HOW SEÑOR VELASQUEZ PLAYED A DEEP GAME WITH CHIVEY--DOUBLE DEALING--HERBERT
MURRAY'S CHANCE--"HARKAWAY MUST BE PUT AWAY"--A GUILTY COMPACT--CHIVEY
IN DURANCE VILE--THE SICK ROOM AND THE OPIATE--AN OVERDOSE--THE
NOTARY'S GUARDIAN--THE SPANISH GAROTTE--"TALKING IN YOUR SLEEP IS A
VERY BAD GAME."
Señor Velasquez was any thing but a fool.
Chivey was not soft, but he was not competent to cope with such a keen
spirit as this Spanish notary.
Señor Velasquez walked up to the hotel in which Herbert Murray was
staying, and the first person he chanced to meet was Murray himself.
"I wish to have a word with you in private, Señor Murray," said the
notary.
Murray looked anxiously around him, starting "like a guilty thing upon
a fearful summons."
The bland smile of the Spanish notary reassured him, however.
"What can I do for Señor Velasquez?" he asked.
"I begged for a few words in private," answered Velasquez.
"Take a seat, Señor Velasquez," said Herbert Murray, "and now tell me
how I can serve you," after entering his room.
The notary made himself comfortable in his chair.
"I can speak in safety now?" he said.
"Of course."
"No fear of interruption here?"
The notary looked Murray steadily in the eyes as he said--
"I was thinking of your officious servant."
Herbert Murray changed colour as he faltered--
"Of whom?"
"Chivey, I think you call him--your groom, I mean."
"There is no fear from him now," said Murray, with averted eyes; "not
the least in the world."
Señor Velasquez smiled significantly.
"Your man Chivey," resumed the Spanish notary, "has confided to me a
secret."
"Concerning me?"
"Yes."
"The villain!"
"Now listen to me, Señor Murray. You have behaved very imprudently
indeed. Your whole secret is with me."
Herbert started.
"With you?"
"Yes."
Herbert Murray glanced anxiously at the door.
The notary followed his eyes with some inward anxiety, yet he did not
betray his uneasiness at all.
"He was speaking the truth for once, then," said Murray. "He had
confided his secrets to someone else."
"Yes."
Herbert Murray walked round the room, and took up his position with his
back to the door.
"Señor Velasquez," he said, in a low but determined voice, "you have
made an unfortunate admission. If there is a witness, it is only one;
you are that witness, and your life is in danger."
The notary certainly felt uncomfortable, but he was too old a stager to
display it.
Herbert Murray produced a pistol, which he proceeded to examine and to
cock deliberately.
"That would not advance your purpose much, Señor Murray," he said,
coolly; "the noise would bring all the house trooping into the room."
Murray was quite calm and collected now, and therefore he was open to
reason.
"There is something in that," he said, "so I have a quieter helpmate
here."
He uncocked the pistol and put it in his breast pocket.
Then he whipped out a long Spanish stiletto.
"There are other reasons against using that."
"And they are?"
"Here is one," returned the notary, drawing a long, slender blade from
his sleeve.
Murray was palpably disconcerted at this.
The Spanish notary and the young Englishman stood facing each other in
silence for a considerable time.
The former was the first to break the silence.
"Now, look you here, Señor Murray," said he, "I am not a child, nor did
I, knowing all I know, come here unprepared for every emergency--aye,
even for violence."
"Go on," said Murray, between his set teeth.
"You have imprudently placed yourself in the hands of an unscrupulous
young man."
"I have."
"And he has proved himself utterly unworthy?"
"Utterly."
"All of that is known to me," said the notary, craftily. "Now you must
pay no heed to this Chivey."
"I will not," returned Herbert Murray, significantly, "though there is
little fear of further molestation from him, señor."
Young Murray little dreamt of the cause of the notary's peculiar smile.
"Your sole danger, as I take it, Señor Murray, is from your fellow
countryman, Jack Harkaway."
"Yes."
"Then to him you must direct your attention. Where is he?"
"Gone."
"Where to?"
"Don't know."
"I do then," returned the notary, quietly: "and it is to tell you that
that I am here. I have all the necessary information; you must follow
him."
"Why?"
"To make sure of him," coldly replied the Spaniard.
"How?"
Velasquez spoke not.
But his meaning was just as clear as if he had put it into words.
A vicious dig with his stiletto at the air.
Nothing more.
And so they began to understand each other.
* * * *
Señor Velasquez, the notary, was playing a double game.
From Herbert Murray he carefully kept the knowledge that Chivey still
lived.
And why?
That knowledge would have lessened his hold.
The cunning way in which he let Herbert Murray understand that he knew
all, even to the attempt upon Chivey's life at the gravel pits,
completed the mastery in which he meant to hold the young rascal.
He arranged everything for young Murray.
He discovered from him the destination of the ship in which Jack
Harkaway and his friends had escaped, and he procured him a berth on a
vessel sailing in the same direction.
"Once you get within arm's length of this young Harkaway," he said;
"you must be firm and let your blow be sure."
"I will," returned his pupil.
"Once Harkaway is removed from your path, you may sleep in peace, for
he alone can now punish you for forgery."
"I hope so."
"I know it," said Velasquez.
So well were the notary's plans laid, and so luckily did fortune play
into his hands, that forty-eight hours after his interview with Murray,
he had that young gentleman safely on board a ship outward bound.
Now Herbert Murray had passed but one night after that fearful scene by
the gravel pit, but the remembrance of it haunted his pillow from the
moment he went to bed to the moment he arose unrefreshed and full of
fever.
And yet he was setting out with the intention of securing his future
peace and immunity from peril by the commission of a fresh crime.
The ship was setting sail at a little after daybreak, and it had been
arranged that Señor Velasquez was to come and see him off.
But much to his surprise, the notary did not put in an appearance.
Eagerly he waited for the ship to start, lest any thing should occur at
the eleventh hour, and he should find himself laid by the heels to
answer for his crimes.
* * * *
Chivey was supposed to be hiding.
In reality he was a prisoner in the house of Señor Velasquez, and he
knew it.
The notary was an old man, and he suffered from sundry ailments which
belong to age--notably to rheumatism.
An acute attack prostrated the old man, and held him down when he was
most anxious to be up and doing.
And the night before Herbert Murray was to set sail, he lay groaning
and moaning with racking pains.
His cries reached Chivey, who lay in the next room, and he came to the
sick man's door to ask if he could be of any assistance.
He peered warily in.
In spite of his groans and anguish, the old notary was insensible under
the influence of an opiate.
Chivey crept in.
On a low table beside the bed was a lamp flickering fearfully, and a
glass containing some medicine.
Beside the glass a phial labelled laudanum.
Something possessed the intruder to empty the contents of the phial
into the glass, and just as he had done so, the sufferer opened his
eyes.
"Who's there?"
"It's me, Señor Velasquez," said the tiger. "You have been ill----"
"What do you do here?" demanded the notary, sharply.
"You called out. I thought I might be of assistance."
"No, no."
"Then I will go, señor," said Chivey, "for I am tired."
"Stay, give me my physic before you go."
Chivey handed him the glass.
The sick man gulped it down, and made a wry face.
"How bitter it tastes," he said, with a shudder.
"Good-night, señor."
"Good-night."
* * * *
Chivey did not remain very long absent.
The heavy breathing of the notary soon told him that it was safe to
return to the room.
The business of the morrow so filled the mind of the old Spaniard, that
he was talking of it in his sleep.
"At an hour after daybreak, I tell you, Murray," he muttered. "The
berth is paid for, paid for by my gold. You follow on the track of your
enemy Harkaway, and once you are within reach, give a sharp, sure
stroke, and you will be free from your only enemy, seeing that you have
already taken good care of your traitor servant."
Chivey was amazed, electrified.
Did he hear aright?
"At daybreak!" he exclaimed, aloud.
"Yes; at daybreak," returned the notary in his sleep.
After a pause, the sleeper muttered--
"What say you? If Chivey were not quite dead? What of that? How could
he follow you? He has no funds. The only money he possessed I have now
in my strong box under my bed."
Chivey was staggered.
"Is Murray going to bolt, and leave me in the power of this old
villain, I wonder," he muttered.
He broke off in his speculations, for the notary was babbling something
again.
"'The Mogador,'" muttered the old man, speaking more thickly than
before as the opiate began to make itself felt; "the captain is called
Gonzales. You have only to mention the name of Señor Velasquez, and he
will treat you well. He knows me."
He muttered a few more words which grew more and more incoherent each
instant.
Then he lay back motionless as a log.
The opium held him fast in its power.
"Now for the box," exclaimed the tiger, excitedly.
Chivey tore open the box, and lifting up some musty old deeds and
parchments, he feasted his eyes upon a mine of wealth.
A pile of gold.
Bright glittering pieces of every size and country.
And beside it thick bundles of paper money.
"Gold is uncommonly pretty," said the tiger, "but the notes packs the
closest."
Bundle after bundle he stowed away about his person, regularly padding
his chest under his shirt.
"Now for a trifle of loose cash," he said, coolly.
So saying, he dropped about sixty or seventy gold pieces into his
breeches pocket.
His waistcoat pockets he stuffed full also.
Then he pushed back the box into its place under the bed.
"The old man still sleeps," he said to himself, looking round at the
bed.
He was in a rare good humour with himself.
"Ha, ha! I am rich now," said Chivey. "Thank you, old señor, you have
done me a good turn. May you sleep long."
He gave a final glance about him and made off.
* * * *
A distant church clock tolled the hour of midnight as he gained the
seashore.
He was in luck.
Not a soul did he encounter until he reached the beach, when he came
upon two sailors, launching a rowing boat.
"'Mogador?'" he said, in a tone of inquiry.
"_Si_, señor."
"That's your sort," said Chivey. "I want to see Captain Gonzales."
"Come with us, then," said one of the sailors.
"Rather," responded the tiger; "off we dive; whip 'em up, tickle him
under the flank, and we're there in a common canter."
The sailors both understood a little of English.
In very little time they were standing on the deck of the "Mogador."
And facing Chivey as he scrambled up the side, was the master of the
ship, Captain Gonzales, to whom Chivey was presented at once by one of
the sailors.
"Señor Velasquez has sent me to you, captain," said the ever ready
tiger.
"Then you are welcome."
"He told me to give you that," said Chivey, handing the captain a pair
of banknotes; "and to beg you to give me the best of accommodation in a
cabin all to myself."
"It shall be done."
"And above all not to let Mr. Murray know of my presence on board when
he comes."
"Good."
"I am going on very important business for Señor Velasquez, captain,"
pursued Chivey, with infinite assurance; "as you may judge, for he
values your care of me at one hundred crowns to be paid on your next
visit here."
"Rely upon my uttermost assistance."
"Thank you," said Chivey, with a patronising smile; "and now I'll be
obliged to you to show me to my berth."
"Here," cried the Spanish captain. "Pedro--Juan--Lopez. Take this
gentleman to my private cabin."
The "Mogador" stood out to sea bravely enough.
Chivey was there.
Herbert Murray was there.
But the latter little suspected the presence of the former.
Herbert Murray, in fancied security, was reclining on deck upon some
cushions he had got up from below, smoking lazily, and looking up at
the blue sky overhead, when Chivey, who had been looking vainly out for
an appropriate cue to make his reappearance, slipped suddenly forward,
and touching his hat, remarked in the coolest manner in the world--
"Did you ring for me, sir?"
Herbert looked up just as if he had seen a ghost.
"Chivey!"
"Guv'ner."
Herbert Murray stared at his villainous servant.
But villainous as Chivey was, Herbert Murray never thought a bit about
that.
His heart leaped to his mouth, and he was overjoyed to find him there.
"Oh, Chivey, you vagabond!" he ejaculated. "I'm so awfully glad to see
you."
"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin."
There's a lot of truth in that trite and homely old saying.
For one little phrase from the guilty Herbert had come so straight from
the heart that even the villainous tiger was touched immediately.
"Look here, guv'nor," said Mr. Chivey, "I don't think you are half so
bad as I thought. My opinion is that you are not half as bad as some of
'em, and that the ugly job up at the gravel pits was all of my
provoking. I bear no malice."
"You don't!" exclaimed his master, quite overjoyed.
"Not a bit."
"Shake hands."
Chivey obeyed.
And they were faster friends than ever after that.
But what about Señor Velasquez?
What about all their compacts with the villain?
For the time they were of no use to that plotter, whose plans had, up
to the present time, failed.