"I suppose you know that I would have no scruples in shooting you if you betrayed us," he remarked.
Stuart looked up.
"I don't know it," he answered. "Manuel or Leborge might do it, but I think you'd have a lot of scruples in shooting an unarmed boy."
"Surely you can't expect me to save your life merely to run my own neck in a noose?"
"That's as good as admitting that what you're doing might run your neck into a noose," commented Stuart shrewdly, if a little imprudently.
"All right. But you must play fair. I have helped you. In honor, you can't turn that help against me."
It was a definite deadlock. The boy realized that, while the Englishman was not likely to put a bullet through his head, as either Manuel or Leborge would have done, he was none the less likely to arrange affairs so that there would be no chance for talk. Haitian prisons were deathtraps. Also Cecil's declaration that an abuse of kindness would be dishonorable had a great deal of weight with the boy. His father had taught him the fine quality of straight dealing.
"Look here, sir," he said, after a pause. "You said that I hadn't got the right idea as to what you three were doing."
"You haven't."
"Then I can't betray it, that's sure! I'll promise, if you like, that, if I do ever find out the whole truth about this plot, and if it's something which, as an American, I oughtn't to let go by, I won't make any move in it until I know you've been warned in plenty of time. If it isn't, I'll say nothing. There's no reason why I should get Leborge or you in trouble. It's Manuel I'm after."