest. And time is too short. To me--these moments are too
+tremendously valuable. Every other time I have seen you I've had to
+keep looking over my shoulder for spies. Even now," he exclaimed in
+alarm, "those infernal Broughton children may find me and want to play
+ride-a-cock-horse! So you see," he went on eagerly, "you must not
+waste time misunderstanding me."
+
+"Will you tell me about the tunnel?" asked the girl.
+
+"The tunnel!" repeated Roddy blankly.
+
+But he saw that her mind was occupied only with thoughts of her
+father, and at once, briskly and clearly, he explained to her all that
+had been accomplished, and all the plots and counter-plots that were
+in the air.
+
+"And how soon," asked the girl, "do you think it will be safe to enter
+the tunnel?"
+
+Roddy answered that McKildrick thought in two or three days it would
+be clean of poisonous gases, but that that night they would again
+attempt to explore it.
+
+"If I could only help!" exclaimed Inez. "It is not fair that strangers
+to my father should be taking a risk that should fall to one of his
+children. It would mean so much, it would make me so happy, if I could
+feel I had done any little thing for him. You cannot know how grateful
+I am to you all, to your friends, and to you!" Her eyes opened wide in
+sympathy. "And you were so ill," she exclaimed, "and the fever is so
+likely to return. I do not see how it is possible for you to work at
+night at El Morro and by day on the light-house and not break down. We
+have no right to permit it."
+
+"My health," explained Roddy dryly, "is in no danger from overwork. I
+am not employed by the company any longer. If I like I can sleep all
+day. I've discharged myself. I've lost my job."
+
+"You have quarrelled with your father," said the girl quickly, "on
+account of my father? You must not!" she exclaimed. "Indeed, we
+cannot accept such a sacrifice."
+
+"The misunderstanding with my father," Roddy assured her, "is one of
+long standing. I've never made a success of what he's given me to do,
+and this is only the last of a series of failures. You mustn't try to
+make me out an unselfish person. I am sacrificing nothing. Rather, in
+a way, I have gained my independence. At least, if I get a position
+now, people can't say I obtained it through my father's influence. Of
+course, it's awkward to be poor," added Roddy dispassionately,
+"because I had meant to ask you to marry me."
+
+With an exclamation the girl partly rose and then sank back,
+retreating to the farthest limit of the bench.
+
+"Mr. Forrester!" she began with spirit.
+
+"I know what you're going to say," interrupted Roddy confidently. "But
+I ought to tell you that that doesn't weigh with me at all. I never
+could see," he exclaimed impatiently, "why, if you love a girl, the
+fact that she is engaged should make any difference--do _you_? It is,
+of course, an obstacle, but if you are the right man, and the other
+man is not, it certainly is best for everybody that you should make
+that plain to her before she marries the wrong man. In your case it
+certainly has made no difference to me, and I mean to fight for you
+until you turn back from the altar. Of course, when Vega told me you
+were engaged to him it was a shock; but you must admit I didn't let it
+worry me much. I told you as soon as I saw you that I loved you----"
+
+The girl was looking at him so strangely that Roddy was forced to
+pause.
+
+"I beg your pardon!" he said.
+
+The eyes of Inez were searching his closely. When she spoke her voice
+was cold and even.
+
+"Then it was Colonel Vega," she said, "who told you I was engaged to
+him."
+
+"Of course," said Roddy. "He told me the night we crossed from
+Curaçao."
+
+Deep back in the serious, searching eyes Roddy thought that for an
+instant he detected a smile, mischievous and mocking; but as he leaned
+forward the eyes again grew grave and critical. With her head slightly
+on one side and with her hands clasped on her knee, Inez regarded him
+with curiosity.
+
+"And that made no difference to you?" she asked.
+
+"Why should it?" demanded Roddy. "A cat can look at a king; why may
+not I look at the most wonderful and lovely----"
+
+In the same even tones of one asking an abstract question the girl
+interrupted him.
+
+"But you must have known," she said, "that I would not engage myself
+to any man unless I loved him. Or do you think that, like the women
+here, I would marry as I was told?"
+
+Roddy, not at all certain into what difficulties her questions were
+leading him, answered with caution.
+
+"No," he replied doubtfully, "I didn't exactly think that, either."
+
+"Then," declared the girl, "you must have thought, no matter how much
+I loved the man to whom I was engaged, that you could make me turn
+from him."
+
+Roddy held out his hands appealingly.
+
+"Don't put it that way!" he begged. "I've never thought I was better
+than any other man. I certainly never thought I was good enough for
+you. All I'm sure of is that no man on earth can care for you more.
+It's the best thing, the only big thing, that ever came into my life.
+And now it's the only thing left. Yesterday I thought I was rich, and
+I was glad because I had so much to offer you. But now that I've no
+money at all, now that I'm the Disinherited One, it doesn't seem to
+make any difference. At least, it would not to me. Because if I could
+make you care as I care for you, it wouldn't make any difference to
+you, either. No one on earth could love you more," pleaded Roddy. "I
+know it. I feel it. There is nothing else so true! Other men may bring
+other gifts, but 'Mine is the heart at your feet! He that hath more,'"
+he challenged, "'let him give!' All I know," he whispered fiercely,
+"is, that I _love_ you, I _love_ you, I _love_ you!"
+
+He was so moved, he felt what he said so truly, it was for him such
+happiness to speak, that his voice shook and, unknown to him, the
+tears stood in his eyes. In answer, he saw the eyes of the girl
+soften, her lips drew into a distracting and lovely line. Swiftly,
+with an ineffable and gracious gesture, she stooped, and catching up
+one of his hands held it for an instant against her cheek, and then,
+springing to her feet, ran from him up the garden path to the house.
+
+Astounded, jubilant, in utter disbelief of his own senses, Roddy sat
+motionless. In dumb gratitude he gazed about him at the beautiful
+sunlit garden, drinking in deep draughts of happiness.
+
+So sure was he that in his present state of mind he could not again,
+before the others, face Inez, that, like one in a dream, he stumbled
+through the garden to the gate that opened on the street and so
+returned home.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That night McKildrick gave him permission to enter the tunnel. The
+gases had evaporated, and into the entrance the salt air of the sea
+and the tropical sun had fought their way. The party consisted of
+McKildrick, Peter and Roddy and, as the personal representative of
+Inez, Pedro, who arrived on foot from the direction of the town.
+
+"She, herself," he confided secretly to Roddy, "wished to come."
+
+"She did!" exclaimed Roddy joyfully. "Why didn't she?"
+
+"I told her your mind would be filled with more important matters,"
+returned Pedro, seeking approval. "Was I not right?"
+
+Roddy, whose mind was filled only with Inez and who still felt the
+touch of her hand upon his, assented without enthusiasm.
+
+McKildrick was for deciding by lot who should explore the underground
+passage, but Roddy protested that that duty belonged to him alone.
+With a rope around his waist, upon which he was to pull if he needed
+aid, an electric torch and a revolver he entered the tunnel. It led
+down and straight before him. The air was damp and chilly, but in
+breathing he now found no difficulty. Nor, at first, was his path in
+any way impeded. His torch showed him solid walls, white and
+discolored, and in places dripping with water. But of the bats, ghosts
+and vampires, for which Peter had cheerfully prepared him, there was
+no sign. Instead, the only sounds that greeted his ears were the
+reverberating echoes of his own footsteps. He could not tell how far
+he had come, but the rope he dragged behind him was each moment
+growing more irksome, and from this he judged he must be far advanced.
+
+The tunnel now began to twist and turn sharply, and at one place he
+found a shaft for light and ventilation that had once opened to the
+sky. This had been closed with a gridiron of bars, upon which rested
+loose stones roughly held together by cement. Some of these had fallen
+through the bars and blocked his progress, and to advance it was
+necessary to remove them. He stuck his torch in a crevice and untied
+the rope. When he had cleared his way he left the rope where he had
+dropped it. Freed of this impediment he was able to proceed more
+quickly, and he soon found himself in that part of the tunnel that had
+been cut through the solid rock and which he knew lay under the waters
+of the harbor. The air here was less pure. His eyes began to smart
+and his ears to suffer from the pressure. He knew he should turn back,
+but until he had found the other end of the tunnel he was loth to do
+so. Against his better judgment he hastened his footsteps; stumbling,
+slipping, at times splashing in pools of water, he now ran forward. He
+knew that he was losing strength, and that to regain the mouth of the
+tunnel he would need all that was left to him. But he still pushed
+forward. The air had now turned foul; his head and chest ached, as
+when he had been long under water, and his legs were like lead. He was
+just upon the point of abandoning his purpose when there rose before
+him a solid wall. He staggered to it, and, leaning against it,
+joyfully beat upon it with his fists. He knew that at last only a few
+feet separated him from the man he had set out to save. So great was
+his delight and so anxious was he that Rojas should share in it, that
+without considering that no slight sound could penetrate the barrier,
+he struck three times upon it with the butt of his revolver, and then,
+choking and gasping like a drowning man, staggered back toward the
+opening. Half-way he was met by McKildrick and Peter, who, finding no
+pressure on the end of the rope, had drawn it to them and, fearing for
+Roddy's safety, had come to his rescue. They gave him an arm each,
+and the fresh air soon revived him. He told McKildrick what he had
+seen, and from his description of the second wall the engineer
+described how it should be opened.
+
+"But without a confederate on the other side," he said, "we can do
+nothing."
+
+"Then," declared Roddy, "the time has come to enroll Vicenti in the
+Honorable Order of the White Mice."
+
+On their return to Roddy's house they sent for Vicenti, and Roddy,
+having first forced him to subscribe to terrifying oaths, told the
+secret of the tunnel.
+
+Tears of genuine happiness came to the eyes of the amazed and
+delighted Venezuelan. In his excitement he embraced Roddy and
+protested that with such companions and in such a cause he would
+gladly give his life. McKildrick assured him that when he learned of
+the part he was to play in the rescue he would see that they had
+already taken the liberty of accepting that sacrifice. It was
+necessary, he explained, that the wall between the tunnel and the cell
+should fall at the first blow. An attempt to slowly undermine it, or
+to pick it to pieces, would be overheard and lead to discovery. He
+therefore intended to rend the barrier apart by a single shock of
+dynamite. But in this also there was danger; not to those in the
+tunnel, who, knowing at what moment the mine was timed to explode,
+could retreat to a safe distance, but to the man they wished to set
+free. The problem, as McKildrick pointed it out, was to make the
+charges of dynamite sufficiently strong to force a breach in the wall
+through which Rojas could escape into the tunnel, and yet not so
+strong as to throw the wall upon Rojas and any one who might be with
+him.
+
+"And I," cried Vicenti, "will be the one who will be with him!"
+
+"Good!" said Roddy. "That's what we hoped. It will be your part, then,
+to prepare General Rojas, to keep him away from the wall when we blow
+it open, and to pass him through the breach to us. Everything will
+have to be arranged beforehand. We can't signal through the wall or
+they would hear it. We can only agree in advance as to the exact
+moment it is to fall, and then trust that nothing will hang fire,
+either on your side of the barrier or on ours."
+
+"And after we get him into the tunnel!" warned Vicenti, as excited as
+though the fact were already accomplished, "we must still fight for
+his life. The explosion will bring every soldier in the fortress to
+the cell, and they will follow us."
+
+"There's several sharp turns in the tunnel," said McKildrick "and
+behind one of them a man with a revolver could hold back the lot!"
+
+"I speak to do that!" cried Roddy jealously. "I speak to be Horatius!"
+
+"'And I will stand on thy right hand,'" declared Peter; "'and hold the
+bridge with thee.' But you know, Roddy," he added earnestly, "you're
+an awful bad shot. If you go shooting up that subway in the dark
+you'll kill both of us. You'd better take a base-ball bat and swat
+them as they come round the turn."
+
+"And then," cried Roddy, springing to his feet, "we'll rush Rojas down
+to the launch! And in twelve hours we'll land him safe in Curaçao.
+Heavens!" he exclaimed, "what a reception they'll give him!"
+
+The cold and acid tones of McKildrick cast a sudden chill upon the
+enthusiasm.
+
+"Before we design the triumphal arches," he said, "suppose we first
+get him out of prison."
+
+When at last the conference came to an end and Vicenti rose to go,
+Roddy declared himself too excited to sleep and volunteered to
+accompany the doctor to his door. But the cause of his insomnia was
+not General Rojas but the daughter of General Rojas, and what called
+him forth into the moonlit Alameda was his need to think undisturbed
+of Inez, and, before he slept, to wish "good-night" to the house that
+sheltered her. In this vigil Roddy found a deep and melancholy
+satisfaction. From where he sat on a stone bench in the black shadows
+of the trees that arched the Alameda, Miramar, on the opposite side of
+the street, rose before him. Its yellow walls now were white and
+ghostlike. In the moonlight it glistened like a palace of frosted
+silver. The palace was asleep, and in the garden not a leaf stirred.
+The harbor breeze had died, and the great fronds of the palms, like
+rigid and glittering sword-blades, were clear-cut against the stars.
+The boulevard in which he sat stretched its great length, empty and
+silent. And Miramar seemed a dream palace set in a dream world, a
+world filled with strange, intangible people, intent on strange,
+fantastic plots. To Roddy the father, who the day before had cast him
+off, seemed unreal; the old man buried in a living sepulchre, and for
+whom in a few hours he might lose his life, was unreal; as unreal as
+the idea that he might lose his life. In all the little world about
+him there was nothing real, nothing that counted, nothing living and
+actual, save the girl asleep in the palace of frosted silver and his
+love for her.
+
+His love for her made the fact that he was without money, and with no
+profession, talent or bread-and-butter knowledge that would serve to
+keep even himself alive, a matter of no consequence. It made the
+thought that Inez was promised to another man equally unimportant. The
+only fact was his love for her, and of that he could not doubt the
+outcome. He could not believe God had brought into his life such
+happiness only to take it from him.
+
+When he woke the next morning the necessity of seeing Inez again and
+at once was imperative. Since she had left him the afternoon before,
+in the garden of Mrs. Broughton, she had entirely occupied his
+thoughts. Until he saw her he could enjoy no peace. Against the
+circumstances that kept them apart he chafed and rebelled. He
+considered it would be some comfort, at least, to revisit the spot
+where he last had spoken with her, and where from pity or a desire to
+spare him she had let him tell her he loved her.
+
+The unusual moment at which he made his call did not seem to surprise
+Mrs. Broughton. It was almost as though she were expecting him.
+
+"My reason for coming at this absurd hour," began Roddy in some
+embarrassment, "is to apologize for running away yesterday without
+wishing you 'good-by.' I suddenly remembered----"
+
+The young matron stopped him with a frown.
+
+"I am disappointed, Roddy," she interrupted, "and hurt. If you
+distrust me, if you won't confide in an old friend no matter how much
+she may wish to help you, she can only----"
+
+"Oh!" cried Roddy abjectly, casting aside all subterfuge, "_will_ you
+help me? Please, Mrs. Broughton!" he begged. "_Dear_ Mrs. Broughton!
+Fix it so I can see her. I am _so_ miserable," he pleaded, "and I am
+so happy."
+
+With the joyful light of the match-maker who sees her plans proceeding
+to success Mrs. Broughton beamed upon him.
+
+"By a strange coincidence," she began, in tones tantalizingly slow, "a
+usually proud and haughty young person condescended to come to me this
+morning for advice. _She_ doesn't distrust me. She believes----"
+
+"And what did you advise?" begged Roddy.
+
+"I advised her to wait in the garden until I sent a note telling
+you----"
+
+Already Roddy was at the door.
+
+"What part of the garden?" he shouted. "Never mind!" he cried in
+alarm, lest Mrs. Broughton should volunteer to guide him. "Don't
+bother to show me; I can find her."
+
+Mrs. Broughton went into the Consulate and complained to her husband.
+
+"It makes Roddy so selfish," she protested.
+
+"What did you think he'd do?" demanded Broughton--"ask you to go with
+him? You forget Roddy comes from your own happy country where no
+chaperon is expected to do her duty."
+
+Inez was standing by the bench at which they had parted. Above her and
+around her the feathery leaves of the bamboo trees whispered and
+shivered, shading her in a canopy of delicate sun-streaked green.
+
+Like a man who gains the solid earth after a strenuous struggle in the
+waves, Roddy gave a deep sigh of content.
+
+"It has been so hard," he said simply. "It's been so long! I have been
+parched, starved for a sight of you!"
+
+At other times when they had been together the eyes of the girl always
+looked into his steadily or curiously. Now they were elusive, shy,
+glowing with a new radiance. They avoided him and smiled upon the
+beautiful sun-steeped garden as though sharing some hidden and happy
+secret.
+
+"I sent for you," she began, "to tell you----"
+
+Roddy shook his head emphatically.
+
+"You didn't send for me," he said. "I came of my own accord. Last
+night you didn't send for me either, but all through the night I sat
+outside your house. This morning I am here because this is where I
+last saw you. And I find _you_. It's a sign! I thought my heart led me
+here, but I think now it was the gods! They are on my side. They fight
+for me. Why do you try to fight against the gods?"
+
+His voice was very low, very tender. He bent forward, and the girl,
+still avoiding his eyes, sank back upon the bench, and Roddy, seating
+himself, leaned over her.
+
+"Remember!" he whispered, "though the mills of the gods grind slow,
+they grind exceeding fine. The day is coming when you will never have
+to send for me again. You cannot escape it, or me. I am sorry--but I
+have come into your life--to stay!"
+
+The girl breathed quickly, and, as though casting off the spell of his
+voice and the feeling it carried with it, suddenly threw out her hands
+and, turning quickly, faced him.
+
+"I must tell you what makes it so hard," she said, "why I must not
+listen to you. It is this. I must not think of myself. I must not
+think of you, except--" She paused, and then added, slowly and
+defiantly--"as the one person who can save my father! Do you
+understand? Do I make it plain? I am _making use_ of you. I have led
+you on. I have kept you near me, for his sake. I am sacrificing
+you--for him!" Her voice was trembling, miserable. With her clenched
+fist she beat upon her knee. "I had to tell you," she murmured, "I had
+to tell you! I had to remember," she protested fiercely, "that I am
+nothing, that I have no life of my own. Until he is free I do not
+exist. I am not a girl to love, or to listen to love. I can be only
+the daughter of the dear, great soul who, without you, may die. And
+all you can be to me is the man who can save him!" She raised her
+eyes, unhappily, appealingly. "Even if you despised me," she
+whispered, "I had to tell you."
+
+Roddy's eyes were as miserable as her own. He reached out his arms to
+her, as though he would shelter her from herself and from the whole
+world.
+
+"But, my dear one, my wonderful one," he cried, "can't you see that's
+only morbid, only wicked? _You_ led _me_ on?" he cried. He laughed
+jubilantly, happily. "Did I _need_ leading? Didn't I love you from the
+first moment you rode toward me out of the sunrise, bringing the day
+with you? How could I help but love you? You've done nothing to make
+me love you; you've only been the most glorious, the most beautiful
+woman----"
+
+At a sign from the girl he stopped obediently.
+
+"Can't I love you," he demanded, "and work for your father the more,
+because I love you?"
+
+The girl sat suddenly erect and clasped her hands. Her shoulders moved
+slightly, as though with sudden cold.
+
+"It frightens me!" she whispered. "Before you came I thought of him
+always, and nothing else, only of him. I dreamed of him; terrible,
+haunting dreams. Each day I prayed and worked for him. And then--" she
+paused, and, as though seeking help to continue, looked appealingly
+into Roddy's eyes. Her own were uncertain, troubled, filled with
+distress. "And then you came," she said. "And now I find I think of
+you. It is disloyal, wicked! I forget how much he suffers. I forget
+even how much I love him. I want only to listen to you. All the
+sorrow, all the misery of these last two years seems to slip from me.
+I find it doesn't matter, that nothing matters. I am only happy,
+foolishly, without reason, happy!"
+
+In his gratitude, in his own happiness, Roddy reached out his hand.
+But Inez drew her own away, and with her chin resting upon it, and
+with her elbow on her knee, sat staring ahead of her.
+
+"And I find this!" she whispered guiltily, like one at confession. "I
+find I hate to spare you for this work. Three weeks ago, when you left
+Curaçao, I thought a man could not risk his life in a nobler cause
+than the one for which you were risking yours. It seemed to me a
+duty--a splendid duty. But now, I am afraid--for you. I knew it first
+the night you swam from me across the harbor, and I followed you with
+my eyes, watching and waiting for you to sink and die. And I prayed
+for you then; and suddenly, as I prayed, I found it was not you for
+whom I was praying, but for myself, for my own happiness. That I
+wanted you to live--for me!"
+
+The girl sprang to her feet, and Roddy rose with her, and they stood
+facing each other.
+
+"Now you know," she whispered. "I had to tell you. I had to confess to
+you that I tried to make you care for me, hoping you would do what I
+wished. I did not mean to tell you that, instead, I learned to care
+for you. If you despise me I will understand; if you can still love
+me----"
+
+"_If_ I love you?" cried Roddy. "I love you _so_----"
+
+For an instant, as though to shut out the look in his face, the eyes
+of the girl closed. She threw out her hands quickly to stop him.
+
+"Then," she begged, "help me not to think of you. Not to think of
+myself. We are young. We are children. He is old: every moment counts
+for him. If this is the big thing in our lives we hope it is, it will
+last always! But with him each moment may mean the end; a horrible
+end, alone, among enemies, in a prison. You must give me your
+word--you must promise me not to tempt me to think of you. You are
+very generous, very strong. Help me to do this. Promise me until he is
+free you will not tell me you care for me, never again, until he is
+free. Or else"--her tone was firm, though her voice had sunk to a
+whisper. She drew back, and regarded him unhappily, shaking her
+head--"or else, I must not see you again."
+
+There was a moment's silence, and then Roddy gave an exclamation of
+impatience, of protest.
+
+"If you ask it!" he said, "I promise. How _soon_ am I to see you
+again?"
+
+Inez moved from him toward the house. At a little distance she stopped
+and regarded him in silence. Her eyes were wistful, reproachful.
+
+"It was so hard to ask," she murmured, "and you've promised so
+easily!"
+
+"How dare you!" cried Roddy. "How dare you! Easy!" He rushed on
+wildly, "When I want to cry out to the whole world that I love you,
+when I feel that every stranger sees it, when my heart beats, 'Inez,
+Inez, Inez,' so that I know the people in the street can hear it too.
+If I hadn't promised you to keep silent," he cried indignantly,
+"because you asked it, I'd tell you now that no other woman in all the
+world is loved as I love you! Easy to be silent!" he demanded, "when
+every drop of blood calls to you, when I breathe only when you
+breathe----"
+
+"Stop!" cried the girl. For an instant she covered her face with her
+hands. When she lowered them her eyes were shining, radiant, laughing
+with happiness.
+
+"I am so sorry!" she whispered penitently. "It was wicked. But," she
+pleaded, "I did so want to hear you say it just once more!"
+
+She was very near to him. Her eyes were looking into his. What she saw
+in them caused her to close her own quickly. Feeling blindly with
+outstretched hands, she let herself sway toward him, and in an instant
+she was wrapped in his arms with his breathless kisses covering her
+lips and cheeks.
+
+For Roddy the earth ceased revolving, he was lifted above it and heard
+the music of the stars. He was crowned, exalted, deified. Then the
+girl who had done this tore herself away and ran from him through the
+garden.
+
+Neither Inez nor Roddy was in a mood to exchange polite phrases in the
+presence of Mrs. Broughton, and they at once separated, each in a
+different direction, Roddy returning to his home. There he found Sam
+Caldwell. He was in no better frame of mind to receive him, but
+Caldwell had been two hours waiting and was angry and insistent.
+
+"At last!" he exclaimed. "I have been here since eleven. Don't tell
+me," he snapped, "that you've been spearing eels, because I won't
+believe it."
+
+"What can I tell you," asked Roddy pleasantly, "that you will
+believe?"
+
+That Caldwell had sought him out and had thought it worth his while to
+wait two hours for an interview seemed to Roddy to show that in the
+camp of his enemies matters were not moving smoothly, and that, in
+their opinion, he was of more interest than they cared to admit.
+
+Caldwell began with an uneasy assumption of good-fellowship.
+
+"I have come under a flag of truce," he said grinning. "We want to
+have a talk and see if we can't get together."
+
+"Who are 'we'?" asked Roddy.
+
+"Vega, myself, and Señora Rojas."
+
+"Señora Rojas!" exclaimed Roddy gravely. "Are you not mistaken?"
+
+"She sent me here," replied Caldwell. "These are my credentials." With
+a flourish and a bow of marked ceremony, he handed Roddy a letter.
+
+It came from Miramar, and briefly requested that Mr. Forrester would
+do the Señora Rojas the honor to immediately call upon her.
+
+Roddy caught up his hat. The prospect of a visit to the home of Inez
+enchanted him, and he was as greatly puzzled as to what such a visit
+might bring forth.
+
+"We will go at once!" he said.
+
+But Caldwell hung back.
+
+"I'd rather explain it first," he said.
+
+Already Roddy resented the fact that Caldwell was serving as the
+ambassador of Madame Rojas, and there was, besides, in his manner
+something which showed that in that service he was neither zealous nor
+loyal.
+
+"Possibly Señora Rojas can do that herself," said Roddy.
+
+"No, she can't!" returned Caldwell sharply, "because she doesn't know,
+and we don't mean to tell her. But I am going to tell _you_."
+
+"Better not!" warned Roddy.
+
+"I'll take the chance," said Caldwell. His manner was conciliating,
+propitiatory. "I'll take the chance," he protested, "that when you
+learn the truth you won't round on your own father. It isn't natural,
+it isn't human!"
+
+"Caldwell on the Human Emotions!" exclaimed Roddy, grinning.
+
+But Caldwell was too truly in earnest to be interrupted.
+
+"Your father's spending two millions to make Vega President," he went
+on rapidly. "We've got to have him. We need him in our business. _You_
+think Rojas would make a better President. Maybe he would. But not for
+us. He's too old-fashioned. He's----"
+
+"Too honest?" suggested Roddy.
+
+"Too honest," assented Caldwell promptly. "And there's another slight
+objection to him. He's in jail. And you," Caldwell cried, raising his
+finger and shaking it in Roddy's face, "can't get him out. We can't
+take San Carlos, and neither can you. They have guns there that in
+twenty minutes could smash this town into a dust-heap. So you see,
+what you hope to do is impossible, absurd! Now," he urged eagerly,
+"why don't you give up butting your head into a stone wall, and help
+your father and me?"
+
+He stopped, and in evident anxiety waited for the other to speak, but
+Roddy only regarded him steadily. After a pause Roddy said: "_I'm_ not
+talking. You're the one that's talking. And," he added, "you're
+talking too much, too!"
+
+"I'll risk it!" cried Caldwell stoutly. "I've never gone after a man
+of sense yet that I couldn't make him see things my way. Now, Señora
+Rojas," he went on, "only wants one thing. She wants to get her
+husband out of prison. She thinks Vega can do that, that he means to
+do it, that I mean to do it. Well--we _don't_."
+
+Roddy's eyes half closed, the lines around his mouth grew taut, and
+when he spoke his voice was harsh and had sunk to a whisper.
+
+"I tell you," he said, "you're talking too much!"
+
+But neither in Roddy's face nor voice did Caldwell read the danger
+signals.
+
+"It doesn't suit our book," he swept on, "to get him out. Until Vega
+is President he must stay where he is. But his wife must not know
+that. She believes in _us_. She thinks the Rojas crowd only interferes
+with us, and she is sending for you to ask you to urge the Rojas
+faction to give us a free hand."
+
+"I see," said Roddy; "and while Vega is trying to be President, Rojas
+may die. Have you thought of that?"
+
+"Can we help it?" protested Caldwell. "Did _we_ put him in prison?
+We'll have trouble enough keeping ourselves out of San Carlos. Well,"
+he demanded, "what are you going to do?"
+
+"At present," said Roddy, "I'm going to call on Madame Rojas."
+
+On their walk to Miramar, Caldwell found it impossible to break down
+Roddy's barrier of good nature. He threatened, he bullied, he held
+forth open bribes; but Roddy either remained silent or laughed.
+Caldwell began to fear that in trying to come to terms with the enemy
+he had made a mistake. But still he hoped that in his obstinacy Roddy
+was merely stupid; he believed that in treating him as a factor in
+affairs they had made him vainglorious, arrogant. He was sure that if
+he could convince him of the utter impossibility of taking San Carlos
+by assault he would abandon the Rojas crowd and come over to Vega. So
+he enlarged upon the difficulty of that enterprise, using it as his
+argument in chief. Roddy, in his turn, pretended he believed San
+Carlos would fall at the first shot, and, as he intended, persuaded
+Caldwell that an attack upon the prison was the fixed purpose of the
+Rojas faction.
+
+Roddy, who as a sentimental burglar had so often forced his way into
+the grounds of Miramar, found a certain satisfaction in at last
+entering it by the front door, and by invitation. His coming was
+obviously expected, and his arrival threw the many servants into a
+state of considerable excitement. Escorted by the major-domo, he was
+led to the drawing-room where Madame Rojas was waiting to receive him.
+As he entered, Inez and her sister, with Vega and General Pulido and
+Colonel Ramon, came in from the terrace, and Caldwell followed from
+the hall.
+
+With the manner of one who considered himself already a member of the
+household, Vega welcomed Roddy, but without cordiality, and with
+condescension. To Inez, although the sight of her caused him great
+embarrassment, Roddy made a formal bow, to which she replied with one
+as formal. Señora Rojas, having ordered the servants to close the
+doors and the windows to the terrace, asked Roddy to be seated, and
+then placed herself in a chair that faced his. The others grouped
+themselves behind her. Roddy felt as though the odds were hardly fair.
+With the exception of Inez, who understood that any sign she might
+make in his favor would do him harm, all those present were opposed to
+him. This fact caused Roddy to gaze about him in pleasurable
+excitement and smile expectantly. He failed to see how the interview
+could lead to any definite result. Already he had learned from
+Caldwell more than he had suspected, and all that he needed to know,
+and, as he was determined on account of her blind faith in Vega to
+confide nothing to Señora Rojas, he saw no outcome to the visit as
+important as that it had so soon brought him again into the presence
+of Inez.
+
+"Mr. Forrester," began Señora Rojas, "I have asked you to call on me
+to-day at the suggestion of these gentlemen. They believe that where
+they might fail, an appeal from me would be effective. I am going to
+speak to you quite frankly and openly; but when you remember I am
+pleading for the life of my husband you will not take offense. With no
+doubt the best of motives, you have allied yourself with what is known
+as the Rojas faction. Its object is to overthrow the President and to
+place my husband at Miraflores. To me, the wife of General Rojas, such
+an undertaking is intolerable. All I desire, all I am sure he desires,
+is his freedom. There are those, powerful and well equipped, who can
+secure it. They do not belong to the so-called Rojas faction. You, we
+understand, have much influence in its counsels. We know that to carry
+out its plans you have quarrelled with your father, resigned from his
+company. If I venture to refer to your private affairs, it is only
+because I understand you yourself have spoken of them publicly, and
+because they show me that in your allegiance, in your mistaken
+allegiance to my husband, you are in earnest. But, in spite of your
+wish to serve him, I have asked you here to-day to beg you and your
+friends to relinquish your purpose. His wife and his children feel
+that the safety of General Rojas is in other hands, in the hands of
+those who have his fullest confidence and mine." In her distress,
+Señora Rojas leaned forward. "I beg of you," she exclaimed, "do as I
+ask. Leave my husband to me and to his friends. What you would do can
+only interfere with them. And it may lead directly to his death."
+
+She paused, and, with her eyes fixed eagerly on Roddy's face, waited
+for his answer. The men standing in a group behind her nodded
+approvingly. Then they also turned to Roddy and regarded him sternly,
+as though challenging him to resist such an appeal. Roddy found his
+position one of extreme embarrassment. He now saw why Señora Rojas had
+received him in the presence of so large an audience. It was to render
+a refusal to grant her request the more difficult. In the group drawn
+up before him he saw that each represented a certain interest, each
+held a distinctive value. The two daughters were intended to remind
+him that it was against a united family he was acting; Caldwell was to
+recall to him that he was opposing the wishes of his father, and Vega
+and the two officers naturally suggested to whom Señora Rojas referred
+when she said her interests were in the hands of powerful and
+well-equipped friends. Should he tell the truth and say that of the
+plans of the Rojas faction he knew little or nothing, Roddy was sure
+he would not be believed. He was equally certain that if, in private,
+he confided his own plan to Señora Rojas and told her that within the
+next forty-eight hours she might hope to see her husband, she would at
+once acquaint Vega and Caldwell with that fact. And, after the
+confidence made him by Caldwell, what he and Vega might not do to keep
+Rojas off the boards, he did not care to think. He certainly did not
+deem it safe to test their loyalty. He, therefore, determined that as
+it was impossible to tell his opponents the truth, he had better let
+them continue to believe he was a leader in the Rojas party, and that,
+with it, his only purpose was an open attack upon the fortress.
+
+"I need not say," protested Roddy gravely, "that I am greatly
+flattered by your confidence. It makes me very sorry that I cannot be
+equally frank. But I am only a very unimportant member of the great
+organization that has for its leader General Rojas----"
+
+"And I," interrupted Señora Rojas, "am the wife of that leader. Are my
+wishes of no weight?"
+
+"I fear, madame," begged Roddy, in deprecatory tones, "that to
+millions of Venezuelans General Rojas is considered less as the
+husband than as the only man who can free this country from the hands
+of a tyrant."
+
+At this further sign of what seemed fatuous obstinacy, Señora Rojas
+lost patience.
+
+"A tyrant!" she exclaimed quickly. "I must protest, Mr. Forrester,
+that the word comes strangely from one who has denounced my husband as
+a traitor."
+
+The attack confused Roddy, and to add to his discomfort it was greeted
+by the men in the rear of Señora Rojas with a chorus of approving
+exclamations. Roddy raised his eyes and regarded them gravely. In a
+tone of stern rebuke Señora Rojas continued:
+
+"We have been frank and honest," she said, "but when we cannot tell
+whether the one with whom we treat runs with the hare or the hounds,
+it is difficult."
+
+Again from the men came the murmur of approval, and Roddy, still
+regarding them, to prevent himself from speaking pressed his lips
+tightly together.
+
+Knowing how near Señora Rojas might be to attaining the one thing she
+most desired, his regret at her distress was genuine, and that, in her
+ignorance, she should find him a most objectionable young man he could
+well understand. The fact aroused in him no resentment. But to his
+secret amusement he found that the thought uppermost in his mind was
+one of congratulation that Inez Rojas was more the child of her
+Venezuelan father than of her American mother. Even while he deeply
+sympathized with Señora Rojas, viewed as a future mother-in-law, she
+filled him with trepidation. But from any point he could see no health
+in continuing the scene, and he rose and bowed.
+
+"I am sorry," he said, "but I cannot find that any good can come of
+this. I assure you, you are mistaken in thinking I am of any
+importance, or that I carry any weight with the Rojas party. Believe
+me, I do not. I am doing nothing," he protested gently, "that can
+bring harm to your husband. No one outside of your own family can wish
+more sincerely for his safety."
+
+The chorus of men interrupted him with an incredulous laugh and
+murmurs of disbelief.
+
+Roddy turned upon them sharply.
+
+"We can dispense with the claque," he said. "My interview is with
+Madame Rojas. If you gentlemen have anything to discuss with me later
+you will come out of it much better if that lady is not present. If
+you don't know what I mean," he added significantly, "Caldwell can
+tell you."
+
+Señora Rojas had no interest in any annoyance Roddy might feel toward
+her guests. She recognized only that he was leaving her. She made a
+final appeal. Rising to her feet, she exclaimed indignantly:
+
+"I refuse to believe that against the wishes of myself and my family
+you will persist in this. It is incredible! I can no longer be content
+only to ask you not to interfere--I forbid it."
+
+She advanced toward him, her eyes flashing with angry tears. Roddy, in
+his sympathy with her distress, would have been glad, with a word, to
+end it, but he felt he could not trust to her discretion. Her next
+speech showed him that his instinct was correct. Accepting his silence
+as a refusal, she turned with an exclamation to Pino Vega.
+
+"If you will not listen to a woman," she protested, "you may listen
+to a man." With a gesture she signified Vega. He stepped eagerly
+forward.
+
+"I am at your service," he said.
+
+"Speak to him," Señora Rojas commanded. "Tell him! Forbid him to
+continue."
+
+Roddy received the introduction of Vega into the scene with mixed
+feelings. To the best of his ability he was trying to avoid a quarrel,
+and in his fuller knowledge of the situation he knew that for Señora
+Rojas it would be best if she had followed his wishes, and had brought
+the interview to an end. That Vega, who was planning treachery to
+Rojas, should confront him as the champion of Rojas, stirred all the
+combativeness in Roddy that he was endeavoring to subdue. When Vega
+turned to him he welcomed that gentleman with a frown.
+
+"As the son of this house," Vega began dramatically, "as the
+representative, in his absence, of General Rojas, I forbid you to
+meddle further in this affair."
+
+The demand was unfortunately worded. A smile came to Roddy's eyes, and
+the color in his cheeks deepened. He turned inquiringly to Señora
+Rojas.
+
+"The son of this house," he repeated. "The gentleman expresses himself
+awkwardly. What does he mean?"
+
+Since Inez had entered the room Roddy had not once permitted himself
+to look toward her. Now he heard from where she stood a quick movement
+and an exclamation.
+
+For an instant, a chill of doubt held him silent. Within the very
+hour, she had told him that to keep him loyal to her father she had
+traded on his interest in her. Had she, for the same purpose and in
+the same way, encouraged Vega? To Roddy, she had confessed what she
+had done, and that she loved him. With that he was grandly content.
+But was she still hoping by her promise of marriage to Vega to hold
+him in allegiance, not to herself, but to her father? Was her
+exclamation one of warning? Had he, by his question, precipitated some
+explanation that Inez wished to avoid? He cast toward her a glance of
+anxious inquiry. To his relief, Inez reassured him with a nod, and a
+smile of trust and understanding.
+
+The exchange of glances was lost neither upon Vega nor upon Señora
+Rojas. In turn, they looked at each other, their eyes filled with
+angry suspicion.
+
+What she had witnessed caused Señora Rojas to speak with added
+asperity.
+
+"Colonel Vega has my authority for what he says," she exclaimed. "He
+_is_ the son of this house. He is the future husband of my daughter
+Inez."
+
+The exclamation that now came from Inez was one of such surprise and
+protest that every one turned toward her.
+
+The girl pushed from her the chair on which she had been leaning and
+walked toward her mother. Her eyes were flashing, but her manner was
+courteous and contained.
+
+"Why do you say that?" she asked quietly. "Has Colonel Vega told you
+that, as he has told others? Because it is not true!"
+
+Señora Rojas, amazed and indignant, stared at her daughter as though
+she doubted she had heard her.
+
+"Inez!" she exclaimed.
+
+"It must be set right," said the girl. "Colonel Vega presumes too far
+on the services he has shown my father. I am not going to marry him. I
+have told him so repeatedly. He is deceiving you in this, as he is
+deceiving you in matters more important. He is neither the son of this
+house nor the friend of this house. And it is time that he understood
+that we know it!"
+
+In her distress, Señora Rojas turned instinctively to Vega.
+
+"Pino!" she exclaimed. "You _told_ me! You told me it was her secret,
+that she wished to keep it even from her mother, but that you thought
+it your duty to tell me. Why?" she demanded. "Why?"
+
+Vega, his eyes flaming, in a rage of mortification and wounded vanity
+threw out his arms.
+
+"My dear lady!" he cried, "it was because I hoped! I still hope," he
+protested. "Inez has been poisoned by this man!" He pointed with a
+shaking finger at Roddy. "He has filled her mind with tales against
+me." He turned to Inez. "Is it not true?" he challenged.
+
+Inez regarded him coldly, disdainfully.
+
+"No, it is not true," she said. "It is the last thing he would do.
+Because, until this moment, Mr. Forrester thought that what you told
+him was a fact." She raised her voice. "And he is incapable of
+speaking ill of a man--" she hesitated, and then, smiling slightly as
+though in enjoyment of the mischief she were making, added, "he knew
+was his unsuccessful rival."
+
+Furious, with a triumphant exclamation, Vega turned to Señora Rojas.
+
+"You hear!" he cried. "My rival!"
+
+Inez moved quickly toward Roddy. Placing herself at his side, she
+faced the others.
+
+Her eyes were wide with excitement, with fear at what she was about
+to do. As though begging permission, she raised them to Roddy and,
+timidly stretching out her hand, touched his arm. "Mother," she said,
+"I am going to marry Mr. Forrester!"
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+The silence that greeted the announcement of Inez, was broken in a
+startling fashion. Before her mother could recover from her amazement
+one of the windows to the garden was thrown open, and a man burst
+through it and sprang toward Vega. He was disheveled, breathless; from
+a wound in his forehead a line of blood ran down his cheek. His
+appearance was so alarming that all of those who, the instant before,
+had been staring in astonishment at Inez now turned to the intruder.
+They recognized him as the personal servant of Vega. Without
+considering the presence of the others, the valet spoke as he crossed
+the room.
+
+"The police are in your house," he panted. "They have searched it;
+taken the papers. They tried to stop me." He drew his hand across his
+face and showed it streaked with blood. "But I escaped by the harbor.
+The boat is at the wharf. You have not a moment!" His eyes wandered
+toward Pulido and Ramon, and he exclaimed delightedly, "You also!" he
+cried; "there is still time!"
+
+General Pulido ran to the window.
+
+"There is still time!" he echoed. "By the boat we can reach Quinta
+Tortola at the appointed hour. Colonel Ramon," he commanded, "remain
+with Señor Caldwell. You, Pino, come with me!"
+
+But Vega strode furiously toward Roddy.
+
+"No!" he shouted. "This man first! My honor first!"
+
+At this crisis of his fortunes, Sam Caldwell, much to the surprise of
+Roddy, showed himself capable of abrupt action. He threw his arm
+around the waist of Vega, and ran him to the window.
+
+"Damn your honor!" he shrieked. "You take your orders from _me_! Go to
+the meeting-place!"
+
+Struggling, not only in the arms of Caldwell but in those of Pulido
+and the valet, Vega was borne to the terrace. As he was pushed from
+the window he stretched out his arm toward Roddy.
+
+"When we meet again," he cried, "I kill you!"
+
+Roddy looked after him with regret. More alarming to him than the
+prospect of a duel was the prospect of facing Señora Rojas. For the
+moment Vega and his personal danger had averted the wrath that Roddy
+knew was still to come, but with the departure of Vega he saw it could
+no longer be postponed. He turned humbly to Señora Rojas. The scene
+through which that lady had just passed had left her trembling; but
+the sight of Roddy confronting her seemed at once to restore her
+self-possession. Anxiously, but in a tone of deep respect, Roddy
+addressed her:
+
+"I have the great honor," he said, "to inform----"
+
+After one indignant glance Señora Rojas turned from him to her
+daughter. Her words sounded like the dripping of icicles.
+
+"You will leave the room," she said. She again glanced at Roddy. "You
+will leave the house."
+
+Not since when, as a child, he had been sent to stand in a corner had
+Roddy felt so guilty. And to his horror he found he was torn with a
+hysterical desire to laugh.
+
+"But, Madame Rojas," he protested hastily, "it is impossible for me to
+leave until I make clear to you----"
+
+In the fashion of the country, Señora Rojas clapped her hands.
+
+"Surely," she exclaimed, "you will not subject me to a scene before
+the servants."
+
+In answer to her summons the doors flew open, and the frightened
+servants, who had heard of the blood-stained messenger, pushed into
+the room. With the air of a great lady dismissing an honored guest
+Señora Rojas bowed to Roddy, and Roddy, accepting the inevitable,
+bowed deeply in return.
+
+As he walked to the door he cast toward Inez an unhappy look of
+apology and appeal. But the smile with which she answered seemed to
+show that, to her, their discomfiture was in no way tragic. Roddy at
+once took heart and beamed with gratitude. In the look he gave her he
+endeavored to convey his assurance of the devotion of a lifetime.
+
+"Good-by," said Inez pleasantly.
+
+"Good-by," said Roddy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On coming to Porto Cabello Sam Caldwell had made his headquarters at
+the home of the United States Consul, who owed his appointment to the
+influence of Mr. Forrester, and who, in behalf of that gentleman, was
+very justly suspected by Alvarez of "pernicious activity." On taking
+his leave of Señora Rojas, which he did as soon as Roddy had been
+shown the door, Caldwell hastened to the Consulate, and, as there
+might be domiciliary visits to the houses of all the Vegaistas,
+Colonel Ramon, seeking protection as a political refugee, accompanied
+him.
+
+The police had precipitated the departure of Vega from the city by
+only a few hours. He had planned to leave it and to join his adherents
+in the mountains that same afternoon, and it was only to learn the
+result of the final appeal to Roddy that he had waited. As they
+hastened through the back streets to the Consulate, Ramon said:
+
+"It was not worth waiting for. Young Forrester told nothing. And why?
+Because he knows nothing!"
+
+"To me," growled Caldwell, "he makes a noise like a joker in the pack.
+I don't mind telling you he's got me listening. He wouldn't have
+thrown up his job and quarrelled with his father and Señora Rojas if
+he wasn't pretty sure he was in right. Vega tells me, three weeks ago
+Roddy went to Curaçao to ask Madame Rojas to help him get her husband
+out of prison. Instead, she turned him down _hard_. But did that phase
+him? No! I believe he's still working--working at this moment on some
+plan of his own to get Rojas free. Every night he goes out in his
+launch with young De Peyster. Where do they go? They _say_ they go
+fishing. Well, maybe! We can't follow them, for they douse the lights
+and their motor is too fast for us. But, to me, it looks like a
+rescue, for the only way they could rescue Rojas would be from the
+harbor. If they have slipped him tools and he is cutting his way to
+the water, some dark night they'll carry him off in that damned
+launch. And then," he exclaimed angrily, "where would I be? That old
+Rip Van Winkle has only got to show his face, and it would be all over
+but the shouting. He'd lose us what we've staked on Vega, and he'd
+make us carry out some of the terms of our concession that would cost
+us a million more."
+
+Ramon exclaimed with contempt.
+
+"Forrester!" he cried. "He is only a boy!"
+
+"Any boy," snapped Caldwell impatiently "who is clever enough to get
+himself engaged to the richest girl in Venezuela, under the guns of
+her mother and Pino Vega, is old enough to vote. I take my hat off to
+him."
+
+The Venezuelan turned his head and looked meaningly at Caldwell; his
+eyes were hard and cruel.
+
+"I regret," he said, "but he must be stopped."
+
+"No, you don't!" growled Caldwell; "that's not the answer. We won't
+stop _him_. We'll let _him_ go! It's the other man we'll stop--Rojas!"
+
+"Yes, yes!" returned Ramon eagerly. "That is the only way left. Rojas
+must die!"
+
+"Die!" laughed Caldwell comfortably. "Not a bit like it! I'm rather
+planning to improve his health." He stopped and glanced up and down
+the narrow street. It was empty. He laid his hand impressively on the
+arm of the Venezuelan.
+
+"To-day," he whispered, "some one will send a letter--an anonymous
+letter--to San Carlos, telling the Commandante why General Rojas would
+be more comfortable in another cell."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From Miramar, Roddy returned directly to his house. On the way he
+found the city in a ferment; all shops had closed, the plazas and
+cafés were crowded, and the Alameda was lined with soldiers. Wherever
+a few men gathered together the police ordered them to separate; and
+in the driveways, troopers of Alvarez, alert and watchful, each with
+his carbine on his hip, rode slowly at a walk, glancing from left to
+right. At his house, Roddy found gathered there all of the White Mice:
+Peter, McKildrick, Vicenti and Pedro. They had assembled, he supposed,
+to learn the result of his visit to Miramar, but they were concerned
+with news more important. Vicenti had called them together to tell
+them that, at any moment, the Rojas faction might rise and attempt to
+seize the city and San Carlos. The escape of Vega, and the fact, which
+was now made public, that he had proclaimed himself in revolt, had
+given the Rojas faction the opportunity for which it had been waiting.
+The city was denuded of Government troops. For hours they had been
+pouring out of it in pursuit of Vega and his little band of
+revolutionists; and until reënforcements should arrive from Caracas,
+which might not be in twenty-four hours, the city was defenseless. The
+moment for the Rojas party had come.
+
+But Vicenti feared that the assault on San Carlos would result, not
+only in the death of many of those who attacked it, but also would be
+the signal on the inside for the instant assassination of Rojas. It
+therefore was imperative, before the attack was made, to get Rojas out
+of prison. He dared not inform even the leaders of the Rojas party of
+the proposed rescue. It must be attempted only by those who could be
+absolutely trusted, those already in the secret. And it was for that
+purpose he had called the White Mice together. When Roddy arrived they
+had, subject to his approval, arranged their plan. From what Vicenti
+had learned, the assault on the fortress would be made at midnight. It
+was accordingly agreed that at nine o'clock, when it would be quite
+dark, they would blow open the wall. Roddy, McKildrick and Peter would
+dine together at Roddy's house, and at eight, in the launch, would
+leave his wharf. Pedro, whose presence would assure General Rojas of
+the good intentions of the others, was directed to so arrange his
+departure from Miramar as to arrive by the shore route at the wharf in
+time to accompany them. And Vicenti, who had set his watch with
+McKildrick's, was at once to inform General Rojas of what was expected
+to happen, and at nine o'clock, when the wall fell, to rush with him
+through the breach.
+
+In the _patio_ the men, standing and in silence, drank to the success
+of their undertaking, and then, after each had shaken hands with the
+others, separated. By Roddy's orders Pedro was to inform Inez of their
+plan and to tell her that, if the Rojas party, in its attack upon the
+city, was successful, her father might that night sleep at Miramar.
+If, after his release, the issue were still in doubt, the launch would
+carry him to Curaçao.
+
+Vicenti left for San Carlos. In case it should be necessary to make
+the dash to Willemstad, Peter remained at the house to collect for the
+voyage provisions, medicine, stimulants, casks of water, and
+McKildrick and Roddy departed in the launch to lay the mine which was
+to destroy the barrier. On their way they stopped at the light-house,
+where McKildrick collected what he wanted for that purpose. It was now
+four o'clock in the afternoon, and by five they had entered the tunnel
+and reached the wall. McKildrick dug a hole in the cement a few feet
+above the base, and in this shoved a stick of dynamite of sixty per
+cent. nitro, and attached a number six cap and a fuse a foot long.
+This would burn for one minute and allow whoever lighted it that
+length of time to get under cover. In case of a miss-fire, he had
+brought with him extra sticks, fuses and caps. These, with drills and
+a sledge-hammer, they hid in a corner of the wall.
+
+In the damp darkness of the tunnel it was difficult to believe that
+outside the sun was still shining.
+
+"If it were only night!" said Roddy. "I hate to leave it. I'd only
+have to touch a match to that, and he'd be free."
+
+"Free of the cell," assented McKildrick, "but we could never get him
+away. The noise will bring the whole garrison. It will be like heaving
+a brick into a hornets' nest. We must wait for darkness. This is no
+matinée performance."
+
+On the return trip to the city they sat in silence, the mind of each
+occupied by his own thoughts. How serious these thoughts were neither
+cared to confess in words, but as they passed under the guns of the
+fortress they glanced at each other and smiled.
+
+"You mustn't think, Mac," said Roddy gratefully, "I don't appreciate
+what you're doing. You stand to lose a lot!"
+
+"I can always get another job," returned McKildrick.
+
+"You can't if one of these fellows puts a bullet in you," said Roddy.
+"You know you are making a big sacrifice, and I thank you for it."
+
+McKildrick looked at him in some embarrassment.
+
+"You stand to lose more than any of us," he said. "I'm told you are to
+be congratulated." His eyes were so full of sympathy and good feeling
+that Roddy held out his hand.
+
+"You're the first one to do it," he said happily; "and it's good to
+hear. Mac!" he exclaimed, in awe-struck tones, "I'm the happiest,
+luckiest, and the least deserving beggar in all the world!"
+
+McKildrick smiled dryly.
+
+"I seem to have heard something like that before," he said.
+
+"Never!" cried Roddy stoutly. "Other poor devils may have thought so,
+but I _know_. It never happened to any one but me!"
+
+McKildrick turned his eyes seaward and frowned,
+
+"I even used the same lines myself once," he said; "but I found I'd
+got hold of some other fellow's part. So if anything _should_ come my
+way to-night it wouldn't make such a lot of difference."
+
+Roddy took one hand from the wheel and, leaning forward, touched
+McKildrick on the knee.
+
+"I'm sorry," he said; "I didn't know."
+
+McKildrick nodded, and as though glad of an interruption, held up his
+hand.
+
+"Listen!" he cried. "Stop the engine!"
+
+Roddy let the launch slip forward on her own headway. In the silence
+that followed they heard from the city the confused murmur of a mob
+and the sharp bark of pistols. They looked at each other
+significantly.
+
+"The surface indications seem to show," said McKildrick, "that things
+are loosening up. I guess it's going to be one of those nights!"
+
+As they rounded the point and the whole of the harbor front came into
+view, they saw that the doors of the bonded warehouses had been broken
+open, and that the boxes and bales they contained had been tumbled out
+upon the wharf and piled into barricades. From behind these, and from
+the windows of the custom-house, men not in uniform, and evidently of
+the Rojas faction, were firing upon the tiny gun-boat in the harbor,
+and from it their rifle-fire was being answered by an automatic gun.
+With full speed ahead, Roddy ran the gauntlet of this cross-fire, and
+in safety tied up to his own wharf.
+
+"Go inside," he commanded, "and find out what has happened. And tell
+Peter we'll take his cargo on board now. Until we're ready to start
+I'll stay by the launch and see no one tries to borrow her."
+
+Peter and McKildrick returned at once, and with gasoline, tins of
+biscuit and meat, and a cask of drinking water, stocked the boat for
+her possible run to Curaçao. The Rojas party, so Peter informed them,
+had taken the barracks in the suburbs and, preliminary to an attack on
+the fortress, had seized the custom-house which faced it; but the
+artillery barracks, which were inside the city, were still in the
+hands of the government troops. Until they were taken, with the guns
+in them, the Rojas faction were without artillery, and against the
+fortress could do nothing. It was already dusk, and, in half an hour,
+would be night. It was for this the Rojas crowd were waiting. As yet,
+of Vega and his followers no news had reached the city. But the
+government troops were pursuing him closely, and it was probable that
+an engagement had already taken place.
+
+"By this time," said Roddy, "Vicenti has told Rojas, and in an hour
+Pedro will arrive, and then we start. Go get something to eat, and
+send my dinner out here. I've some tinkering to do on the engine."
+
+Before separating, McKildrick suggested that Peter and Roddy should
+set their watches by his, which was already set to agree with
+Vicenti's.
+
+"For, should anything happen to me," he explained, "you boys must blow
+up the wall, and you must know just when you are to do it. Roddy knows
+_how_ to do it, and," he added to Peter, "I'll explain it to you while
+we're at dinner."
+
+They left Roddy on his knees, busily plying his oil-can, and crossed
+the garden. In the _patio_ they found the table ready for dinner, and
+two lamps casting a cheerful light upon the white cloth and flashing
+from the bottle of red Rioja.
+
+As they seated themselves, one of the stray bullets that were singing
+above the housetops dislodged a tile, and the pieces of red clay fell
+clattering into the court-yard. Peter reached for the claret and, with
+ostentatious slowness, filled McKildrick's glass.
+
+"Dynasties may come," he said, "and dynasties may go; but I find one
+always dines."
+
+"Why not?" replied McKildrick. "Napoleon said an army is a collection
+of stomachs. Why should you and I pretend to be better soldiers than
+Napoleon's?"
+
+As a signal to the kitchen he clapped his hands; but the servant who
+answered came not from the kitchen, but from the street. His yellow
+skin was pale with fright. He gasped and pointed into the shadow at a
+soldier who followed him. The man wore the uniform of a hospital
+steward and on his arm the badge of the Red Cross. He stepped forward
+and, glancing with concern from Peter to McKildrick, saluted
+mechanically.
+
+"Doctor Vicenti!" he exclaimed; "he wishes to see you. He is outside
+on a stretcher. We are taking him to the hospital, but he made us
+bring him here first." The man shook his head sharply. "He is dying!"
+he said.
+
+In this sudden threat of disaster to their plan the thought of both
+the conspirators was first for Rojas.
+
+"My God!" cried Peter, and stared helplessly at the older man.
+
+"Dying?" protested McKildrick. "I saw him an hour ago; he was----"
+
+"He was caring for the wounded in the streets. He was shot," answered
+the man gravely, laying his finger on his heart, "here!"
+
+"Caring for the wounded!" cried McKildrick. "Why in hell wasn't
+he----"
+
+"Be quiet!" warned Peter.
+
+McKildrick checked himself and, followed by Peter, ran to the street.
+In the light from the open door he saw an army stretcher, and on it a
+figure of a man covered with a blanket. An officer and the soldiers
+who had borne the stretcher stood in the shadow. With an exclamation
+of remorse and sympathy, McKildrick advanced quickly and leaned
+forward. But the man on the stretcher was not Vicenti. To make sure,
+McKildrick bent lower, and in an instant the stranger threw out his
+arms and, clasping him around the neck, dragged him down. At the same
+moment the stretcher bearers fell upon him from the rear, and,
+wrenching back his arms, held them together until the officer clasped
+his wrists with handcuffs. From Peter he heard a muffled roar and,
+twisting his head, saw him rolling on the sidewalk. On top of him were
+a half-dozen soldiers; when they lifted him to his feet his wrists
+also were in manacles.
+
+McKildrick's outbursts were silenced by the officer.
+
+"You need not tell me you are Americans," he said, "and if you go
+quietly no harm will come. We wish only to keep you out of mischief."
+
+"Go?" demanded Peter. "Go where?"
+
+"To the _cartel_," said the officer, smiling. "You will be safer
+there."
+
+He stepped into the light and waved his sword, and from across the
+street came running many more soldiers. A squad of these the officer
+detailed to surround his prisoners. To the others he said: "Search the
+house. Find the third one, Señor Forrester. Do not harm him, but," he
+added meaningly, "bring him with you!"
+
+At the word, Peter swung his arms free from the man who held them.
+With a yell of warning, which he hoped would reach Roddy, and pulling
+impotently at his handcuffs, he dashed into the house, the soldiers
+racing at his heels.
+
+Roddy had finished his inspection of his engine, but was still
+guarding the launch, waiting with impatience for some one to bring him
+his dinner. He was relieved to note that from the direction of Miramar
+there was no sound of fighting. In the lower part of the city he could
+hear a brisk fusillade, but, except from the custom-house, the firing
+had more the sound of street fighting than of an organized attack.
+From this, he judged the assault on the artillery barracks had not yet
+begun. He flashed his electric torch on his watch, and it showed half
+past seven. There was still a half-hour to wait. He rose and, for the
+hundredth time, spun the wheel of his engine, examined his revolver,
+and yawned nervously. It was now quite dark. Through the trees and
+shrubs in the garden he could see the lights on the dinner-table and
+the spectacle made him the more hungry. To remind the others that he
+was starving, he gave a long whistle. It was at once cautiously
+answered, to his surprise, not from the house but from a spot a
+hundred feet from him, on the shore of the harbor. He decided, as it
+was in the direction one would take in walking from Miramar, that
+Pedro had arrived, and he sighed with relief. He was about to repeat
+his signal of distress when, from the _patio_, there arose a sudden
+tumult. In an instant, with a crash of broken glass and china, the
+lights were extinguished, and he heard the voice of Peter shrieking
+his name. He sprang from the launch and started toward the garden. At
+that moment a heavy body crashed upon the gravel walk, and there was
+the rush of many feet.
+
+"Roddy!" shrieked the voice of Peter, "they're taking us to jail.
+They're coming after _you_. Run! Run like hell!"
+
+In the darkness Roddy could see nothing. He heard what sounded like an
+army of men trampling and beating the bushes. His first thought was
+that he must attempt a rescue. He jerked out his gun and raced down
+the wharf. Under his flying feet the boards rattled and Peter heard
+him coming.
+
+"Go back!" he shrieked furiously. "You can't help us! You've got work
+to do! Do it!"
+
+The profanity with which these orders were issued convinced Roddy that
+Peter was very much in earnest and in no personal danger.
+
+The next moment he was left no time for further hesitation. His flying
+footsteps had been heard by the soldiers as well as by Peter, and from
+the garden they rushed shouting to the beach. Against such odds Roddy
+saw that to rescue Peter was impossible, while at the same time, even
+alone, he still might hope to rescue Rojas.
+
+He cast loose the painter of the launch, and with all his strength
+shoved it clear. He had apparently acted not a moment too soon, for a
+figure clad in white leaped upon the wharf and raced toward him. Roddy
+sprang to the wheel and the launch moved slowly in a circle. At the
+first sound of the revolving screw there came from the white figure a
+cry of dismay. It was strangely weak, strangely familiar, strangely
+feminine.
+
+"Roddy!" cried the voice. "It is I, Inez!"
+
+With a shout of amazement, joy, and consternation, Roddy swung the
+boat back toward the shore, and by the breadth of an oar-blade cleared
+the wharf. There was a cry of relief, of delight, a flutter of skirts,
+and Inez sprang into it. In an agony of fear for her safety, Roddy
+pushed her to the bottom of the launch.
+
+"Get down!" he commanded. "They can see your dress. They'll fire on
+you."
+
+From the shore an excited voice cried in Spanish "Do I shoot,
+sergeant?"
+
+"No!" answered another. "Remember your orders!"
+
+"But he escapes!" returned the first voice, and on the word there was
+a flash, a report, and a bullet whined above them. Another and others
+followed, but the busy chug-chug of the engine continued undismayed
+and, as the noise of its progress died away, the firing ceased. Roddy
+left the wheel, and, stooping, took Inez in his arms. Behind them the
+city was a blaze of light, and the sky above it was painted crimson.
+From the fortress, rockets, hissing and roaring, signalled to the
+barracks; from the gun-boat, the quick-firing guns were stabbing the
+darkness with swift, vindictive flashes. In different parts of the
+city incendiary fires had started and were burning sullenly, sending
+up into the still night air great, twisting columns of sparks. The
+rattle of musketry was incessant.
+
+With his arm about her and her face pressed to his, Inez watched the
+spectacle unseeingly. For the moment it possessed no significance.
+And for Roddy, as he held her close, it seemed that she must feel his
+heart beating with happiness. He had never dared to hope that such a
+time would come, when they would be alone together, when it would be
+his right to protect and guard her, when, again and again, he might
+try to tell her how he loved her. Like one coming from a dream, Inez
+stirred and drew away.
+
+"Where are we going?" she whispered.
+
+"We're going to the tunnel to save your father," answered Roddy.
+
+The girl gave a little sigh of content and again sank back into the
+shelter of his arm.
+
+They passed the fortress, giving it a wide berth, and turned in toward
+the shore. The city now lay far to the right, and the clamor of the
+conflict came to them but faintly.
+
+"Tell me," said Roddy, "why did you come to the wharf?" He seemed to
+be speaking of something that had happened far back in the past, of a
+matter which he remembered as having once been of vivid importance,
+but which now was of consequence only in that it concerned her.
+
+Reluctantly Inez broke the silence that had enveloped them.
+
+"They came to the house and arrested Pedro," she said. To her also
+the subject seemed to be of but little interest. She spoke as though
+it were only with an effort she could recall the details. "I knew you
+needed him to convince father you were friends. So, as he could not
+come, I came. Did I do right?"
+
+"Whatever you do is right," answered Roddy. "We might as well start
+life with that proposition as a fixed fact."
+
+"And do you want me with you now?" whispered the girl.
+
+"Do I want you with me!" Roddy exclaimed, in mock exasperation. "Don't
+provoke me!" he cried. "I am trying," he protested, "to do my duty,
+while what I would like to do is to point this boat the other way, and
+elope with you to Curaçao. So, if you love your father, don't make
+yourself any more distractingly attractive than you are at this
+moment. If you don't help me to be strong I will run away with you."
+
+Inez laughed, softly and happily, and, leaning toward him, kissed him.
+
+"That's not helping me!" protested Roddy.
+
+"It is for the last time," said Inez, "until my father is free."
+
+"That may not be for months!" cried Roddy.
+
+"It is for the last time," repeated Inez.
+
+Roddy concealed the launch in the cove below El Morro and, taking from
+the locker a flask of brandy and an extra torch, led the way up the
+hill. When they drew near to the fortress, fearing a possible ambush,
+he left Inez and proceeded alone to reconnoitre. But El Morro was
+undisturbed, and as he and McKildrick had left it. He returned for
+Inez, and at the mouth of the tunnel halted and pointed to a place
+well suited for concealment.
+
+"You will wait there," he commanded.
+
+"No," returned the girl quietly, "I will go with you. You forget I am
+your sponsor, and," she added gently, "I am more than that. After
+this, where you go, I go."
+
+As she spoke there came from the wharf of the custom-house, lying a
+mile below them, a flash of flame. It was followed by others, and
+instantly, like an echo, the guns of the fort replied.
+
+"Shrapnel!" cried Roddy. "They've captured the artillery barracks, and
+we haven't a moment to lose!"
+
+He threw himself on the levers that moved the slabs of stone and
+forced them apart. Giving Inez his hand, he ran with her down the
+steps of the tunnel.
+
+"But why," cried Inez, "is there more need for haste now than before?"
+
+Roddy could not tell her the assault of the Rojas party on the
+fortress might lead to a reprisal in the assassination of her father.
+
+"The sound of the cannon," he answered evasively, "will drown out what
+we do."
+
+Roddy was now more familiar with the various windings of the tunnel,
+and they advanced quickly. Following the circles of light cast by
+their torches, they moved so rapidly that when they reached the wall
+both were panting. Roddy held his watch in front of the light and
+cried out with impatience.
+
+"Ten minutes!" he exclaimed, "and every minute--" He checked himself
+and turned to the wall. The dynamite, with the cap and fuse attached,
+was as McKildrick had placed it. For a tamp he scooped up from the
+surface of the tunnel a handful of clay, and this he packed tightly
+over the cap, leaving the fuse free. He led Inez back to a safe
+distance from the wall, and there, with eyes fastened on Roddy's
+watch, they waited. The seconds dragged interminably. Neither spoke,
+and the silence of the tunnel weighed upon them like the silence of a
+grave. But even buried as they were many feet beneath the ramparts,
+they could hear above them the reverberations of the cannon.
+
+"They are firing in half-minute intervals," whispered Roddy. "I will
+try to set off the dynamite when they fire, so that in the casements,
+at least, no one will hear me. When the explosion comes," he directed,
+"wait until I call you, and if I shout to you to run, for God's sake,"
+he entreated, "don't delay an instant, but make for the mouth of the
+tunnel."
+
+Inez answered him in a tone of deep reproach. "You are speaking," she
+said, "to a daughter of General Rojas." Her voice trembled, but, as
+Roddy knew, it trembled from excitement. "You must not think of _me_,"
+commanded the girl. "I am here to help, not to be a burden. And," she
+added gently, her love speaking to him in her voice, "we leave this
+place together, or not at all."
+
+Her presence had already shaken Roddy, and now her words made the
+necessity of leaving her seem a sacrifice too great to be required of
+him. Almost brusquely, he started from her.
+
+"I must go," he whispered. "Wish me good luck for your father."
+
+"May God preserve you both!" answered the girl.
+
+As he walked away Roddy turned and shifted his light for what he knew
+might be his last look at her. He saw her, standing erect as a lance,
+her eyes flashing. Her lips were moving and upon her breast her
+fingers traced the sign of the cross.
+
+[Illustration: Her fingers traced the sign of the cross.]
+
+Roddy waited until his watch showed a minute to nine o'clock. To meet
+the report of the next gun, he delayed a half-minute longer, and then
+lit the fuse, and, running back, flattened himself against the side of
+the tunnel. There was at last a dull, rumbling roar and a great crash
+of falling rock. Roddy raced to the sound and saw in the wall a
+gaping, black hole. Through it, from the other side, lights showed
+dimly. In the tunnel he was choked with a cloud of powdered cement. He
+leaped through this and, stumbling over a mass of broken stone, found
+himself in the cell. Except for the breach in the wall the explosion
+had in no way disturbed it. The furniture was in place, a book lay
+untouched upon the table; in the draft from the tunnel the candles
+flickered drunkenly. But of the man for whom he sought, for whom he
+was risking his life, there was no sign. With a cry of amazement and
+alarm Roddy ran to the iron door of the cell. It was locked and
+bolted. Now that the wall no longer deadened the sound his ears were
+assailed by all the fierce clamor of the battle. Rolling toward him
+down the stone corridor came the splitting roar of the siege guns, the
+rattle of rifle fire, the shouts of men. Against these sounds, he
+recognized that the noise of the explosion had carried no farther than
+the limits of the cell, or had been confused with the tumult
+overhead. He knew, therefore, that from that source he need not fear
+discovery. But in the light of the greater fact that his attempt at
+rescue had failed, his own immediate safety became of little
+consequence. He turned and peered more closely into each corner of the
+cell. The clouds of cement thrown up by the dynamite had settled; and,
+hidden by the table, Roddy now saw, huddled on the stone floor, with
+his back against the wall, the figure of a man. With a cry of relief
+and concern, Roddy ran toward him and flashed his torch. It was
+Vicenti. The face of the young doctor was bloodless, his eyes wild and
+staring. He raised them imploringly.
+
+"Go!" he whispered. His voice was weak and racked with pain. "Some one
+has betrayed us. They know everything!"
+
+Roddy exclaimed furiously, and, for an instant, his mind was torn with
+doubts.
+
+"And you!" he demanded. "Why are you here?"
+
+Vicenti, reading the suspicion in his eyes, raised his hands; the
+pantomime was sufficiently eloquent. In deep circles around his wrists
+were new, raw wounds.
+
+"They tried to make me tell," he whispered. "They think you're coming
+in the launch. You, with the others. When I wouldn't answer, they put
+me here. It was their jest. You were to find me instead of the other.
+They are waiting now on the ramparts above us, waiting for you to come
+in the launch. They know nothing of the tunnel."
+
+Roddy's eyes were fixed in horror on the bleeding wrists.
+
+"They tortured you!" he cried.
+
+"I fainted. When I came to," whispered the doctor, "I found myself
+locked in here. For God's sake," he pleaded, "save yourself!"
+
+"And Rojas?" demanded Roddy.
+
+"That is impossible!" returned Vicenti, answering Roddy's thought. "He
+is in another cell, far removed, the last one, in this corridor."
+
+"In _this_ corridor!" demanded Roddy.
+
+Vicenti feebly reached out his hand and seized Roddy's arm.
+
+"It is impossible!" he pleaded. "You can't get out of this cell."
+
+"I will get out of it the same way I got in," answered Roddy. "Can you
+walk?"
+
+With his eyes, Vicenti measured the distance to the breach in the
+wall.
+
+"Help me!" he begged.
+
+Roddy lifted him to his feet and, with his arm around him, supported
+him into the tunnel. From his flask he gave him brandy, and Vicenti
+nodded gratefully.
+
+"Further on," directed Roddy, "you will find Señorita Rojas. Tell her
+she must go at once. Don't let her know that I am going after her
+father."
+
+"It is madness!" cried Vicenti. "The turnkey is in the corridor, and
+at any moment they may come to assassinate Rojas."
+
+"Then I've no time to waste," exclaimed Roddy. "Get the Señorita and
+yourself out of the tunnel, and get out _quick_!"
+
+"But you?" pleaded Vicenti. "You can do nothing."
+
+"If I must," answered Roddy, "I can blow the whole damn fort to
+pieces!"
+
+He ran to the spot where McKildrick had placed the extra explosives.
+With these and the hand-drill, the sledge, and carrying his hat filled
+with clay, he again climbed through the breach into the cell. The
+fierceness of the attack upon the fort had redoubled, and to repulse
+it the entire strength of the garrison had been summoned to the
+ramparts, leaving, so far as Roddy could see through the bars, the
+corridor unguarded. The door of the cell hung on three trunnions, and
+around the lowest hinge the weight of the iron door had loosened the
+lead and cement in which, many years before, it had been imbedded.
+With his drill, Roddy increased the opening to one large enough to
+receive the fingers of his hand and into it welded a stick of
+dynamite. To this he affixed a cap and fuse, and clapping on his tamp
+of clay, lit the fuse, and ran into the tunnel. He had cut the fuse to
+half-length, and he had not long to wait. With a roar that shook the
+cell and echoed down the corridor, that portion of the wall on which
+the bars hung was torn apart, and the cell door, like a giant
+gridiron, fell sprawling across the corridor. Roddy could not restrain
+a lonely cheer. So long as the battle drowned out the noise of the
+explosions and called from that part of the prison all those who might
+oppose him, the rescue of Rojas again seemed feasible. With another
+charge of dynamite the last cell in the corridor could be blown open,
+and Rojas would be free. But Roddy was no longer allowed, undisturbed,
+to blast his way to success. Almost before the iron door had struck
+the floor of the corridor there leaped into the opening the burly
+figure of the turnkey. In one hand he held a revolver, in the other a
+lantern. Lifting the lantern above his head, he stood balancing
+himself upon the fallen grating. Hanging to his belt, Roddy saw a
+bunch of keys. The sight of the keys went to his head like swift
+poison. For them he suddenly felt himself capable of murder. The dust
+hung in a cloud between the two men, and before the turnkey could
+prepare for the attack Roddy had flung himself on him and, twisting
+the bones of his wrist, had taken the revolver. With one hand on the
+throat of the turnkey he shoved the revolver up under his chin until
+the circle of steel sank into the flesh.
+
+"Don't cry out!" whispered Roddy. "Do as I tell you, or I'll blow your
+head off. Take me to the cell of General Rojas!"
+
+Brave as the man had been the moment before, the kiss of the
+cold muzzle turned his purpose to ice. The desire to live was
+all-compelling. Choking, gasping, his eyes rolling appealingly, he
+nodded assent. With the revolver at his back he ran down the corridor,
+and, as he ran, without further direction, fumbled frantically at his
+keys. At the end of the corridor he separated one from the others, and
+with a trembling hand unlocked and pushed open a cell door.
+
+The cell was steeped in darkness. Roddy threw the turnkey sprawling
+into it, and with his free hand closed his fingers over the key in the
+lock.
+
+"General Rojas!" he called. "Come out! You are free!"
+
+A shadowy figure suddenly confronted him; out of the darkness a voice,
+fearless and unshaken, answered.
+
+"What do you wish with me?" demanded the voice steadily. "Is this
+assassination? Are you my executioner?"
+
+"Good God, no!" cried Roddy. "Fifty-four, four! I'm the man that gave
+you the warning. The tunnel!" he cried. "The tunnel is open." He
+shoved the butt of the revolver toward the shadow. "Take this!" he
+commanded; "if I've lied to you, shoot me. But come!"
+
+General Rojas stepped from the cell, and with a cry of relief Roddy
+swung to the iron door upon the turnkey and locked it. The act seemed
+to reassure the older man, and as the glare of the lanterns in the
+corridor fell upon Roddy's face the eyes of the General lit with hope
+and excitement. With a cry of remorse he held out the revolver.
+
+"I was waiting to die," he said. "Can you forgive me?"
+
+"Can you run?" was Roddy's answer.
+
+With the joyful laugh of a boy, the General turned and, refusing
+Roddy's arm, ran with him down the corridor. When he saw the fallen
+grating he gave a cry of pleasure, and at the sight of the breach in
+the wall he exclaimed in delight.
+
+"It is good!" he cried. "It is well done."
+
+Roddy had picked up the turnkey's lantern and had given it to General
+Rojas. Lowering it before him, the old soldier nimbly scaled the mass
+of fallen masonry, and with an excited, breathless sigh plunged into
+the tunnel.
+
+As he did so, in his eyes there flashed a circle of light; in his ears
+there sounded a cry, in its joy savage, exultant, ringing high above
+the tumult of the battle. The light that had blinded him fell
+clattering to the stones; in the darkness he felt himself held
+helpless, in strong, young arms.
+
+"Father!" sobbed the voice of a girl. "Father!"
+
+Like a coach on the side-lines, like a slave-driver plying his whip,
+Roddy, with words of scorn, of entreaty, of encouragement, lashed them
+on toward the mouth of the tunnel and, through the laurel, to the
+launch. Acting as rear-guard, with a gun in his hand he ran back to
+see they were not pursued, or to forestall an ambush skirmished in
+advance. Sometimes he gave an arm to Vicenti, sometimes to the
+General; at all times he turned upon them an incessant torrent of
+abuse and appeal.
+
+"Only a minute longer," he begged, "only a few yards further. Don't
+let them catch us in the last inning! Don't let them take it from you
+in the stretch! Only a few strokes more, boys," he cried frantically,
+"and I'll let you break training. Now then, all of you! Run! Run!"
+
+Not until they were safely seated in the launch, and her head was
+pointed to the open sea, did he relax his vigilance, or share in their
+rejoicing.
+
+But when the boat sped forward and the shore sank into darkness he
+heaved a happy, grateful sigh.
+
+"If you've left anything in that flask, Vicenti," he said, "I would
+like to drink to the family of Rojas."
+
+The duel between the city and the fort had ceased. On the man-of-war
+and on the ramparts of the fortress the guns were silent. From the
+city came a confusion of shouts and cheers. In his excitement, Roddy
+stood upright.
+
+"It sounds as though you had won, sir!" he cried.
+
+"Or that they have exhausted their ammunition!" answered the General.
+The answer was not long in coming.
+
+From the deck of the gun-boat there sprang into the darkness the
+pointing finger of a search-light. It swept the wharves, showing them
+black with people; it moved between the custom-house and the fort, and
+disclosed the waters of the harbor alive with boats, loaded to the
+gunwale with armed men. Along the ramparts of the fort the shaft of
+light crept slowly, feeling its way, until it reached the flag-staff.
+There it remained, stationary, pointing. From the halyards there
+drooped a long, white cloth.
+
+With a cheer, Roddy spun the wheel, and swung the bow of the launch
+toward Miramar.
+
+"You needn't go to Curaçao to-night, General!" he cried. "This city
+votes solid for Rojas!"
+
+From the wharves to the farthest limits of the town the cheers of
+victory swept in a tidal wave of sound. With one accord the people,
+leaping, shouting, dancing, and cheering, raced into the Alameda.
+
+"To Miramar," they shrieked, "to Miramar! _Viva Rojas!_"
+
+To those in the launch the cheers of triumph carried clearly. The
+intoxication of the multitude was contagious.
+
+"What do you wish?" demanded Roddy breathlessly--"to show yourself to
+the people, or----"
+
+"No!" cried the General, "to my home, to my home!"
+
+When San Carlos surrendered, those in charge of the _cartel_, making a
+virtue of what they knew would soon be a necessity, threw open the
+cells of the political prisoners, and Peter, McKildrick, and Pedro
+found themselves in the street, once more free men. There they learned
+that Vega and his band had been routed, and that Vega, driven back to
+the harbor, had taken refuge on a sailing boat, and was on his way to
+Curaçao.
+
+From Caracas the news was of more momentous interest. The rising of
+the Rojas party in Porto Cabello had led the same faction at the
+capital to proclaim itself in revolt. They found themselves unopposed.
+By regiments the government troops had deserted to the standard of
+Rojas, and Alvarez, in open flight, had reached his yacht, at La
+Guayra, and was steaming toward Trinidad. Already a deputation had
+started for Porto Cabello to conduct Rojas to the capital. But as to
+whether in freeing Rojas Roddy had succeeded or failed, or whether
+Rojas had been assassinated, or had been set at liberty by his
+victorious followers, they could learn nothing.
+
+Only at the home of Señora Rojas could they hear the truth.
+Accordingly, with the rest of the city, they ran to Miramar. The house
+was ablaze with lights, and the Alameda in front of it, the gardens,
+even the long portico were packed with a mad mob of people. Climbing
+to the railings and to the steps of the house itself, men prominent in
+the life of the city called for "_Vivas_" for the new President, for
+Señora Rojas, for the Rojas revolution. Below them, those who had been
+wounded in the fight just over were lifted high on the shoulders of
+the mob, and in it, struggling for a foothold, were many women, their
+cheeks wet with tears, their cries of rejoicing more frantic even than
+those of the men.
+
+For a mad quarter of an hour the crowd increased in numbers, the
+shouting in vehemence; and then, suddenly, there fell a shocked and
+uneasy silence. Men whispered together fearfully. In the eyes of all
+were looks of doubt and dismay. From man to man swept the awful rumor
+that at San Carlos, Rojas had not been found.
+
+It was whispered that, from the fortress, messengers had brought the
+evil tidings. The worst had come to pass. At the last moment the
+defenders of San Carlos had cheated them of their victory. Rojas had
+been assassinated, and his body thrown to the harbor sharks.
+
+From the mob rose a great, moaning cry, to be instantly drowned in
+yells of rage and execration. A leader of the Rojas party leaped to
+the steps of the portico. "Their lives for his!" he shrieked. "Death
+to his murderers! To the fortress!"
+
+Calling for vengeance, those in the garden surged toward the gates;
+but an uncertain yell from the mob in the street halted them. They
+turned and saw upon the balcony above the portico the figure of Señora
+Rojas. With one arm raised, she commanded silence; with the other, she
+pointed to the long window through which she had just appeared.
+Advancing toward the edge of the balcony, the mob saw two young girls
+leading between them, erect and soldierly, a little, gray-haired man.
+
+Amazed, almost in terror, as though it looked on one returning from
+the grave, for an instant there was silence. And then men shrieked and
+sobbed, and the night was rent with their exultant yell of welcome.
+
+With their backs pressed against the railings of the garden, Peter and
+McKildrick looked up at the figures on the balcony with eyes that saw
+but dimly.
+
+"So Roddy got away with it," said Peter. "Pino Vega, please write!
+_Viva_ the White Mice!"
+
+With a voice that shook suspiciously, McKildrick protested.
+
+"Let's get out of this," he said, "or I shall start singing the
+doxology."
+
+An hour later, alone on the flat roof of Miramar, leaning on the
+parapet, were two young people. Above them were the blue-black sky and
+white stars of the tropics; from below rose the happy cheers of the
+mob and the jubilant strains of a triumphant march.
+
+"To-morrow," said Roddy, "I am going to ask your father a favor. I am
+going to ask him for the use for two hours of the cell he last
+occupied."
+
+"And why?" protested Inez.
+
+"I want it for a friend," said Roddy. "Pedro tells me my friend is the
+man who sent word to San Carlos to have the White Mice locked up and
+your father moved into another cell. I want the new Commandante to
+lock my friend in that cell, and to tell him he is to remain there the
+rest of his natural life. Two hours later, the White Mice will visit
+him, and will smile on him through the bars. Then I'll unlock the
+door, and give him his 'passage-money home and a month's wages.' His
+name is Caldwell."
+
+"I had no idea you were so vindictive," said Inez.
+
+"It is rather," said Roddy, "a sense of humor. It makes the punishment
+fit the crime."
+
+He turned, and drawing closer, looked at her wistfully, appealingly.
+
+"Your father," he whispered, "is free."
+
+The girl drew a long breath of happiness.
+
+"Yes," she sighed.
+
+"I repeat," whispered Roddy, "your father is free."
+
+"I don't understand," answered the girl softly.
+
+"Have you forgotten!" cried Roddy, "You forbade me to tell you that I
+loved you until he was free."
+
+Inez looked up at him, and the light of the stars fell in her eyes.
+
+"What will you tell me?" she whispered.
+
+"I will tell you," said Roddy, "the name of a girl who is going to be
+kissed in one second."
+
+                              THE END
+
+
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
+
+Minor changes have been made to correct obvious typesetters' errors;
+otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the author's
+words and intent.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The White Mice, by Richard Harding Davis
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