I hadn't lost my head and thrown that taunt at him! I suppose I
shall never know how much difference, or how little, this mistake of
mine made. The instant the words were out I would have given anything to
recall them. But it was too late. To apologize, or try to explain, would
only do more harm. I ventured one sidelong glance at Major Vandyke's
face after I had shot that bolt; and I quivered all over as I saw how
the blood streamed darkly up to his forehead and swelled the veins at
his temples. If I hadn't been afraid of him for Eagle, whose superior
officer he was, I might have pitied him for the pain I had inflicted,
under which he could keep silence only by biting his lip. I knew he was
hating me violently, but I didn't care a rap. All I cared for just then
was that he was hating Eagle March, and counting on paying him out in
some way--I couldn't guess what.

"I must warn Eagle," I said to myself; and I could almost have kissed
Tony, I was so glad to see him when he came back with the purple-covered
book which nobody wanted.

Major Vandyke walked on with us to the motor, as if nothing had
happened, but he was very silent, letting Tony and me talk undisturbed.
It was only after he had spoken in a dry, mechanical way to Mrs.
Dalziel, and the car was about to start, that I caught his eyes. There
was a look in them as cold and deadly--or I imagined it--as deliberate
murder.

I couldn't wait until next day to see Eagle and tell him--I hardly knew
what, but _something_, to put him on his guard. He had said that he was
engaged to lunch with a man named Donaldson at the Hotel Weldon, and it
occurred to me that I might reach him there by telephone. At a little
before one o'clock, I called up the hotel, and inquired if Captain March
had arrived, to keep an appointment with Mr. Donaldson. The answer was
"yes"; and when I had given my name, I was asked to hold the line for a
few minutes, until Captain March should come to the telephone.

As I sat with the receiver at my ear, waiting, somebody began to talk in
weird Spanish--or "Mex," as I'd heard it nicknamed in El Paso. The
telephone and I had never been intimate friends at home, and I'd
practically made its acquaintance since coming to America, so I scarcely
realized why or how I was hearing that voice. "Is it some one trying to
call to me?" I wondered stupidly. "Who knows here, except Eagle, that I
speak Spanish?" Then, gradually, it dawned on me that I had "tapped" a
c