Shortly after midnight Ben was awakened by a noise which seemed to come from the door of his room. Half asleep as he was, it came to his consciousness like the sparkling of a motor. There was the same sharp tick, tick, tick, with regular pauses between.
As he sat up in bed and listened, however, the sounds resolved themselves into the rattle of one metal against another. In a minute he knew that some one unfamiliar with the lock of his door was moving the stem of a key against the metal plate which surrounded the key-hole.
Then he heard the bolt shoot back and the door opened. There was an electric switch on the wall within reach of his hand, and in a second the room was flooded with light. The person who stood in the center of the floor, halfway between the doorway and the bed, was an entire stranger to the boy. He was dressed in clothing which would not have been rejected by the head waiter of one of the lobster palaces on Broadway, and his manner was pleasing and friendly.
He smiled and dropped into a chair, holding out both hands when he saw Ben’s eyes traveling from himself to an automatic revolver which lay on a stand at the head of the bed.
“Of course,” he said, then, as Ben sat down on the edge of the bed, “you want to know what I’m doing here.”
“Naturally!” replied the boy.
The man, who appeared to be somewhere near the age of twenty-five, drew a yellow envelope from his pocket and tossed it over to Ben.
“I am manager at the Quito telegraph office!” he said. “And I received this despatch for you just before twelve o’clock. In addition to this I received a personal message from Mr. Havens. Read your message and then I will show you mine!”
Ben opened the envelope and read:
“Be sure and wait for me at the point where this message is delivered. Complications which can only be explained in person!”