"Yes, he would do it for me. And then here is fifty dollars more. Look and count it. Think of what you could do with one hundred and fifty dollars of the Yankee's money. Think of what it would buy—food and I know not what—a fine dress for your sweetheart, to take her away from that rival of yours. And it is all good money, too."
"How am I to know it?"
"Carramba! Couldn't you take my word. You know me, Jose, and what I do for Spain. Do you not know that I am a friend of Blanco's? Hey? And you know that he trusts me when he trusts nobody else."
"And how did you get that money?"
"How did I get it! Ha! ha! I will tell—yes, por dios, I will, and those Yankee pigs may hear me, too. Ha! ha! There was what they called a traitor on the New York, the Yankee's flagship. She isn't much, but she is the best they have. One of our little gunboats could whip her, for it would be men fighting pigs."
The sergeant's eyes danced.
"And we'll sink her, too," went on Ignacio. "Just wait! I saw her run away once from a little gunboat. The Yankees build their boats swifter than ours so they can run away. But anyhow, as I said this man was working for Spain. And he tried to blow up the flagship."
"Por dios!" cried the sergeant, "like we did the Maine."
"Exactly. It would have been another glorious triumph for us. And, Jose Garcia, who do you think it was that prevented him?"
The man clinched his fists.