The girl sighed. “I suppose I have no right to smile,” she said sadly, “for I really am in great trouble.”
“What is it?” he demanded eagerly. “If I can help, Miss Throgmorton, you know you can count on me.”
“Yes, I know that I can,” she answered softly. “That is why I have sent for you. I—but we had better not talk here. We will go to the top of this hill. We shall be more safe up there.”
Leaving Uncle Peter in charge of their horses, they climbed the hillock, and Virginia invited her companion to seat himself beside her on a bowlder, under the feathery branches of a bamboo tree. “This is where—er—Mr. Hawley and I always met when we had secrets to discuss,” she announced. “It commands a view of the road in both directions, so there is no danger of anybody creeping up on us unseen.”
With an excess of caution which made him smile, she gazed up into the branches of the solitary tree under which they were sitting. Then she continued, lowering her voice almost to a whisper: “I am going to begin, Mr. Ridder, by telling you what picture it was that Mr. Hawley and I were trying to take at the fortress the other night.”
“Is it necessary that I should know?” he asked. He felt somewhat uncomfortable, for he could not help suspecting that it might be her evident pique against the Camera Chap which prompted her to give him the information, which, until now, neither she nor Hawley had seen fit to confide to him.
“If Mr. Hawley knew what I am doing,” the girl said, as though reading his thoughts, “I feel sure that he would approve, for he couldn’t be unreasonable enough to expect that just because he has given up the task of freeing poor President Felix, nothing else is to be done.”
“Freeing President Felix?” the naval officer repeated, looking at her in bewilderment.
The girl nodded. “It was his picture that we were trying to get the other night. It was to rescue him that Mr. Hawley came to Baracoa. And now that he has gone, and Señora Felix has gone, and they have done away with poor Doctor Bonsal, there is nobody left but me to fight for the freedom of that unhappy man. But I can’t do it alone,” she added wistfully. “I am only a girl, and I realize my helplessness. I’ve got to have assistance, and that is why I have decided to take you into the secret. I know that you are brave, and generous, and trustworthy, Mr. Ridder.”
The navy man bowed. “I am sure, at least, that you will find me trustworthy,” he said simply. “If you really think it best for me to know, I shall be glad to hear the facts of the case, Miss Throgmorton, and to give you any help that I can.”