.

"For she will soon be somebody else's sweetheart," chuckled the other.

That was too much. Clif had held himself back, for he did not wish those
cruel men to know he could torment him.

But at that last remark he could no longer restrain his anxiety. He
sprang toward the Spanish captain with a pleading look on his face.

"Tell me!" he cried. "Tell me--where is she?"

The other's lip curled sneeringly as he stared at him.

"You are very much interested," said he. "Well, to be sure, the girl is
pretty--pretty as I ever saw, unfortunately for her. But you may see her
again. I expect--she is likely to be in the same prison with you."

Every drop of blood left Clif's face at those terrible words. Bessie
Stuart in prison!

"Merciful providence!" he gasped.

And then once more he sprang toward the Spaniard, a look on his face, a
look of agony that would have touched a heart of stone.

"For Heaven's sake, sir," he gasped, "tell me!"

"Tell you what?"

"Is she in Havana?"

The Spaniard laughed softly.

Then he nodded toward Ignacio.

"Ask him," he said. "He keeps track of such people for us. She has been
here some time now; and people who get into our prisons don't--ha! ha!
they don't get out in a hurry, do them, Ignacio?"

"No, senor."

"And then she is very pretty, too," added the officer, with a laugh.

To the agony those remarks were raising in the mind of poor Clif those
two brutal men seemed quite insensible. Or perhaps they were teasing
him.

But if so, the officer had enough then, for he turned upon his heel
impatiently.

"Enough of this nonsense," he said. "You need not worry about your
sweetheart, for you will probably be dead by to-morrow."

And the man turned to the soldiers.

"Those four prisoners," he said, pointing to the sailors, "will be kept
here for the present. They will probably be exchanged in a few days. We
do not blame them for the crime this officer here committed. As for him,
he will probably be sent over to Morro Castle to-night."

And then the file of soldiers closed about the dazed cadet and led him
out of the room. He was scarcely able to walk by himself.

The last sound that he heard as he left the room was the fiendish
chuckle of the triumphant Ignacio.

CHAPTER XV.

IN MORRO CASTLE.

That certainly was a day of triumph for the vindictive Spaniard. Not
only Clif Faraday was made wretched, but there was his friend, too, and
each a thousand times more u