at one time his jailer," interrupted Santiago. "That ought to
make him feel grateful."

"Oh," exclaimed Jose, "you are the captain Jack has often talked about!
Well, I'm glad we have been able to do a little for you."

"This morning while we were waiting for your precious doctor," I
continued, "he told me a very startling piece of news."

"Yes?" said Jose.

"About my father."

Jose sprang to his feet, demanding fiercely, "What do you know of Senor
Crawford, major? Don Eduardo came to his end by foul means: he was not
slain by the government, but by some one who hoped to profit by his
death."

"According to the major's information, he was not slain at all," I
said, and proceeded to relate the story.

Jose listened attentively to every word, and then asked Santiago
innumerable questions. Like myself, he displayed great excitement, but
I judged from his expression that he entertained little hope of my
father being still alive.

"The truth is," said he, "Don Eduardo had made numerous powerful
enemies both in public and private life; and as we all know, any stick
is good enough to beat a dog with. Besides, he owned vast estates,
and--"

"Go on!" laughed Santiago as Jose hesitated; "the king's party put him
to death in order to seize them!"

"No, no," said Jose hotly; "I don't tar all Spaniards with the same
brush. Still, they aren't all saints either, and I say some of them
killed him under cloak of the government. And some day," he added, "I
will prove it. As to his being alive, I think there is small chance of
it.--And Jack, my boy, I would not mention the matter to your mother."

"But," said I, clinging to my shred of hope, "he was not killed in the
mountains, and we have heard nothing since."

Jose let me talk, and listened kindly to my arguments, but I noticed
that none of them made any impression. At the best, he said, my father
had been thrown into prison seriously hurt, and it was not likely that
he had survived the confinement.

"Have you ever seen the casemates at Callao, major?" he asked.

"Yes," said Santiago, "and very unhealthy places they are. But there
are more prisons than those in Peru."

It would be wearisome to repeat our conversation, for, after all, we
were arguing in the dark, having only the major's imperfect story to go
by. Besides, as Jose said, many events had happened during the last
two years, and my father was by no means the only noted man in Peru to
disappear. S