"You have succeeded?" repeated Ranald.
"Yes; thanks to the clue you placed for me. Thank you very much."
"So you have fairly viewed him?"
"Yes; face to face—free from paint and feather—for upwards of half an hour, without his having the faintest warrant for imagining that I had him under the lens."
"Ah! That's why you announced yourself in that rather theatrical manner you use out here?"
"Theatrical, eh? Well, if you mean tragic, you are right, sir. By the way you were worried about who placed me on guard over this young lady? I heard that too. Nothing to apologise for. Well; it is not over the young lady that I am placed, and it is not Jim Ridge that orders me here and there. I am attached to Captain Kidd, ladies, and Mr. Guide," said Joe, with an ominous smile, "and it is Uncle Sam that set me on him. That is all I can say. As for listening to your talk, I did it because of a powerful interest. It is only then I do play the spy, I hope."
"It does not matter a bit, sir!" cried Rosario, in her impulsive way. "This time, as a listener, you have heard good of yourself—but I shall never have done praising you; but go on and tell us about that dreadful man!"
"I came for that, and I waste no time, for it is valuable. To be brief—the commander of these scoundrels, calling himself Kidd, is not Kidd at all, but a younger man—looking thirty, but may be more. He's dark enough to be taken for an Indian or Mexican. He's a handsome man for those that like the King of the Gambler's type. I know that under the name of 'Hank,' which is Harry, Brown, rather notorious down South, he has been outlawed by the Government. Folks laugh at the District Courts, but as their warrant commands the military to lend hand for an arrest, I guess Mr. Brown thought it judicious to leave civilization. But even that name may not be his original one, or really his. It may conceal something blacker in the past. For one, may not Hank Brown be Corvino, or Cornelio Bustamente, whose portrait you traced, señorita?"
"As you spoke the same idea struck me, I do not know why. The more I think it over, the more solid the impression becomes. Besides, this Cornelio Bustamente was the bounden friend of Don Miguel Tadeo de Castel Leon."
"His agent in the shameful scheme to which you fell a victim," added the lieutenant quickly; "but where is Don Miguel, then, the infernal fiend who wrought out the plot? How is it he has contrived to get away without leaving any traces? It is important to learn that. Well, well, this is not interesting to you," he continued, looking over to Ulla and Ranald, who were not engrossed in this turn of the conversation. "We shall discover him, too, Heaven helping us! I have a clue that satisfies me, and sooner or later the whole skein must be in my grip. Ladies, have faith in me and in Jim Ridge; both, on our sides, are going to see this game out, or our bones shall whiten the mountains."