“If Señor Hawley can prove that such was the case it would undoubtedly be to his advantage,” Lopez responded. “But, of course, in that event, his testimony would have to agree with that of the lady.”
“The lady?” A shade of anxiety flitted across the snapshot adventurer’s face.
“I refer to the lady who came out of Doctor Bonsal’s house that night with Señor Hawley and entered the automobile which was waiting for her at the garden gate. Señora Felix was heavily veiled, but that disguise was not sufficient to prevent me from recognizing her.”
Portiforo’s spy laughed maliciously at the prisoner’s evident discomfiture. “And she is not the only fair witness we shall have at the trial in the event of Señor Hawley’s insisting that he is not an insurrecto spy,” he announced. “The government of Baracoa would regret exceedingly having to put the daughter of the United States minister to any inconvenience, but if Señor Hawley’s attitude makes the testimony of these ladies necessary——”
“Their testimony won’t be necessary,” Hawley interrupted grimly. “Whatever happens, we’ll leave the women entirely out of this business.”
Lopez bowed. “Señor Hawley has decided most chivalrously.” With this remark, evidently well satisfied with the result of their conversation, he turned on his heels and abruptly left the prisoner to his own thoughts.
Those thoughts were not pleasant ones. For some time the president’s photographic envoy sat on the edge of his iron cot, his hands supporting his chin, reflecting moodily on the situation. He realized that he was confronted by the most serious predicament of his career. If he revealed the real motive of his expedition to the fortress, it would, of course, clear him of the charge of being a revolutionary spy. They couldn’t do much to an American newspaper photographer for attempting to take a snapshot of a political prisoner. They would be compelled to let him off with a slight punishment. But he had not the slightest intention of making such a revelation. From the demeanor of Lopez he had an uneasy suspicion that the truth was already known to that perspicacious person, and that this threat of condemning him as a spy had been made with the idea of forcing him to show his hand. Still, there was a chance that he might be mistaken, that in spite of all that had happened Portiforo and his fellow conspirators might still be under the impression that their secret was safe, and while there was that chance Hawley did not feel at liberty to betray the confidence of the President of the United States and imperil the life of Felix in order to save his own neck.
He realized that Lopez had not exaggerated the peril which he faced, for he knew that under martial law, capital punishment is the fate of a spy; and as Rodriguez, since his escape from prison, had fled to the hills and started an incipient revolution, he believed that it was under martial law that he would be tried. That his government would see that he had a fair trial he felt confident, but as his lips were sealed by this threat to call Virginia and Señora Felix as witnesses if he sought to make his accusers prove their charge, he already looked upon himself as doomed.
“I guess I’m up against it,” he mused grimly. “It looks as if friend Portiforo holds all the trump cards.”