“You’re a dirty blackmailer!” Rhodes accused. “But you won’t get by with it, because it means nothing to me whether Corning is dead or alive. I’m leaving the country.”
“Senor stay with Carlos until he hand over the emeralds.”
With his uninjured hand, Rhodes drew for a revolver secreted at his waist. Carlos was much quicker. His shot winged the engineer in the fingers.
“Try that again, Senor, and I shoot to kill,” Carlos warned. He spoke in Spanish and Jack did not catch the words that followed.
But he saw the bandit confiscate the weapon, which he recognized as his own. It was the automatic Jack had taken from Carlos, and that later had disappeared from the Scout tent.
Rhodes sagged back into a chair, nursing his wounded hand.
“The gems,” Carlos reminded him.
When Rhodes made no move to hand them over, the bandit tore a small pouch from the leather belt beneath the engineer’s shirt.
“You are welcome to half the emeralds,” Rhodes muttered.
“All, Senor.”