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 Senor 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!"]