an consul's home on San Miguel Street.
Her friend looked excited. "Have you heard the awful news, Marie?" said
she.
"No!" exclaimed Marie, "What is it?"
"Why, Dimiguez was caught last night by Spanish guards inside the
yard of the governor-general's summer palace up on the Malacanan,
just as he was slipping out of the palace itself. How he got in there,
nobody knows."
Marie dropped her basket. "Heavens!" gasped she, "Did he do anything
wrong?"
"They found in his pocket diagrams of the interior of the palace,
showing the entries to it, the room where the governor-general sleeps,
and many other things; also your picture. See here! the morning paper
gives a full account of it."
Marie glanced at the head lines and then started on a vigorous run for
the building in which the Spanish military court was sitting. Rushing
in, past an armed guard, she began to plead for her lover's life. But
he had already been tried, convicted and sentenced to death by
strangulation in the old chute at Cavite. Dimiguez never moved a
muscle when he saw Marie. Armed guards forced her abruptly out of
the building and ordered her to leave.
Inside of two hours, on the same day, April 7, the anniversary of
Marie's birth, he was taken to the little town of Cavite, seven miles
southwest of Manila, and was there placed in the lower end of a long
chute built out into Manila Bay. This chute was just wide enough for
a man to enter. Its sides, top and bottom were all built of heavy
planks. The side planks lacked a few inches of connecting with the
top, although of course the side posts ran clear up and the top was
firmly bolted to them. The entrance to it was well elevated near the
docks. The lower end protruded into the bay, so that it was visible
about eighteen inches above the water during the period of low tide,
and submerged several feet during high tide.
Tides come in slowly at Cavite, each succeeding wave rising but a
trifle higher than the others, until the usual height is reached. Thus,
a prisoner placed in this chute, forced to the lower end and then
fastened securely during low tide, can look out over the side planks
at the hideous spectators, watch the tide as it begins to rise and
see slow death approaching. It was in this chute that Marie's lover
met his death.
Marie saw the launch that carried him away as it left Manila. She
rushed down to the Pasig river, loosened her little boat from the
tree to which it was tied, jumpe
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