IV After their dinner at the hotel, Roddy and Peter strolled down the quay¹ and over the tiny drawbridge that binds² Otrabanda to Willemstad. There, for some time, half-way between the two towns, they loitered against the railing of the bridge, smoking and enjoying the cool night breeze from the sea. After his long nap Roddy was wakeful. He had been told that Willemstad boasted of a café chantant, and he was for finding it. But Peter, who had been awake since the ship’s steward³ had aroused him before sunrise, doubted that there was a café chantant, and that if it did exist it could keep him from sleep, and announced his determination to seek his bed.
 
Left to himself, Roddy strolled slowly around the narrow limits of the town. A few of the shops and two of the cafés were still open, throwing bright spaces of light across the narrow sidewalks, but the greater number of houses were tightly barred; the streets slumbered⁴ in darkness. For a quarter of an hour Roddy sauntered idly, and then awoke to the fact that he was not alone. Behind him in the shadow, a man with his face hidden in a shawl, the sound of his footsteps muffled⁵ by his rope sandals, was following his wanderings.
 
Under the circumstances, after the developments of the day, Roddy was not surprised, nor was he greatly interested. Even in Porto Cabello, at one time or another, every one was beset⁶ by spies. And that here, in the central office of the revolutionists, Alvarez should be well represented was but natural.
 
Twice, softly and quickly, the man who followed had approached him from the rear, and each time, lest he should have some more serious purpose than to simply spy upon him, Roddy had stepped into the street. But when for the third time the man drew near, his approach was so swift that Roddy had no time to move away. The man brushed against him, and when he had passed Roddy found a letter had been pressed into his hand.
 
The hour was late, Roddy looked like a tourist, the note had been delivered covertly⁷. Roddy concluded it contained an invitation to some disreputable adventure, and after calling the man the name associated with what Roddy believed to be his ancient and dishonorable profession, he tossed the note into the street.
 
With a cry of dismay the man ran toward it,but Roddy was before him. As the note had left his hand his fingers had touched upon heavy, waxen seals.
 
In an instant he had retrieved⁸ the note, and, followed eagerly by the man, carried it to the light of a gas lamp. The envelope was not illuminating⁹, the sealing-wax was stamped with no crest¹⁰ or initials, the handwriting was obviously disguised.
 
After observing that from the shadow the man still watched him, while at the same time he kept an anxious lookout¹¹ up and down the street, Roddy opened the note. It read: “You have come to Curaçao for a purpose. One who has the success of that purpose most at heart desires to help you. To-morrow, just before sunrise, walk out the same road over which you drove to-day. Beyond the Café Ducrot the bearer of this letter will wait for you with a led horse. Follow him. If you think he is leading you into danger, order him to ride in advance, and cover him with your revolver. If you will come, say to the bearer, ‘Vengo,’ if not, ‘No Vengo.’ He has orders not to reply to any question of yours. If you speak of this to others, or if the bearer of this suspects you have arranged for others to follow you, he will only lead you back to your hotel, and your chance to right a great wrong will have passed.”
 
There was no signature. But as though it were an afterthought, at the bottom of the page was written, “Adventures are for the adventurous¹².”
 
Standing¹³ well in the light of the street lamp, with his back to the houses, with his face toward the waiting messenger, Roddy read the letter three times. But after the first reading his eyes neglected the body of the note and raced to the postscript¹⁴. That was the line that beckoned¹⁵ and appealed; to him it seemed that whoever wrote the letter doubted he would come to the rendezvous¹⁶, and was by that line enticing¹⁷ him, mocking him, daring him to refuse. It held forth¹⁸ both a promise and a challenge.
 
As to who the writer of the note might be, there were in Roddy’s mind three explanations. He considered them hastily. Peter was the author of the note, and it was a poor joke intended to test him. It was a genuine offer from some one who had guessed the object of his visit to Curaçao and honestly wished to be of service. It came from the man in the mask and his associates, who, resenting his interference of the morning, had pleasant thoughts of luring¹⁹ him down a lonely road and leaving him lying there. Which of the three suppositions might be correct it was impossible to know, but the postscript decided²⁰ him. He beckoned[Pg 109] to the messenger, and the man ran eagerly forward. “I will come,” said Roddy. The man smiled with pleasure, bowed to him, and dived into the darkness. As he ran down the street Roddy stood listening until the soft patter of the sandals had ceased, and then slowly returned to the hotel.
 
For an hour, still speculating as to who his anonymous²¹ friend might be, he stood, smoking, upon the balcony. On the quay below him a negro policeman dozed²² against a hawser-post. A group of cargadores, stretched at length upon stacks of hides, chattered²³ in drowsy²⁴ undertones. In the moonlight the lamps on the fishing-boats and on the bridge, now locked against the outside world, burned mistily²⁵, and the deck of the steamer moored²⁶ directly below him was as deserted²⁷ and bare, as uncanny and ghostlike, as the deck of the ship of the Ancient Mariner²⁸. Except for the chiming of ships’ bells, the whisper of the running tide, and the sleepy murmur²⁹ of the longshoremen, the town of Willemstad was steeped in sleep and silence. Roddy, finding he could arrive at no satisfactory explanation of the note, woke the night porter, and telling that official he was off before daybreak to shoot wild pigeons, and wanted his coffee at that hour, betook himself to his cot. It seemed as though he had not twice tossed on the pillow before the night-watchman stood yawning at his side.
 
Roddy and Peter occupied adjoining rooms, and the door between the two was unlocked. When Roddy had bathed, dressed, and, with a feeling of some importance, stuck his revolver into his pocket, he opened the door, and, still suspicious that his faithful friend was sending him on a wild-goose chase, for a few moments stood beside his bed. But Peter, deep in the sleep of innocence³⁰, was breathing evenly, stentoriously. Not without envying him the hours of rest still before him, Roddy helped himself to Peter’s revolver, left him a line saying it was he who had borrowed it, and went out into the dark and empty streets.
 
Half awake and with his hunger only partially³¹ satisfied, Roddy now regarded his expedition with little favor. He reverted³² strongly to the theory that some one was making a fool of him. He reminded himself that if in New York he had received such a note, he either would have at once dismissed it as a hoax³³ or turned it over to the precinct station-house. But as the darkness changed to gray, and the black bulk of the Café Ducrot came into view, his interest quickened. He encouraged himself with the thought that while in New York the wording of the note would be improbable, hysterical³⁵, melodramatic, in hot, turbulent Venezuela it was in keeping with the country and with the people.
 
Since setting forth from the hotel a half hour had passed, and as he left the Café Ducrot behind him the night faded into the gray-blue mist of dawn. Out of the mist, riding slowly toward him, mounted on one pony³⁶ and leading another, Roddy saw the man who on the night before had brought him the letter. He was leaning forward, peering through the uncertain light. When he recognized Roddy he galloped³⁷ to him, and with evident pleasure but without speaking, handed him the reins³⁸ of the led pony. Then motioning to Roddy to wait, he rode rapidly down the road over which the American had just come. Roddy settled himself in the saddle, and with a smile of satisfaction beamed upon the ghostlike world around him. So far, at least, the adventure promised to be genuine. Certainly, he argued, Peter could not have prepared a joke so elaborate.
 
Apparently³⁹ satisfied that Roddy had brought no one with him, the messenger now rejoined him, and with a gesture of apology took the lead, and at a smart trot⁴⁰ started in the same direction in which Roddy had been walking.
 
Roddy gave his guide a start of fifty feet, and followed. With the idea of a possible ambush⁴¹ still in his mind, he held the pony well in hand, and in front of him, in his belt, stuck one of the revolvers. He now was fully⁴² awake. No longer in the darkness was he stumbling on foot over the stones and ruts of the road. Instead, the day was breaking and he had under him a good horse, on which, if necessary, he could run away. The thought was comforting, and the sense of possible danger excited him delightfully⁴³. When he remembered Peter, sleeping stolidly⁴⁵ and missing what was to come, he felt a touch of remorse⁴⁶. But he had been warned to bring no one with him, and of the letter to speak to no one. He would tell Peter later. But, he considered, what if there should be nothing to tell, or, if there were, what if he should not be alive to tell it? If the men who had planned to assassinate⁴⁷ Colonel Vega intended to punish him for his interference, they could not have selected a place or hour better suited to their purpose. In all the world, apparently, he was the only soul awake. On either side of him were high hedges of the Spanish bayonet, and back of them acres of orange groves⁴⁸. The homes of the planters lay far from the highway, and along the sides of the road there were no houses, no lodge⁴⁹ gates, not even a peon’s thatched hut.
 
Roddy was approaching a sharp turn in the road, a turn to the left at almost right angles. It was marked by an impenetrable hedge. Up to now, although the hedges would have concealed⁵⁰ a regiment⁵², the white road itself had stretched before him, straight and open. But now the turn shut it from his sight. The guide had reached the corner. Instead of taking it, he turned in his saddle and pulled his pony to a walk.
 
To Roddy the act seemed significant. It was apparent that they had arrived at their rendezvous. Sharply, Roddy also brought his pony to a walk, and with a heavy pull on the reins moved slowly forward. The guide drew to the right and halted. To Roddy’s excited imagination this manœuvre could have but one explanation. The man was withdrawing himself from a possible line of fire. Shifting the reins to his left hand, Roddy let the other fall upon his revolver. Holding in the pony and bending forward, Roddy peered cautiously around the corner.
 
What he saw was so astonishing, so unlike what he expected, so utterly⁵³ out of place, that, still leaning forward, still with his hand on his revolver, he stared stupidly.
 
For half a mile the road lay empty, but directly in front of him, blocking the way, was a restless, pirouetting pony, and seated upon the pony, unmoved either by his gyrations or by the appearance of a stranger in her path, was a young girl.
 
As Roddy had cautiously made his approach he had in his mind a picture of skulking⁵⁴ Venezuelans with pointed⁵⁵ carbines; his ears were prepared for a command to throw up his hands, for the slap of a bullet. He had convinced himself that around the angle of the impenetrable hedge this was the welcome that awaited him. And when he was confronted by a girl who apparently was no more a daughter of Venezuela than she was a masked highwayman, his first thought was that this must be some innocent foreigner stumbling in upon the ambush. In alarm for her safety his eyes searched the road beyond her, the hedges on either side. If she remained for an instant longer he feared she might be the witness to a shocking tragedy, that she herself might even become a victim. But the road lay empty, in the hedges of spiked⁵⁶ cactus⁵⁷ not a frond⁵⁸ stirred; and the aged³⁴ man who had led him to the rendezvous sat motionless, watchful⁵⁹ but undisturbed.
 
Roddy again turned to the girl and found her closely observing him. He sank back in his saddle and took off his hat. Still scanning the hedges, he pushed his pony beside hers and spoke⁶⁰ quickly.
 
“Pardon me,” he said, “but I think you had better ride on. Some men are coming here. They—they may be here now.”
 
That his anxiety was entirely⁶¹ on her account was obvious. The girl colored slightly, and smiled. As she smiled, Roddy for the first time was looking directly at her, and as he looked his interest in assassins and his anxiety as to what they might do passed entirely from him. For months he had not seen a girl of his own people, and that this girl was one of his own people he did not question. Had he first seen her on her way to mass, with a lace shawl across her shoulders, with a high comb and mantilla, he would have declared her to be Spanish, and of the highest type of Spanish beauty. Now, in her linen⁶² riding-skirt and mannish coat and stock, with her hair drawn⁶³ back under a broad-brimmed hat of black straw, she reminded him only of certain girls with whom he had cantered along the Ocean Drive at Newport or under the pines of Aiken. How a young woman so habited had come to lose herself in a lonely road in Curaçao was incomprehensible. Still, it was not for him to object. That the gods had found fit to send her [Pg 116]there was, to Roddy, sufficient in itself, and he was extremely grateful. But that fact was too apparent. Though he was unconscious of it, the pleasure in his eyes was evident. He still was too startled to conceal⁵¹ his admiration⁶⁴.
 
The girl frowned, her slight, boyish figure grew more erect⁶⁵.
 
“My name is Rojas,” she said. “My father is General Rojas. I was told you wished to help him, and last night I sent you a note asking you to meet me here.”
 
She spoke in even, matter-of-fact tones. As she spoke she regarded Roddy steadily⁶⁶. When, the night before, Inez had sent the note, she had been able only to guess as to what manner of man it might be with whom she was making a rendezvous at daybreak, in a lonely road. And she had been more than anxious. Now that she saw him she recognized the type and was reassured⁶⁷. But that he was worthy⁶⁸ of the secret she wished to confide⁶⁹ in him she had yet to determine. As she waited for him to disclose himself she was to all outward appearances tranquilly⁷⁰ studying him. But inwardly her heart was trembling, and it was with real relief that, when she told him her name, she saw his look of admiration disappear, and in his eyes come pity and genuine feeling.
 
“Oh!” gasped⁷¹ Roddy unhappily, his voice filled with concern. “Oh, I am sorry!”
 
The girl slightly inclined her head.
 
“I came to ask you,” she began, speaking with abrupt⁷² directness, “what you propose to do?”
 
It was a most disconcerting question. Not knowing what he proposed to do, Roddy, to gain time, slipped to the ground and, hat in hand, moved close to the pommel of her saddle. As he did not answer, the girl spoke again, this time in a tone more kindly⁷³. “And to ask why you wish to help us?”
 
As though carefully considering his reply, Roddy scowled⁷⁴, but made no answer. In a flash it had at last come to him that what to Peter and to himself had seemed a most fascinating game was to others a struggle, grim and momentous⁷⁵. He recognized that until now General Rojas had never been to him a flesh-and-blood person, that he had not appreciated that his rescue meant actual life and happiness. He had considered him rather as one of the pieces in a game of chess, which Peter and himself were secretly playing against the Commandant of the San Carlos prison. And now, here, confronting him, was a human being, living, breathing, suffering, the daughter of this chessman, bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh, demanding of the stranger by what right he made himself her father’s champion, by what right he pushed himself into the tragedy of the Rojas family. In his embarrassment⁷⁶ Roddy decided desperately⁷⁷ to begin at the very beginning, to tell the exact truth, to omit nothing, and then to throw himself upon the mercy of the court.
 
The gray mist of the morning had lifted. Under the first warm rays of the sun, like objects developing on a photographer’s plate, the cactus points stood out sharp and clear, the branches of the orange trees separated, assuming form and outline, the clusters of fruit took on a faint touch of yellow. From the palace yard in distant Willemstad there drifted toward them the boom of the morning gun.
 
With his reins over his arm, his sombrero crumpled⁷⁸ in his hands, his face lifted to the face of the girl, Roddy stood in the road at attention, like a trooper reporting to his superior officer.
 
“We were in the tea-house of the Hundred and One Steps,” said Roddy. “We called ourselves the White Mice.”
 
Speaking quickly he brought his story down to the present moment. When he had finished, Inez, who had been bending toward him, straightened herself in the saddle and sat rigidly⁷⁹ erect. Her lips and brows were drawn into two level lines,her voice came to him from an immeasurable distance.
 
“Then it was a joke?” she said.
 
“A joke!” cried Roddy hotly. “That’s most unfair. If you will only give us permission we’ll prove to you that it is no joke. Perhaps, as I told it, it sounded heartless. I told it badly. What could I say—that I am sorry? Could I, a stranger, offer sympathy to you? But we are sorry. Ever since Peter proposed it, ever since I saw your father——”
 
The girl threw herself forward, trembling. Her eyes opened wide.
 
“You saw my father!” she exclaimed. “Tell me,” she begged, “did he look well? Did he speak to you? When did you—” she stopped suddenly, and turning her face from him, held her arm across her eyes.
 
“It was four months ago,” said Roddy. “I was not allowed to speak to him. We bowed to each other. That was all.”
 
“I must tell them,” cried the girl, “they must know that I have seen some one who has seen him. But if they know I have seen you——”
 
She paused; as though asking advice she looked questioningly at Roddy. He shook his head.
 
“I don’t understand,” he said.
 
“My mother and sister don’t know that I am here,” Inez told him. “If they did they would be very angry. No one,” she added warningly, “must know. They are afraid of you. They cannot understand why you offer to help us. And they mistrust you. That is why I had to see you here in this way.” With a shrug⁸⁰ of distaste the girl glanced about her. “Fortunately,” she added, “you understand.”
 
“Why, yes,” Roddy assented⁸² doubtfully. “I understand your doing what you did, but I don’t understand the others. Who is it,” he asked, “who mistrusts me? Who,” he added smiling, “besides yourself?”
 
“My mother,” answered Inez directly, “your consul⁸³, Captain Codman, Colonel Vega, and——”
 
In surprise, Roddy laughed and raised his eyebrows⁸⁴.
 
“Vega!” he exclaimed. “Why should Vega mistrust me?” Knowing what was in his mind, the girl made him a formal little bow.
 
“It is not,” she answered, “because you saved his life.” In obvious embarrassment she added: “It is because you are not in the confidence of your father. You can see that that must make it difficult for Colonel Vega.”
 
Bewildered, Roddy stared at her and again laughed.
 
“And what possible interest,” he demanded, “can my father have in Colonel Vega?”
 
For a moment, with distrust written clearly in her eyes, the girl regarded him reproachfully. Then she asked coldly:
 
“Do you seriously wish me to think that you do not know that?”
 
While they had been speaking, even when Inez had made it most evident to Roddy that to herself and to her friends he was a discredited⁸⁵ person, he had smiled patiently. His good humor had appeared unassailable. But now his eyes snapped indignantly. He pressed his lips together and made Inez an abrupt bow.
 
“I assure you, I know nothing,” he said quickly.
 
He threw the reins over the neck of the pony, and with a slap on its flank drove it across the road within reach of the waiting Pedro. Then lifting his hat, and with another bow, he started in the direction of Willemstad. Inez, too surprised to speak, sat staring after him. But before he had taken a dozen steps, as though she had called him back and asked him to explain, he halted and returned. He had entirely recovered his good humor, but his manner when he spoke was not conciliatory.
 
“The trouble is this,” he said, “your friends are so deep in plots that they have lost sight of the thing that counts. While they are ‘mistrusting,’ and suspecting, and spying on e............