"Shan't we all go down?" asked Harry.
"I'm afraid it wouldn't be wise," Tom answered. "We can't turn our prisoner loose. On the other hand, if we took him with us, roped as he is, it might stir up a lot of questioning and make some trouble. But Nicolas will know better. What do you say, my boy?"
"I say that Senor Reade is right."
Tom therefore started down into the valley alone. A few half-clad natives lounged in the street. They stared curiously at this stalwart-looking, bronzed young Gringo who walked toward them with alert step.
Two or three of the children, after the custom of their kind, called out for money. Tom, smiling pleasantly, drew forth a few loose American coins that he had with him and scattered them in the road. Then he hastened on to the telegraph station, a squalid-looking little one-room shanty. But the place looked good to Tom, for its wires reached out over the civilized world, and more especially ran to the dear old United States that he was so anxious to reach with a few words.
Tom passed inside, to find a bare-footed, white-clad Mexican soldier at a telegraph desk. The soldier wore the chevrons of a sergeant.
"Sergeant, may I send a telegram from here?" Tom inquired in Spanish.
"Certainly, senor," replied the sergeant, pushing forward a blank. As this telegraph station was a military station, it was under the exclusive control of the soldiery.
Tom picked up the blank and the proffered pencil. He dated the paper, then wrote the name and address of the manager of his and Harry's engineering office in the United States. Below this Reade wrote:
"Hazelton and I are now endeavoring to reach railway and return immediately. If not heard from soon, look us up promptly through Washington."
"Our man will know, from this, if he doesn't hear from us soon," Tom reflected, "that there has been foul play, and that he must turn the matter over to the United States Government at Washington for some swift work by Uncle Sam on our behalf. Once this message gets through to the other end, Harry and I won't have to worry much about being able to get out of Mexico in safety."
The sergeant read the English words through carefully.
"Will the senor pardon me for saying," ventured the telegrapher, "that this message reads much as though yourself and a friend are trying to escape?"
The man spoke in English, though with a Spanish accent.
"What do you mean, Sergeant?" Tom queried, quickly.
"Why should you need to escape, if you are honest men, engaged in honest business?" demanded the sergeant, eyeing Reade keenly.
"Why, it isn't a felony to try to get out of Mexico, is it?" Tom counter-queried.
"That depends," said the sergeant. "It depends, for instance, on why you are leaving."
"We're leaving because we want to," Tom informed him.
"You are Senor Reade, are you not?" pressed the sergeant, after eyeing the telegram once more. "And your friend, who does not appear here in person, is Senor Hazelton? Unless I am wrong, then you are the two engineers whom Don Luis Montez engaged. How do I know that you have any right to leave Mexico? How do I know that you are not breaking a contract?"
"Breaking a contract?" Tom retorted, somewhat indignantly. "Sergeant, we are not contract laborers. We are civil engineers—professional men."
"Nevertheless," replied the sergeant, handing back the telegram into the hands of bewildered. Tom Reade, "I cannot undertake to send this message until it is endorsed with the written approval of Don Luis Montez, your employer."
"Does Don Luis own this side of Mexico, or this wing of the MexicanArmy?" Tom inquired, with biting sarcasm.
"I cannot send the telegram, senor, except as I have stated."
Whereupon the sergeant began firmly, though gently, to push Tom out of the room. Comparing the size and muscular development of the two, it looked almost humorous to see this effort. But Tom, who now realized how hopeless his errand was, allowed himself to be pushed out. Then the door was slammed to and locked behind him.
"Nothing doing!" muttered Reade, in chagrin and dismay. "In fact, much less than nothing! Harry and I will simply have to tramp fifty miles further and find the railway. Great Scott! I doubt if the conductor will even let us aboard his train without a pass signed by Don Luis. Hang the entire state of Bonista!"
Deep in thought, and well-nigh overwhelmed by the complete realization of his defeat, Tom stalked moodily back up among the rocks.
As he turned a sharp, jutting ledge, Tom suddenly recoiled, as a brisk military voice called:
"Para! Quien vive!" (Halt! Who goes there?)
Reade found a Mexican military bayonet pressing against his chest, behind the bayonet a rifle, and to the immediate rear of the rifle a ragged, barefooted young soldier, though none the less a genuine Mexican soldier!
Further back other soldiers squatted on the ground. In their centre sat the scowling Gato, handcuffed and therefore plainly a prisoner.
Harry and Nicolas were also there—not handcuffed, yet quite as plainly prisoners.
"This must be a part of the army that Don Luis also owns!" flashed through Reade's mind.
From behind the group stepped forth a boyish-looking young fellow at whose side dangled a sword. He was a very young lieutenant.
"Are these your men?" inquired Tom.
"Yes," nodded the lieutenant.
"Why have they stopped me?" Tom demanded, calmly.
"On suspicion, senor."
"Suspicion of what?" demanded Reade, his eyes opening wider."Is it suspicious for a foreigner to be walking about in Mexico?"
"I am not here to answer questions, senor," replied the young officer. "You will be good enough not to resist."
"I haven't any intention of resisting," Tom retorted. "I know better than to think that I can thrash the whole Mexican Army that is behind you."
"You are as sensible as I had hoped you would be, senor," continued the lieutenant, with a slight bow.
"But I wish you would tell us why you are holding us," Tom insisted.
"I am not obliged to tell you, senor, and I am not certain that it would be wise of me to do so," the officer answered. "However, I will say that I found your party with a Mexican citizen as a prisoner."
"And you seem to have made a prisoner of the same fellow yourself,"Reade retorted.
"As an officer of the Mexican Army, senor, that is my privilege," came the lieutenant's response. "As to your right, however, to arrest and hold a Mexican citizen, there may be some question. I shall have to satisfy myself on this point before I can release you."
"Why, I'll be wholly frank with you," Tom Reade offered. "This fellow, Gato, is a rascal whom I had occasion to thrash. In revenge for the humiliation he has given me to understand that he would kill me. Last night he held us up at the point of his rifle. Our servant, Nicolas, threw a stone that bowled Gato over. Then, for our own safety, we tied him up and brought him with us."
"Why was it necessary to your safety, senor, since you had the fellow's rifle and his ammunition? You see, I have gained this much from your friend."
"Why was it necessary?" Tom repeated, wonderingly. "Why, Lieutenant, do you feel that we should have turned a deadly enemy loose?"
"But you had no right to arrest him, senor."
"Nor did we arrest him in the sense that you mean, Lieutenant. All we did was to render Gato helpless and bring him along with us until we should have passed out of the bit of country in which he might have been dangerous to our safety."
"How could he be dangerous when you had his weapon?" the lieutenant demanded, argumentatively.
"Why, he had other men out with him. How long would it have taken Gato to find his men and bring them down upon us—three or four guns against one?"
"But did you see his other men at any time in the night?"
"No," Tom admitted.
"Senor, you have made a grave mistake in arresting and holding the man, Gato. You had no right to do so."
"Why, in our own country," Tom protested, "any one may arrest a man who is committing a crime. In our own case we very likely would have lost our lives to bandits if we had not tied Gato and brought him with us."
"Had you tied him and left him behind it might have been different," explained the lieutenant. "But what you did, Senor Reade, was to make an actual arrest, and this you, as an American, had no right to do. Therefore, I shall hold you until this matter has been further inquired into."
It was a bad plight, and there seemed to be no simple way out of it. The young chief engineer began to see that, innocently, and wholly for the purpose of self-protection, he very likely had infringed upon the kinds of rights that foreigners in Mexico do not possess.
"All right, Lieutenant," sighed Tom. "I suppose we shall have to go along with you. Where are you taking us?"
"That will have to be decided," said the officer. "Nowhere for the presents my men are tired and need rest. We will not humiliate you, Senor Reade, by placing you in irons, but I will ask your word of honor that you won't attempt to escape from us."
"I give you that word of honor," said Tom, simply.
"And I have only to remind you, senor, that, if you make the mistake of breaking your word, bullets travel fast and several of my men are sharpshooters."
"I am an American and a gentleman," Reade returned, with offended dignity. "My word of honor is not given to be broken."
"Then you will seat yourself, senor, or stroll about and amuse yourself within the narrow limits of this small camp."
Tom stepped over, rested his hand on Harry's shoulder, then dropped to a seat beside his chum.
"Can you beat it?" Tom demanded, in ready American slang.
"It would be hard to, wouldn't it?" Harry asked, smiling sheepishly.
Pedro Gato turned to regard them with a surly grin. Though handcuffed,Gato seemed to feel that he was now enjoying his own innings.
For an hour or more the soldiers continued to rest. All of them, including the lieutenant, who sat stiffly aloof from his men, rolling and smoking cigarettes.
"I see a bully argument against cigarette smoking," whisperedTom in his chum's ear.
"What is it?" Harry wanted to know.
"All of these fellows are smoking cigarettes. I am proud of myself to feel that I don't belong in their class."
"A year ago Alf Drew would have felt at home in this cigarette-puffing, sallow-faced lot, wouldn't be?" grinned Harry.
"I am glad to say that Alf now knows how measly a cigarette smoker looks," answered Tom.
Alf Drew, as readers of the preceding volume will remember, was a boy addicted to cigarettes, but whom Tom had broken of the stupid habit. Alf was now employed in the engineering offices of Reade & Hazelton.
"There's something coming," announced Reade, presently. "It sounds like a miniature railroad train."
"I wish it were a real one, and that we had our baggage aboard," muttered Harry, with a grimace.
One of the sentries had gone to intercept the approaching object. Instead the soldier now permitted the approaching object to roll into camp. It proved to be Don Luis's big touring car. In the tonneau sat the mine owner and Dr. Carlos Tisco.
"What is this, Senor Reade?" cried Don Luis Montez, in pretended astonishment. "In trouble? Lieutenant, these gentlemen are friends of mine. May I ask you what this means?"
Tom was not deceived by this by-play. He snorted mildly while the young army lieutenant explained why he had detained the engineers.
"But these gentlemen are friends and employes," Don Luis explained. "What they tell you about Gato is quite true. Will you oblige me by releasing these gentlemen, Lieutenant."
The young officer seemed to hesitate.
"It's all a part of the comedy," whispered Tom, and Harry nodded.
"I—I will let these Americanos go, for the present, Don Luis," suggested the lieutenant, "provided you will take them back to your estate, and agree to be responsible for them if they are wanted.
"Thank you very much, Lieutenant. I will readily undertake that," agreed Montez, smiling. "Then come, Senores Reade and Hazelton, and I will interrupt my journey to take you back to safety under a hospitable roof."
"I don't know that I wouldn't rather go with the soldiers," Harry muttered to his chum.
"No!" murmured Reade. "I've heard too much about these Mexican prisons to care anything about going to one. I reckon we'd better go with Don Luis. After we've rid ourselves of military guard, and have reached the Montez estate, we are at least released from our word of honor not to attempt an escape. I guess, Harry, we had better take up with Don Luis's rascally offer."
"Well,caballeros, does it need much discussion to enable you to accept my kindness?" called Montez, banteringly.
"Not at all, Don Luis," Tom made answer. "We're going with you—with the lieutenant's consent."
The young lieutenant bowed his agreement. Tom and Harry lifted their hats lightly to the officer, then stepped into the tonneau of the car.
"Home," said Don Luis.
The chauffeur made a quick turn, and the car speedily left the camp behind.
"I have often heard, gentlemen, that foreigners have difficulty in understanding our laws," observed Don Luis. He spoke affably, but mockery lurked in his tones. "Without realizing it you two have committed a serious offense against our laws. You have ventured to arrest a Mexican citizen."
Nicolas, who sat in front with the chauffeur, sat as stiff and silent as though he had been a figure of stone.
"What will be the outcome of this adventure, under the law?" Tom inquired, dryly.
"It would need one of our judges to say that," replied Don Luis, shrugging his shoulders. "However, I may be able to arrange the matter with the authorities."
"And, if you can't arrange it—?"
"Why, then, I dare say, my friends, you will have to be arrested again. Then you would be taken to one of our prisons until your trial came off. You might even be heldincommunicado, which means that, as prisoners, you would not be allowed to communicate with the outside world—not even with your American government."
"And how long would we be heldincommunicado?" Tom asked.
Don Luis gave another shrug of his shoulders.
"You would be heldincommunicado, Senor Reade, until the judges were ready to try you."
"And that might be years off," Tom muttered.
Don Luis beamed delightedly, while a thin smile curled on Dr. Tisco's lips.
"You are beginning, senor, to get some grasp of Mexican law," laughed Montez.
"In other words, Don Luis," said Tom, dryly, "it's a game wherein you can't possibly lose, and we can remain out of prison only as long as you are gracious enough to will it?"
"That might be rather a strong way of stating the case," murmured the Mexican. "However, after your unlawful act of last night, you undoubtedly are liable to a long confinement in one of our prisons. But believe me, Senor Reade, you may command me as far as my humble influence with our government goes!"
The situation was certainly one to make Tom think hard. He was certain that Don Luis had engineered the whole situation, even to urging Gato on to a part in this grin drama.
"Well, you've got us!" sighed Tom.
"You will find me your best friend, always," protested Montez.
"You have us," Tom continued, "but you haven't our signatures to the report on your mine. That is going to be more difficult."
"Time heals all breaches between gentlemen who should be friends," declared Don Luis, quite graciously.
After that it was a silent party that rode in the touring car. Though the road back to the estate was worthy of no such name as road, the big car none the less "ate up the miles." It was not long before the young engineers caught sight of the big white house.
"Come, gentlemen," begged Don Luis, alighting, and turning to the young engineers with a courtly grace that concealed a world of mockery. "You will find your rooms ready, and my household ready to minister to your comfort."
Tom Reade, as he stepped upon the porch, drew himself up as stiffly as any American soldier could have done.
"We've had to come this far with you, Don Luis," admitted the young engineer, dropping all his former pretense of dry good humor, "but you can't make us live under your roof unless you go so far as to have us seized, tied and carried in."
"I have no intention of being anything but a gracious friend and host," murmured Montez.
"Then, while we probably must stay here," Tom resumed, "we'll leave your place and go to live somewhere in the open near you. We can accept neither your house nor your food."
"Very good," answered Montez, meekly, bowing again. "I will only suggest,caballeros, that you do not attempt to go too far from my house. If you do, the soldiers will surely find you. Then they will not bring you back to me, and you will learn whatincommunicadomeans in our Mexican law.Adios,caballeros!"
"Am I still the servant of the American gentlemen, Don Luis?" asked Nicolas, humbly.
"You may go with them. They will need you, little Nicolas," answeredDon Luis, and watched the three out of sight with smiling eyes.
Montez could afford to be cheerful. He knew that he had triumphed.
"There is one thing about it," remarked Reade, as he rose and stood at the doorway of the tent. "We're not being overworked."
"Nor are we getting awfully rich, as the weeks go by, either," smiled Harry.
"No; but we're puppets in a game that interests me about as much as any that I ever saw played," Tom smiled back.
"This game—interests you?" queried Harry, looking astonished. "That is a new idea to me, Tom. I never knew you to be interested, before, in any game that wasn't directly connected with some great ambition."
"We have a great ambition at present."
"I'd like to know what it is," grumbled Harry. "It's three weeks since that scoundrel, Don Luis, brought us back in triumph. We refused to enter his house as guests, and started to camp in the open in these two old tents that Nicolas secured for us. In all these three weeks we haven't done a tap of work. We haven't studied, or read because we have no books. We sleep, eat, and then sleep some more. When we get tired of everything else we go out and trudge over the hills, being careful not to get too far, lest we run into the guns of Gato and his comrades, for undoubtedly Gato was turned loose as soon as he was lost to our sight. We don't do anything like work, and we're not even arranging any work for the future. Yet you say that you're boosting your ambitions."
"I am," Tom nodded solemnly. "Harry, isn't it just as great an ambition to be an honest engineer as it is to be a highly capable one?"
"Of course."
"Don't capitalists usually invest large sums on a favorable report from engineers?"
"Often."
"And, if the engineers were dishonest the capitalists would lose their money, wouldn't they?"
"Certainly."
"Then here's our ambition, and we're working it out—finely, too," Tom went on, with much warmth. "Don Luis has a scheme to rob some people of a large sum of money by selling them a worthless mine in a country where there are several good ones. If he could get us to help him, to our own dishonor, Don Luis Montez would succeed in swindling this company of men. Harry, we're just lying around here, day after day, doing no hard work, but we're blocking Don Luis's game and saving money for honest men. Don Luis doesn't care to have us assassinated, for he still hopes to break down our resistance. He can't bring the capitalists here to meet us until we do give in, and so the game lags for Don Luis. He can't bring in other engineers, for they'd meet us and we would post them. The American engineer must be a serious problem for Don Luis. He thought he could buy almost any of us. Our conduct has made him afraid that American engineers can't be bought. Evidently he must have his report signed by American engineers of repute, which means that he is trying to sell his worthless mine to Americans. Harry, we're teaching Don Luis to respect the honesty of American engineers; we're saving some of our countrymen from being swindled, probably out of thousands of dollars; we're proving that the American engineer is honest, and we're discouraging rascals everywhere from employing us in crooked work. Now, honestly, isn't all that ambition enough to hold us for a few weeks?"
"I suppose so," Harry agreed. "But what is the end of all this to be. Won't Don Luis merely have us assassinated in the end, if we go on proving stubborn?"
"He may," Tom answered, pressing his lips grimly. "But, if he does, he'll pay heavily for his villainy."
"How?"
"Every man has to pay for his sins."
"That's what we were taught in Sunday school," Harry nodded, "and I've always believed it. Yet here, in these remote mountains of the state of Bonista, if anywhere, Don Luis would appear to be safe. If a few of his men crept up here, late some night, with pistols or knives, and finished us before we had time to wake up, do you imagine that any one hereabouts would dare to make any report of the matter? Would our fate ever reach the outside world?"
"It would be sure to, in time, I believe," Tom answered, thoughtfully.
"How?"
"That I can't tell. But I believe in the invariable triumph of right, no matter how great the odds against it may seem."
"Let right triumph, after we're buried," continued Harry, "and what good would it do us?"
"None, in any ordinary material sense. Yet good would come to the world through our fate, even if only in proclaiming, once more, the sure defeat of all wicked plans in the end."
Harry said no more, just then. Tom Reade, who ordinarily was intensely practical, was also the kind of young man who could perish for an ideal, if need be. Tom went outside, stretching himself on the grass under a tree. He sighed for a book, but there was none, so he lay staring off over the valley below.
Twenty minutes later Harry, after trying vainly to take a nap on a cot in the tent, followed his chum outside.
"Odd, isn't it, Tom?" questioned Hazelton. "We're living what looks like a wholly free life. Nothing to prevent us from tramping anywhere we please on these hills, and yet we know to a certainty that we wouldn't be able to get twenty miles from here before soldiers would have us nabbed, and marching away to a prison from which, very likely, no one in the outside world would ever hear of us again."
"It is queer," agreed Tom, nodding. "Oh, just for one glimpse of Yankee soil!"
"Twice," went on Harry, "we've even persuaded Nicolas to bribe some native to take a letter from us, to be mailed at some distant point. After two or three days Don Luis, in each instance, has come here, and, with a smile, has shown us our own intercepted letter. Yet Nicolas has been honest in the matter, beyond a doubt. It is equally past question that the native whom Nicolas has trusted and paid has made an honest attempt to get away and post our letter; but always the cunning of a Montez overtakes the trusted messenger."
"And one can only guess what has happened to the messengers," Tom said, soberly. "Undoubtedly both of the two poor fellows are now passing the daysincommunicado. It makes a fellow a bit heartsick, doesn't it, chum, to think of the probable fates of two men who have tried to serve us. And what, in the end, is to be the fate of poor little Nicolas? Don Luis Montez is not the sort of man to forgive him his fidelity to us."
"And where's Nicolas, all this time?" suddenly demanded Harry, glancing at his watch. "Why, the fellow hasn't been here for three hours! Where can he be?"
"Quien sabe?" responded Reade, using the common Spanish question, given with a shrug, which means, "Who knows! Who can guess?"
"Can Nicolas have fallen into any harm?" asked Hazelton, a new note of alarm in his voice. "The poor, faithful little fellow! It gives me a shiver to think of his suffering an injury just because he serves us so truly."
"I shall be interested in seeing him get back," Tom nodded thoughtfully.
"And I'm beginning to have a creepy feeling that he won't come back!" cried Harry. "He may at this moment be past human aid, Tom, and that may be but the prelude to our own craftily-planned destruction."
Tom Reade sat up, leaning on one elbow, as he regarded his chum with an odd smile.
"Harry," Tom uttered, dryly, "we certainly have no excuse for being blue when we have such rosy thoughts to cheer us up!"
"Hang Mexico!" grunted Hazelton.
By and by Tom Reade began to grow decidedly restless. He would sit up, look and listen, and then lie down again. Then he would fidget about nervously, all of which was most unusual with him, for Reade's was one of those strong natures that will endure work day and night as long as is necessary, and then go in for complete rest when there is nothing else to do.
Harry did not observe this, for he had gone back into the tent. Two sheets of a Mexican newspaper had come wrapped around one of Nicolas's last food purchases. Hazelton was reading the paper slowly by way of improving his knowledge of Spanish.
At last Tom called, in a low voice:
"Don't worry about me, chum, if you miss me. I'm going to take a little stroll."
"All right, Tom."
Reade did not hurry away. He had to remember that in all probability he was being watched. So he strolled about as though he had no particular purpose in mind. Yet, after some minutes, he gained a point from which he could gaze down the hill-slope toward the little village of huts in which the mine laborers lived.
There were a few small children playing about the one street that ran through the village. A few of the women were out of doors, also, but none of the men were in sight, for these were toiling away at the mine. ThoughEl Sombrerohad so far shown no ore that amounted to anything, Don Luis, while waiting to sell his mine for a fortune, kept hispeonsworking hard in the hope that they might strike some real ore.
After Tom had been gazing for three or four minutes his eves suddenly lighted, for he saw Nicolas come out of one of the huts.
"I wonder what has kept the little fellow so long," Tom murmured. But he turned away with an appearance of listlessness, for, if he were observed, he did not care to have a watcher note his interest in the servant's coming.
So Nicolas passed on toward the tents without having observed Reade.
"I won't get back too soon," Tom decided. "If we are watched at all it wouldn't do to have me appear too much interested in thepeon'sdoings."
Now that his mind was somewhat easier, Tom strolled on once more. His roundabout path took him along among the rocks that littered the ground over the principal tunnels ofEl Sombrero. Hundreds of feet beneath him now toiled some of thepeonswho lived in the village of huts yonder.
Presently Reade increased his speed considerably, deciding that now it would be safe to return directly to camp. Suddenly he stopped short, head up, his gaze directed at the tops of three or four rocks. Some human being had just dodged out of sight at that point.
Tom felt a swift though brief chill. Something had made him suspect that the prowler might be Gato, or one of the latter's companions.
Instead of running away Tom made for the place of hiding in short leaps.
"Hold on there a minute, my friend," Tom called in Spanish. "I think it may be worth my while to look you over."
Just as Reade was ready to bound over the rocks a figure rose as though to meet him. A light leap landed Reade on top of the stranger, who was borne to earth.
"Mercy senor!" begged the other. "Do not be rough with me. I am not strong enough to stand it."
The man spoke Spanish and was well past middle age, of a very spare figure, and his face was very thin, although there was a deep flush on his cheeks.
"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Tom in Spanish. He touched the stranger's cheeks, which were hot with fever.
Then Tom slid off his poor captive and squatted beside him. Reaching for the man's left wrist and resting two fingers on his pulse, Tom added, gently:
"Tell me all about it, senor."
"There is not much to tell," panted the stranger, weakly, for Tom's landing on him had jarred him severely. "I am sick, as you can see."
"Oh, that isn't much," said Tom, blithely. "With decent care you will soon he well. It is plain that you are a gentleman—nopeon. Yonder, some distance, is a house where I think you are very likely to be well taken care of. Don Luis Montez—"
Despite the hectic flush in the cheeks, the stranger's face paled visibly. Tom, always observant, noted this.
"Oh, I see," Reade went on, calmly. "You do not like Don LuisMontez, or you do not care about going to his house."
The stranger gazed up wistfully at the young engineer's kindly face.
"Senor," he asked, "you would not betray me?"
"You mean to Don Luis?"
A weak nod was the answer.
"Rest easy on that score, my friend," Tom begged, dryly. "Don Luis and I are not on the best of terms. I do not like him very well myself."
"Will you help to hide me here, and then go away and be silent?"
"Go away and leave you here?" suggested Reade.
"Yes, senor. It will be a great favor."
"It would be murder," Tom retorted. "Man, you're ill and you need care—nursing. I don't know much about doctoring, but if you have any reason why you don't want Don Luis to know you're here, then I'll do the best I can for you here. I have a chum who'll help me. You have been traveling for some time?" Tom continued, his glance taking in the stranger's well-worn shoes and trousers.
"That is true, yes," nodded the stranger.
"You've been over a rough road, also," Tom continued, "and now you're ill. Your pulse is a hundred and twenty, and you're breathing thirty-two times to the minute. You must have a good bed, be covered comfortably and have plenty of water to drink while we're getting some medicines for you."
"You are indeed kind, but I fear," protested the stranger, "that you will attract attention my way, and then I shall be captured."
Tom studied the face of the sick man keenly.
"I wish you would tell me something about yourself," the young engineer hinted. "It might help me to decide what it is best to do for you."
"Senor," begged the stranger, with a start of dread "it would be a great kindness to me if you would go away and leave me here. Do not come back—and forget that you have seen me."
"It can't be done," replied Tom, with gentle positiveness. "It wouldn't be in American nature to go away and leave a fellow creature to die of helplessness when a little care and nursing ought to put that man on his feet again. But I won't argue with you, for I see the excitement is bringing a deeper flush into your face. Senor, as you are a gentleman trust another gentleman to serve you loyally and not betray you. I am going to leave you for a little while. Will you give me your word to remain here until I return?"
"Yes," nodded the other, weakly.
"I'll wrap this around you," Reade continued, taking off his own blouse and wrapping it around the thin body of the older man. "This will help you a little if you are taken with chills. I shall be back as soon as I can possibly come without attracting attention. Do not be startled if you hear other footsteps than my own. I shall bring with me a friend. I would trust in his hands anything or all that I have in the world. Will you trust me to serve you, senor?"
"I shall trust you," promised the other, simply. "In truth, my young friend, I have many reasons why I could wish to recover of this illness and be well again."
Tom slipped away, then rose to his full height, and resumed his late appearance of lounging along without an object. As he neared the camp he espied Nicolas, whom he had forgotten.
"Our little fellow came back, you see," called Harry, as Tom neared the tents. "What have you been doing?"
"Loafing," yawned Reade, as he strolled up. When he reached the cook tent, however, he stepped inside and the Mexican servant followed him.
"Senor," Nicolas reported, in a whisper, "I think I succeeded in my errand."
"But you do not yet know?" queried Tom.
"How can I know so soon, senor?" questioned Nicolas.
"True," nodded Tom.
Then he stepped outside the tent, remarking: "Our food supply is so low, Nicolas, that I fear you will have to take the basket and go after more."
"It shall be done, senor," promised the servant, and going into the tent appeared a moment later with a basket.
Tom handed him some money.
"I am listening to your orders, senor."
"Oh, you know as well what food to get as I do," Tom rejoined."But," he added, under his voice, "youmustget me some—"
Here Tom added the Spanish names of three or four drugs that he wanted.
"I think I shall be able to get the drugs, senor. Some of thepeonsmust keep them in their houses."
"You must get them, as I said. Now, make good time. I will await your return."
Then Tom drew Harry aside, describing the finding of the fever-stricken stranger.
"Who on earth can he be?" wondered Harry, curiously. "And what can he be doing in this out of the way part of the world?"
"That's his own secret," retorted Tom, dryly; and the man is bent on keeping it. There are only two things that we need to know—one that he is ill, and the other that he is very plainly a gentleman, who would be incapable of repaying our kindness with any treachery. What do you say, Harry? Shall we bring him here and look after him?"
"That's for you to say, Tom."
"It's half for you to say, Harry. Half the risk is also yours, if anything goes wrong."
"Tom, I feel the same way that you do about it," Harry declared, his eyes shining brightly. "A fellow creature in distress is one whom we can't pass by. We can't leave him to die. Such a thing would haunt me as long as I live. When do you want to go after him?"
"Just as soon as it's dark," Reade replied. "That will be within the hour, for here in the tropics night comes soon after the sun sets."
When the time came Tom and Harry left their tent, strolling slowly. It was very dark and the young engineers listened intently as they went along. They found their stranger and lifted him from the ground. He was so slight and frail that he proved no burden whatever. Apparently without having been seen by any one Reade and Hazelton bore their man back to camp.
"Into the cook tent," whispered Reade. "Don Luis, if he should visit us, is less likely to look there than anywhere else."
Into the cook tent they bore the stranger, arranging a bed on the floor, and covering the sick man with such blankets as his condition appeared to call for.
"I am back,caballeros," announced Nicolas, treading softly into the tent. "To the praise of Heaven, be it said, I secured the medicines you told me to get."
Then Nicolas stopped short, gazing wonderingly at the fever-flushed face of the stranger.
"He's a puzzle," remarked Harry, four days later.
"Meaning our sick man?"
"Of course. But he isn't going to be a sick man much longer, thanks to you, Tom. You were born to be a physician."
"Don't you believe it," smiled Reade. "The only previous experience I've had was when I simply had to pull you through out on Indian Smoke Range last winter. Harry, I was afraid you were a goner, and I couldn't let you go. But then, just when you were at your worst I had the best of outside help in pulling you through."
"You mean you got help after you had pulled me out of all danger,"Hazelton retorted. "And now you've pulled our stranger through.Or the next thing to it. His fever is gone, and he's mending."
"Nothing much ailed him, I reckon, but intense anxiety and too little food. Our man is resting, now, and getting strong."
"But he's a mystery to me," Harry continued.
"How so?"
"I can't make anything out of him."
"That's right."
"Do you figure out anything concerning him?" Hazelton inquired.
"I don't want to. It isn't any of my business. Our unknown guest is very plainly a gentleman, and that's enough to know about him. If he hasn't told us anything more then it's because he thinks his affairs are of more importance to himself than to us."
"Oh, of course, I didn't mean that I wanted to pry into his affairs,"Harry protested.
"No; and we won't do it, either, Harry. If our guest should happen to be missing some morning, without even a note of thanks left behind, we'll understand what it cost him to slip away without saying farewell."
The day before Don Luis had made one of his occasional visits, but he had not gone into the cook tent. Even had he done so the mine owner would probably have seen nothing to make him curious. At the further end of the cook tent lay the stranger, and his bed had been curtained off by a dark-colored print curtain that looked as though it might have been placed there to partition off part of the tent. Don Luis had called merely to chat with the young engineers, and to use his keen eyes in determining whether his enforced guests were any nearer to the point of yielding to his demands upon them.
Concerning the sick man, Nicolas had remained wholly silent. He did not offer to go near the sick man, but brought whatever Tom or Harry had called for. To have the sick man on their hands had been a rather welcome break for the young engineers, since it had given them something with which to occupy themselves.
Just before dark on the fifth day, Tom strolled into the cook tent, going to the rear and parting the curtain.
"How do you feel, now?" Reade asked in a whisper.
"Much stronger, senor," came the grateful answer. "Last night, when your servant slept, I rose and walked about the tent a little to find the use of my legs again. To-day, when alone, I did the same thing. By morning I shall be fit to walk once more. Senor, do not think me ungrateful if you come into this tent, some morning, soon, and find my end of it deserted. I shall go, but I shall never forget you."
"You will please yourself, sir," Tom answered, simply. "Yet I beg you not to attempt to leave until you are able to take care of yourself. We shall not think you ungrateful if it be a long time before we hear from you again. Another thing, sir. When you go do not fail to take with you, in your pockets, food enough to last you for some days."
"I—I cannot pay for it," hesitated the stranger. "Nor, for the present, can I offer to pay you back the money you have expended on my medicines."
"Now, who said anything about that?" Tom asked, nearly as gruffly as it was possible for him to speak to a sick man. "Pay for nothing here, sir, and do not worry about it, either. You do not know how much pleasure your coming has given us. We needed something to do needed it with an aching want that would not be stilled. Looking after you, sir, has been a very welcome treat to us."
"You have been kinder to me, senores, than any one has been to me in many years," murmured the stranger, tears starting to his eyes.
"There, there! Forget it," urged Tom.
"Good evening, Don Luis!" sounded Harry's voice outside. "Ah,Dr. Tisco."
"That's our warning to stop talking," whispered Tom in the stranger's ear, then rose and slipped outside the curtain.
"Where is Senor Reade?" inquired Don Luis.
"Any one calling me?" inquired Tom, looking out of the cook tent."Ah, good evening, gentlemen."
Tom stepped outside, offering his hand. As this was the first time of late that he had made any such overture to the mine owner, Montez was quick to grasp the hope that it conveyed.
"You are not comfortable here, Senor Reade," said Don Luis, looking about. "I regret it the more when I remember how much room I have under my poor roof. Why don't you move up there, at once. There are several apartments any one of which you may have."
"On the contrary we are very comfortable here," Tom rejoined, seating himself on the ground. "We have lived the open-air life so much that we are really happier in a tent than we could be in any house."
"I cannot understand why you can feel so about it," murmured the Mexican stepping to the entrance of the larger tent and glancing inside. "I will admit, Senor Reade, that you keep a very tidy house under canvas, and your wants may be extremely simple. But a house offers comforts that cannot possibly be found in a tent like this. And the other is still smaller and more cheerless," he added, crossing into the other tent.
Don Luis was now within arm's length of the thin curtain, and was apparently about to push it aside.
"Won't you come outside," suggested Tom, "and tell me the object of your call this evening? It is too warm in here."
"Gladly," smiled the Mexican, letting go of the curtain, which he had just touched, and wheeling about.
"Hang the rascal!" muttered Tom, inwardly. "Has he gotten wind of the fact that we have a stranger here? Does Don Luis know all about the man? Is he playing on my nerves at this moment?"
But Montez, with an appearance of being wholly interested in Tom Reade, went outside with him. Harry placed campstools for the callers, while the young engineers threw themselves upon the ground. Don Luis Montez, as usual, was to do the talking, while Dr. Tisco's purpose in being present was to use his keen, snapping eyes in covertly studying the faces of the two Americans.
"I have called to say," declared Don Luis, coming promptly to the point, "that within three days a party of American visitors will be here. They come with a view to buying the mine, and I shall sell it to them at a very handsome profit. Before we can deal with these Americans it will be absolutely necessary for me to have that report, signed by you both. Moreover, you must both give me your word of honor that you will meet the Americans, and stand back of that report. That you will do all in your power to make possible the sale of the mine."
"We've discussed all of that before," said Harry, dryly.
"And we shall yet require a little more time before we can give a too definite answer," Tom broke in hastily, to head off his chum.
"But the time is short,caballeros," Don Luis urged, a new light, however, gleaming in his eyes, for this was the first time that the young engineers had shown any likelihood of granting his wishes.
"A great deal can be decided upon in three days, Don Luis," Tom went on, slowly. "You will have to give us a little more time, and we will weigh everything carefully."
"But you believe that you will be ready to meet my views?" DonLuis demanded, eagerly.
"I cannot see how our endorsement of your mine can be of any very great value to you," Tom resumed. "It is hardly likely that any of these capitalists who are coming have ever heard of us. In any case, they are quite likely to feel that we are much too young to be able to form professional opinions of any value."
"You give me your help in the matter," coaxed Montez, "and I will attend to the rest. More,caballeros; stand by me so well that I dispose of the mine, and I will promise you twenty thousand dollars, gold, apiece."
"That is a lot of money," Reade nodded, thoughtfully. "But there are other considerations, too."
"Yes; your liberty and your safety," Montez broke in, quickly, with a meaning smile. "Caballeros, do not for one moment think that I can be hoodwinked, and that you will be safe as soon as you meet your fellow Americans. One single flaw in your conduct, after they arrive, and I assure you that you will be promptly arrested. That would be the end of you. It is always easy for government officers to report that prisoners attempted to escape, and were shot dead because of the attempt. That is exactly what will happen if you do aught to hinder the sale of this mining property."
"Nothing like a clear understanding," smiled Tom, rising, and once more holding out his hand. "Don Luis, it will be enough if we give you our answer by the morning of day after to-morrow? And I will add that I think we shall see our way clear to help along the sale of this mining property at a high figure. Let me see; at what value do you hold it?"
"At two million and a half dollars, Senor Reade."
"I think we can assure your visitors that they are doing well enough," Tom nodded.
"One word more,caballeros," said Montez, as he let go of the young chief engineer's hand. "If you fail us, do not either of you imagine, for a moment, that you have any further lease of life."
"I don't believe we shall fail you," Tom assured the Mexican. "I believe that the visiting Americans will buy. If they don't it won't be our fault."
"And now that we are at such an excellent understanding once more, Senor Reade," proposed the mine owner, "can't we prevail upon you to come up to the house and spend a pleasant evening."
"Thank you," Tom returned, graciously. "But not to-night. I am restless. I must do considerable thinking, and I don't want to talk much. Action is what I crave. If you see us running all over your property, don't imagine that we are trying to run away from here."
"My property is at your disposal," smiled Don Luis. "I shall feel assured that you will not go many miles from here."
The remark covered the fact that Montez had all avenues of escape so well guarded that the young engineers simply could not escape by flight.
Good nights were exchanged, and the visitors, smiling politely, departed.
"Now, why on earth did you talk to Don Luis in that fashion?" Harry demanded, as soon as they were alone. "You know, well enough, that not even the certainty of immediate death would make you accede to his rascally wishes."
"I'm afraid I don't know anything of the sort," Tom drawled. "On the contrary, we may help Montez sell out to the American visitors."
Harry gasped.
"Tom Reade, are you going crazy?"
"Not that I've noticed."
"Then what are you talking about?"
"Harry, I'm tired, and I think you are."
"I'm sick and tired with disgust that Don Luis should think he could use us to bait his money-traps with," Hazelton retorted.
"Let's turn in and get a good night's rest."
"Oh, bother!" retorted the junior engineer. "I couldn't sleep. Tom, I shan't sleep a wink to-night, for dreading that you'll turn rascal-helper. Tell me that you've been joking with me, Tom!"
"But I can't truthfully tell you that," Reade insisted. "I am not joking, and haven't been joking to-night."
"Then I wish you'd open up and tell me a few things."
"Wait," begged Tom. "Wait until I'm sure that the few things will bear telling."
With that much Harry Hazelton found that he would have to be content.He allowed himself to be persuaded to turn in.
Tom Reade was asleep in a few minutes. It was after two in the morning ere Harry, after racking his brains in vain, fell asleep.
The next morning it was found that the stranger in the back of the cook tent had made good his prophecy by vanishing.
Soon after an early breakfast Tom and Harry were afield.
From behind a window in the upper part of his big house, Don Luis, equipped with a powerful field glass, watched them keenly whenever they were in sight.
"What on earth are the Gringos doing?" he wondered, repeatedly. "Are they just walking about, aimlessly? At times it looks like it. At other times it doesn't."
Then Montez sent for Tisco and discussed with him the seeming mystery of the actions of the young engineers.
"Don't ask me, Don Luis," begged the secretary. "I am not clever at guessing riddles. More, I have not pretended to understand this Gringo pair."
"Are they, in the end, going to trick me, Carlos?"
"Who can say?" demanded Dr. Tisco, with a shrug of his shoulders. "Of course, they both know that it will be but a short cut to suicide if they attempt to fool you."
"Their deaths will cause me no anxiety, Carlos, either before or after the sale," murmured Montez. "In fact, my good Carlos—"
"Say it," leered Dr. Tisco, as his employer paused.
"I may as well say it, for you have guessed it, Carlos. Yes, I will say it. Even if this Gringo pair appear honestly to aid me in making the sale—and even if I do make the sale and receive the money—this Gringo pair must die. We know how to arrange that, eh, my staunch Carlos?"
Dr. Tisco shrugged his shoulders.
"Of course, we can put them out of the way, at any time, with secrecy and dispatch, Don Luis. But what will be the use—provided they help you to get the American money into your hands? To be sure, the new buyers will soon find that they have a worthless mine on their hands, but that may happen with the finest mine. The new buyers will never be able to prove that you brought all of your pretty-looking ore from another mine. You can depend upon the secrecy of the people from whom you have been buying the baiting ore forEl Sombrero."
"Ah, but there is another side to that, Carlos. If Senores Reade and Hazelton serve us, and then go safely back to the United States, they can swear that they found and knewEl Sombreroto be worthless. Then their evidence, flanked by the sudden running-out ofEl Sombrero, will make a case that the new American buyers could take into court."
"Let them take it into court," proposed the secretary, contemptuously. "The governor of Bonista rules the judges of the courts of the state of Bonista with an iron hand. Rest assured that, if the Americans were to take their claims into the courts of this state, the judges would decide for you, and that would be the end of the matter. And do you believe, Don Luis, that, after Senores Reade and Hazelton once get alive out of Bonista, any consideration would tempt them to come back here to testify? They have sampled your power,"
"Yet why do you object, Carlos, to having the Gringo pair put out of the way?"
"I do not care anything about their lives," Tisco declared, coolly. "It is only on general business principles that it seems to me unwise to have human lives taken when it is not necessary. He who resorts too often to the taking of life is sure to meet his own doom."
"Not in Bonista," jeered Montez, "and not where Don Luis is concerned in business matters."
"As you will, then," sighed the secretary. "You will please your own self, anyway, Don Luis."
"Truly, Carlos. And so I have decided that these Gringo engineers shall perish, anyway, as soon as they have served my purpose."
This talk had taken place in a cupola. Down the stair, with stealthy steps, crept a young, horrified, trembling girl.
Francesca, knowing that her father had gone to the cupola, had followed him to talk with him. She had halted on hearing voices. Now, with despair in her eyes, the terrified girl stole away like one haunted and hunted by evil spirits.
"My father—an intending murderer! He, of a proud hidalgo family, a vile assassin, in thought at least?" moaned the girl, wringing her hands as soon as she had stolen to the privacy of her own rooms.
"My father's hands—to be covered with human blood!" sobbed Francesca, sinking down before a crucifix to pray.
For hours the girl remained in terror-stricken solitude. Then she rose, somewhat comforted at last, and with the aid of cold water removed the traces of her tears from her dark, beautiful face.
Her plan was to seek her father, throw herself at his feet, and beg him not to disgrace the blood of the hidalgos nor to destroy his own soul with a hideous crime.
"I must seek him in private. There must be no others near whenI make my appeal!" thought the girl.
Just then a servant entered.
"Your father is in the garden, Senorita Francesca," reported the woman, "and wonders why you do not join him. It is his wish that you join him now."
"Say to my father that his wish is my law," quavered the terrified girl.
Five minutes later Francesca went timidly up to her father in the gardens before the house.
Don Luis turned to her. He was thinking, at the moment, of his dark plans regarding the young engineers. In his eyes, despite his effort to smile on his daughter, was a deadly glitter that dried up hope in the heart of the daughter.
"You have been secluding yourself more than usual to-day,chiquita," chided Montez.
That wordchiquita, meaning "pet," caused the girl to recoil inwardly. Could it be that this hard, cruel man had the right to address her in endearing terms?
"I am not well to-day, my father," she answered, in a low voice.
"Then take my arm,chiquita, and walk with me," urged Montez.
"My father," she cried, shrinking back, "if you will indulge me, I will walk alone. Perhaps, in that way, I shall gain more strength from the exercise."
"As you will," smiled Don Luis, coldly. "For myself, I have much to think of. I have American guests coming soon. I expect that they will buyEl Sombrerofor money enough to make you one of the richest heiresses in all Mexico,chiquita."
"For me? And I do not know how to care for money!" answered the girl, unsteadily. Then she turned away, swiftly, unable to stand longer looking into Don Luis's eyes.
Through the day Tom and Harry had tramped about almost feverishly, stopping at intervals as though for rest. Now, in the late afternoon, they were on their way back to camp by a route that took them not far from Don Luis's grounds.
As they came within sight of the place, Tom espied Montez and Dr. Tisco walking slowly at one end of the garden, seemingly engaged in earnest conversation. At the farther end of the garden from them, Francesca walked by herself, seeming outwardly composed.
"It seems strange, doesn't it," asked Harry, "that such a fine girl can possibly be Don Luis's daughter?"
"She inherits her mother's purity and goodness, doubtless," Tom replied.
"Ouch!" grunted Hazelton, stumbling over a stone with which his foot had collided. At Harry's exclamation Tom glanced up, then his eyes met a strange sight.
Lying in a cleft in the rocks, with his head behind a bush, and well concealed, lay the stranger whom the young engineers had nursed through an illness.
That stranger was intently gazing at the garden of Don Luis. So absorbed was he that he had either not heard or did not heed the passing of the two Americans.
For a brief instant Tom Reade halted, regarding the face of the absorbed stranger.
"I didn't have an idea about you, Mr. Stranger," muttered Tom to himself, as he plodded forward once more. "But now—now, I'll wager that I've guessed who and what you are. Mr. Stranger, I believe that this one glance at your face has told me your story and your purpose in being in these mountains of Bonista!"