“Listen!” proceeded the don hurriedly. “I was here alone in the early evening. Some one rang the bell at the gate. I went out and admitted”—anger throbbed in the Spaniards voice—“Don Carlos Valdez! He is what you Americans call a trouble maker. I call him a pestilence, an evil specter who stalks through the devoted countries and helps revolutionists overthrow established governments. I am Spanish, but I love law and order! I hate violence and bloodshed! I am for peace! But Don Carlos is always for war, and more war, for in that he finds unholy profit. Well, it was he who called on me to-night. He declared that he wanted a passport, for he was going abroad. I told him to go to my secretary, at the legation. He said he had been there, but that the secretary was not in. I could not refuse him the passport if his intentions were peaceable and he paid the fee, so he came back into the house with me. As I seated myself and leaned over the table, the demon struck me from behind. I fell unconscious. When I recovered, I was bound as you saw me, and I have lain so for hours. But Don Carlos had not left when I regained consciousness. He and I have long been at swords’ points, and he taunted me with the base plans he intended to carry out.”
Don Ramon writhed in his chair in a spasm of fierce anger.
“Vat vas he going to do?” asked Carl.
“He has designs on the submarine!” proceeded the don. “He thinks the boat would be valuable to the revolutionists to the south of us. They are threatening Port Livingston, at the mouth of the Izaral, and are seeking to secure the fort there. The lawful authorities of the state will send ships of war to defeat the revolutionists, and Don Carlos wants the submarine to destroy the war vessels.”
Carl gasped, then he added soothingly, “Don’d you be exzited. Der schemer von’t get der supmarine. Captain Nemo, junior, is sick, but Bob Steele is on der job, und you bed you he von’t let Don Carlos haf der Grampus to help oudt der repels.”
“No! Bob Steele will not hire the boat to the rascally Don Carlos, who is a serpent for craft. He intends to get the boat away from Belize by a ruse—and will use my name, my honorable name, to help him prosecute his villainous plot! Think of that!”
“How vill he do it?”
“I do not know, but such is his miserable intention; he flaunted it in my face as I lay on the floor at his feet, helpless to move or to speak. We must prevent him from carrying out his contemptible designs. I have told you so much, because it was necessary that you should understand. Come! Let us go at once to Bob Steele! Let us warn him, and put him on his guard.”
“Good!” agreed Carl heartily. “But haf you a pair of drousers vat I couldt vear?”
“That is a small matter, Señor Pretzel,” demurred the don on his way to the door. “We have other and larger matters to claim our instant attention.”