"Stand up," he said, "you are not hurt; only a bit winded. I guess Rodriguez has had enough heads without yours. You thought you were acting for your country's good; I guess you were, from all I hear."
The man had been looking at the speaker wonderingly, not understanding a word. Dan turned to him impatiently.
"Get out!" he said. He pushed the man, searching his brain for the Spanish equivalent. "What the mischief--oh," he glared at the trembling prisoner. "_Vayase Vd! Largo de aqui!_"
The poor wretch needed no more. With a quick, smiling gleam of white teeth he bowed, and the next instant was loping through the garden. Dan sauntered slowly toward the hotel. Soldiers acting upon information given by Miss Howland were beating the grounds, and there was much shouting and occasionally a pistol shot.
But the hotel was deserted of the brilliant guests who had filled it but a quarter of an hour before. The spell of darkness lay upon the banquet hall. A few men and women were loitering in the court, awaiting developments. Oddington was there, and another man of the party, but the rest, including the Howlands, had evidently gone to their rooms.
"Miss Howland told us you made rather an interesting tackle, Merrithew," said Oddington as Dan nodded to him. "I am sorry I missed it. Where is your prisoner?"
Dan smiled. "The tackle was so artistic," he said, "that I jarred most of my senses out of me. He got away. Here's his gun," and Dan held up an old-fashioned carbine.
"Howland will be sorry you let your man escape, if only because he prevented the carefully prepared speech he had been laboring over. It was pretty nervy of you, although Howland tells me they are all the time potting at Rodriguez and missing him. Still, I should think they would give you the Order of San Blanco."
"I think I can struggle along without it," said Dan. "Good-night."
He turned toward the harbor and the _Tampico_. The moon had now broken from the clouds which had partially hidden it all evening, and the hotel grounds and the slope leading to the water front were bathed in light. Dan's mood was rather bitter. They might have waited for him, he thought. At least, Miss Howland and her father might have, in view of what had happened. But still, why should they? The old feeling of aloofness filled him, and all the self-assurance which had characterized his attitude with Miss Howland a half-hour before vanished. He was angry with himself for having dared to maintain such an attitude.