"That I can't tell. But I believe in the invariable triumph of right, no matter how great the odds against it may seem."

"Let right triumph, after we're buried," continued Harry, "and what good would it do us?"

"None, in any ordinary material sense. Yet good would come to the world through our fate, even if only in proclaiming, once more, the sure defeat of all wicked plans in the end."

Harry said no more, just then. Tom Reade, who ordinarily was intensely practical, was also the kind of young man who could perish for an ideal, if need be. Tom went outside, stretching himself on the gra.s.s under a tree. He sighed for a book, but there was none, so he lay staring off over the valley below.

Twenty minutes later Harry, after trying vainly to take a nap on a cot in the tent, followed his chum outside.

"Odd, isn't it, Tom?" questioned Hazelton. "We're living what looks like a wholly free life. Nothing to prevent us from tramping anywhere we please on these hills, and yet we know to a certainty that we wouldn't be able to get twenty miles from here before soldiers would have us nabbed, and marching away to a prison from which, very likely, no one in the outside world would ever hear of us again."

"It is queer," agreed Tom, nodding. "Oh, just for one glimpse of Yankee soil!"

"Twice," went on Harry, "we've even persuaded Nicolas to bribe some native to take a letter from us, to be mailed at some distant point. After two or three days Don Luis, in each instance, has come here, and, with a smile, has shown us our own intercepted letter. Yet Nicolas has been honest in the matter, beyond a doubt.

It is equally past question that the native whom Nicolas has trusted and paid has made an honest attempt to get away and post our letter; but always the cunning of a Montez overtakes the trusted messenger."

"And one can only guess what has happened to the messengers,"

Tom said, soberly. "Undoubtedly both of the two poor fellows are now pa.s.sing the days _incommunicado_. It makes a fellow a bit heartsick, doesn't it, chum, to think of the probable fates of two men who have tried to serve us. And what, in the end, is to be the fate of poor little Nicolas? Don Luis Montez is not the sort of man to forgive him his fidelity to us."

"And where's Nicolas, all this time?" suddenly demanded Harry, glancing at his watch. "Why, the fellow hasn't been here for three hours! Where can he be?"

"_Quien sabe_?" responded Reade, using the common Spanish question, given with a shrug, which means, "Who knows! Who can guess?"

"Can Nicolas have fallen into any harm?" asked Hazelton, a new note of alarm in his voice. "The poor, faithful little fellow!

It gives me a shiver to think of his suffering an injury just because he serves us so truly."

"I shall be interested in seeing him get back," Tom nodded thoughtfully.

"And I'm beginning to have a creepy feeling that he won't come back!" cried Harry. "He may at this moment be past human aid, Tom, and that may be but the prelude to our own craftily-planned destruction."

Tom Reade sat up, leaning on one elbow, as he regarded his chum with an odd smile.

"Harry," Tom uttered, dryly, "we certainly have no excuse for being blue when we have such rosy thoughts to cheer us up!"

"Hang Mexico!" grunted Hazelton.

CHAPTER XVII

THE STRANGER IN THE TENT

By and by Tom Reade began to grow decidedly restless. He would sit up, look and listen, and then lie down again. Then he would fidget about nervously, all of which was most unusual with him, for Reade's was one of those strong natures that will endure work day and night as long as is necessary, and then go in for complete rest when there is nothing else to do.

Harry did not observe this, for he had gone back into the tent.

Two sheets of a Mexican newspaper had come wrapped around one of Nicolas's last food purchases. Hazelton was reading the paper slowly by way of improving his knowledge of Spanish.

At last Tom called, in a low voice:

"Don't worry about me, chum, if you miss me. I'm going to take a little stroll."

"All right, Tom."

Reade did not hurry away. He had to remember that in all probability he was being watched. So he strolled about as though he had no particular purpose in mind. Yet, after some minutes, he gained a point from which he could gaze down the hill-slope toward the little village of huts in which the mine laborers lived.

There were a few small children playing about the one street that ran through the village. A few of the women were out of doors, also, but none of the men were in sight, for these were toiling away at the mine. Though _El Sombrero_ had so far shown no ore that amounted to anything, Don Luis, while waiting to sell his mine for a fortune, kept his _peons_ working hard in the hope that they might strike some real ore.

After Tom had been gazing for three or four minutes his eves suddenly lighted, for he saw Nicolas come out of one of the huts.

"I wonder what has kept the little fellow so long," Tom murmured.

But he turned away with an appearance of listlessness, for, if he were observed, he did not care to have a watcher note his interest in the servant's coming.

So Nicolas pa.s.sed on toward the tents without having observed Reade.

"I won't get back too soon," Tom decided. "If we are watched at all it wouldn't do to have me appear too much interested in the _peon's_ doings."

Now that his mind was somewhat easier, Tom strolled on once more.

His roundabout path took him along among the rocks that littered the ground over the princ.i.p.al tunnels of _El Sombrero_. Hundreds of feet beneath him now toiled some of the _peons_ who lived in the village of huts yonder.

Presently Reade increased his speed considerably, deciding that now it would be safe to return directly to camp. Suddenly he stopped short, head up, his gaze directed at the tops of three or four rocks. Some human being had just dodged out of sight at that point.

Tom felt a swift though brief chill. Something had made him suspect that the prowler might be Gato, or one of the latter's companions.

Instead of running away Tom made for the place of hiding in short leaps.

"Hold on there a minute, my friend," Tom called in Spanish. "I think it may be worth my while to look you over."

Just as Reade was ready to bound over the rocks a figure rose as though to meet him. A light leap landed Reade on top of the stranger, who was borne to earth.

"Mercy senor!" begged the other. "Do not be rough with me. I am not strong enough to stand it."

The man spoke Spanish and was well past middle age, of a very spare figure, and his face was very thin, although there was a deep flush on his cheeks.

"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Tom in Spanish. He touched the stranger's cheeks, which were hot with fever.

Then Tom slid off his poor captive and squatted beside him. Reaching for the man's left wrist and resting two fingers on his pulse, Tom added, gently:

"Tell me all about it, senor."

"There is not much to tell," panted the stranger, weakly, for Tom's landing on him had jarred him severely. "I am sick, as you can see."

"Oh, that isn't much," said Tom, blithely. "With decent care you will soon he well. It is plain that you are a gentleman--no _peon_. Yonder, some distance, is a house where I think you are very likely to be well taken care of. Don Luis Montez--"

Despite the hectic flush in the cheeks, the stranger's face paled visibly. Tom, always observant, noted this.

"Oh, I see," Reade went on, calmly. "You do not like Don Luis Montez, or you do not care about going to his house."