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 Cafe 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 curacao 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
curacao, 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 reenacted 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,
Senora 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 canyons 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, Curacao, 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 Curacao? 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."