“And the copy of the secret plans?” Stanley Graydon asked breathlessly.
“Secret drawer, at bottom of my clothes locker. He’ll slip into my cabin first day aboard. Get papers.”
Weakened by the compelling strain, the cold, measured whispers died away. Stanley Graydon’s tense face was twisted in mingled aversion and sympathy.
“Here, old man,” he snapped, “you’ve got to get this story off your chest. I’m going to give you a shot of strychnine. You’ve got to go on!”
He bent over with the hypodermic, and Dixon grinned sardonically.
“Be damned to the cholera!” he muttered. “Hasn’t downed me yet. Graydon, you’ve got to get back to the old ship. I don’t want those devils to get the plans at any price. To hell with their dirty money. I’m not going out with the guilt of a traitor on my soul.”
“They’d never let me over the gangway,” Stanley Graydon protested.
“Send for Don Rafael!”
From his closed teeth a groan escaped, but he had regained the mastery of himself when Don Rafael tiptoed into the room. Dixon’s eyes were dull, but the old authority of the quarter-deck was in his faint voice.
“My anchor chain is running out, Graydon. You, Don Rafael, swear me to the truth by the most sacred oath you know. Graydon, take down every word. I’ll sign it if it takes my last breath of strength.”