“What do you expect me to do?” asked the lieutenant, when he had finished.
“I don’t know. I was in hopes you could suggest something!”
“I’m afraid that even a suggestion from an officer of the United States might be looked upon as a breach of neutrality,” was the reply.
“Then how would it do if you should go to bed and go to sleep?” asked Billie. “Of course you could not violate your order of neutrality if you were asleep.”
“And then, again,” explained Billie, “there is a dangerous man abroad tonight, who needs watching.”
“I saw an English-speaking foreigner give a Mexican ten thousand pounds tonight to aid the revolution.”
“What!” almost shouted the lieutenant. “Ten thousand pounds?”
“How do you know he gave him that amount?”
Billie ran his hand inside his shirt and pulled forth the big envelope he had taken from Don Pablo’s secretary.
“I couldn’t swear to it yet,” he said; “because I have not looked inside this envelope; but, if I am not mistaken there is that sum in drafts on the Bank of England in this envelope.”
With trembling fingers he tore open the wrapper, and there, just as he had expected, were the drafts—ten, each for a thousand pounds!
“And who was the man?” asked Lieutenant Grant.
“I don’t know, but I had hoped that the name on the drafts might tell.”
The lieutenant examined them carefully. Then he shook his head. “No,” he said, “there is nothing to show by whom they were drawn. They are simply bank checks of one of the largest banks in New York on the Bank of England, with whom they doubtless have a large account. They are made payable to Pablo Ojeda, and, so far as the checks go to show, might have been purchased by Don Pablo himself. However, in the expert hands of the United States Secret Service, we may be able to find out whose money this really is.”
“I thought I was doing a big thing,” he muttered. “Now I see I might better have followed the man.”
“You have done a big thing,” said the lieutenant; “and, to show my appreciation of what you have done, I am going to send all the pickets for half a mile down the river to hunt the man. If any of your friends should slip across the river at that point, I shall not know it. And now, I’d advise you to hunt up Captain Peak and go to bed—that is, unless you and he should decide to do a little more scout duty before daylight.”