Under Blanco's eye; or, Hal Maynard among the Cuban insurgents — Inside the Classic

Vasquez’s eyes glittered. He regarded the boy with a look of evil triumph, though his manner, as he stepped into the carriage, was faultlessly diplomatic.

“You will excuse my intrusion?” he begged.

“I shall have to,” was Hal’s cold rejoinder.

“I was anxious to see you. This meeting has given me great pleasure.”

Then, lowering his voice, he added:

“Senor Maynard, your employer owes me, as you know, two thousand dollars. I must have that money at once.”

“If Mr. Richardson owes you anything,” replied Hal, “he will pay it.”

“Bah! Do you think I am so simple? Senor Richardson left yesterday for Key West.”

“I repeat,” came firmly from Hal, “that, if he owes you anything he will pay it.”

“And I, my dear young friend,” rejoined the Spaniard, “assure you that I mean to collect from you. You have the money. I know it.”

Hal tried not to start at this cool piece of assurance.

“I know,” continued Senor Vasquez, in the same low tone, “where you collected the money. I know just how much you collected, and can tell you, to a peseta, just how much you carry in a certain bag. Ha! my friend, you do not seem happy over my knowledge. But a trustworthy man of mine has followed you. You see that there is no use denying what my faithful agent told me.”

“But did he tell you,” smiled Hal, coolly, “where I took that bag?”

Senor Vasquez changed color and hesitated.

That was enough to show observant Hal that his “bluff” had a chance of winning.

“If he did not tell you that,” resumed the American, “go back and cane your agent for a sleepy fellow. Senor Vasquez, if you meant to wrest the money from me by force, you should have employed a better agent.”

Maynard’s manner was so cool and convincing that for a moment the Spaniard was staggered.

“Ha!” he cried, suddenly. “Whatever you have done with the money, you have not had chance to send it out of Cuba, and your last chance to do that is gone. Perhaps you will conclude to tell me where the money is.”

“Assuredly not,” rejoined Hal, stoutly.

“Now, if I were to make a few remarks about you to the crowd which surges about this carriage, do you know what would happen to you?”

“Certainly,” replied Hal. “I should be in danger of being killed.”

“Do you feel like taking the risk?”

“If you were scoundrel enough, senor, I should be compelled to take it.”

Vasquez’s black eyes snapped dangerously.

“I have only to say the word,” he suggested.

Hal was playing a desperate game. The thought drove some of the color from his cheeks.

“Will you tell me where the money is?” insisted the Spaniard.

“Suppose that I did not know, how could I tell you?”

Vasquez snorted impatiently, then beckoned to one of the leaders of the mob, who quickly approached.

“Your last chance, Senor Maynard,” whispered the Spaniard.

“I can tell you nothing.”

As Hal uttered these words he expected to be handed over to the Spanish mob.

To his surprise Vasquez’s manner swiftly changed.

To the ring-leader Senor Vasquez said:

“Pedro, I trust that your friends will not molest this young man. He is in a measure under my protection.”

“Senor Vasquez’s words always carry weight,” was the quick, respectful answer.

“My dear young friend,” went on the Spaniard, “I may see you again. If we do meet, I trust I shall find you more gracious.”

With that the Spaniard slipped quickly from the carriage, and the driver, taking the cue, turned up one of the streets into the city.

Jeers followed, but nothing else happened.

“Vasquez is as slick as ever,” mused Hal, sinking back on the cushion. “At first, he thought he would frighten me. Now perhaps he means to call upon me at the hotel, try to convince me that he saved my life, and thus work upon my gratitude. If Senor Vasquez imagines that he can persuade me to betray my good old employer, he will wake up and find it all a dream!

“But first of all he will send his agents out again, to see if he can get them on the track of the place where the money is. How my Spanish pirate would swear if he knew that he had been within a foot of the money all the while! Yet, because I have fooled the fellow this time, I must not underrate him. He is deadly!”

Deadly, indeed! Vasquez, though a rich merchant, had seldom earned an honest dollar.