"Before you and I can speak again of friendship, there are matters which must be explained," I answered, coldly. "Since I saw you this afternoon, you have impliedly accused me of complicity in this Carlist business: I have that from the doctor whom you frightened away from Colonel Livenza's house. You have also intervened in the quarrel between Colonel Livenza and myself—a quarrel which had its origin in an errand on which you sent him."
He listened closely, and was too skilled in masking his looks to give any indication of the effect of my words. But I thought he was surprised when I stopped, having said so little.
"Your quarrel with Livenza was the outcome of the scene at the Café de l'Europe, where the hot-headed fool insulted you."
"No, that was the open cause. The real one was the result of his coming to Senorita Castelar's at the time I was there—a visit timed by you."
"Livenza is in love with the senorita, and hopes to marry her; and you know how some of us Spaniards feel on such matters. But what is this to me?"
"You had given me good news to carry to her, you knew when I was going, and you sent Livenza there. What happened afterwards was the direct consequence."
"It is preposterous!" he cried, with a shrug of the shoulders. "As if I could be responsible for what two angry men do when they quarrel. Really!" and he laughed. Clearly he was relieved that I had nothing worse to say. "I am glad at any rate that you have not hurt each other." This with a scarcely veiled sneer.
"When a man who professes to be my friend deliberately tries to embroil me in an affair which may cost me my life, I do not dismiss it with a shrug of the shoulders and a laugh, as something too trivial to be noticed. But if you will give me the information I came for, I will go."
"I have no information to give you;" and he got up.
"To that I answer I am not going without it, nor without an assurance and a proof of Sarita Castelar's safety—and safety without any entangling complications;" and I looked at him as I said the last sentence with a meaning that did not escape him.