Completely at sea as a result of the unexpected revelation of the shoe-prints we had found in the Museum, and with suspicions now thoroughly aroused against Lockwood, I accompanied Kennedy to keep our appointment with the Senorita at the Prince Edward Albert.
We were purposely a bit early, in order to meet Inez, so that she would not have to be alone with the Senora, and we sat down in the lobby in a little angle from which we could look into the tea room.
We had not been sitting there very long when Kennedy called my attention to Whitney, who had just come in. Almost at the same time he caught sight of us, and walked over.
"I've been thinking a good deal of your visit to me just now," he began, seating himself beside us. "Perhaps I should not have said what I did about your friend Norton. But I couldn't help it. I guess you know something about that dagger he lost, don't you?"
"I have heard of the 'great fish' and the 'little fish' and the 'curse of Mansiche,'" replied Kennedy, "if that is what you mean. Somehow the Inca dagger seems to have been mixed up with them."
"Yes--with the peje grande, I believe," went on Whitney.
Beneath his exterior of studied calm I could see that he was very much excited. If I had not already noted a peculiar physical condition in him, I might have thought he had stopped in the cafe with some friends too long. But his eyes were not those of a man who has had too much to drink.
Just then Senorita Mendoza entered, and Kennedy rose and went forward to greet her. She saw Whitney, and flashed an inquiring glance at us.
"We were waiting for Senorita Mendoza," explained Kennedy to both Whitney and her, "when Mr. Whitney happened along. I don't see Senora de Moche in the tea room. Perhaps we may as well sit out here in the corridor until she comes."
It was evidently his desire to see how Whitney and Inez would act, for this was the first time we had ever seen them together.
"We were talking of the treasure," resumed Whitney, omitting to mention the dagger. "Kennedy, we are not the only ones who have sought the peje grande, or rather are seeking it. But we are, I believe, the only ones who are seeking it in the right place, and," he added, leaning over confidentially, "your father, Senorita, was the only one who could have got the concession, the monopoly, from the government to seek in what I am convinced will be the right place. Others have found the 'little fish.' We shall find the 'big fish.'"
He had raised his voice from the whisper, and I caught Inez looking anxiously at Kennedy, as much as to say, "You see? He is like the rest. His mind is full of only one subject."
"We shall find it, too," he continued, still speaking in a high- pitched key, "no matter what obstacles man or devil put in our way. It shall be ours--for a simple piece of engineering--ours! The curse of Mansiche--pouf!"
He snapped his fingers defiantly as he said it. There was an air of bravado about his manner. I could not help feeling that perhaps in his heart he was not so sure of himself as he would have others think.
I watched him closely, and could see that he had suddenly become even more excited than before. It was as though some diabolical force had taken possession of his brain, and he fought it off, but was unable to conquer.
Kennedy followed the staring glance of Whitney's eyes, which seemed almost to pop out of his head, as though he were suffering from the disease exophthalmic goitre. I looked also. Senora de Moche had come from the elevator, accompanied by Alfonso, and was walking slowly down the corridor. As she looked to the right and left, she had caught sight of our little group, all except Whitney, with our backs toward her. She was now looking fixedly in our direction, paying no attention to anything else.
Whitney was a study. I wondered what could be the relations between these two, the frankly voluptuous woman and the calculating full-blooded man. Whitney, for his part, seemed almost fascinated by her gaze. He rose as she bowed, and, for a moment, I thought that he was going over to speak to her, as if drawn by that intangible attraction which Poe has so cleverly expressed in his "Imp of the Perverse." For, clearly, one who talked as Whitney had just been talking would have to be on his guard with that woman. Instead, however, he returned her nod and stood still, while Kennedy bowed at a distance and signalled to her that we would be in the tea room directly.
I glanced up in time to see the anxious look on the face of Inez change momentarily into a flash of hatred toward the Senora.
At the same moment Alfonso, who was on the other side of his mother, turned from looking at a newsstand which had attracted his attention and caught sight of us. There was no mistaking the ardent glance which he directed at the fair Peruvian at my side. I fancied, too, that her face softened a bit. It was only for a moment, and then Inez resumed her normal composure.
"I won't detain you any longer," remarked Whitney. "Somehow, when I start to talk about my--our plans down there at Truxillo I could go on all night. It is marvellous, marvellous. We haven't any idea of what the future holds in store. No one else in all this big city has anything like the prospect which is before us. Gradually we are getting everything into shape. When we are ready to go ahead, it will be the sensation of Wall Street--and, believe me, it takes much to arouse the Street."
He may have been talking wildly, but it was worth while to listen to him. For, whatever else he was, Whitney was one of the most persuasive promoters of the day. More than that, I could well imagine how any one possessed of an imagination susceptible to the influence of mystery and tradition would succumb to the glittering charm of the magic words, peje chica, and feel all the gold- hunter's enthusiasm when Whitney brought him into the atmosphere of the peje grande. As he talked, visions of hidden treasure seemed to throw a glamour over everything. One saw golden.
"You will excuse us?" apologized Kennedy, taking Inez by the arm. "If you are about, Mr. Whitney, I shall stop to chat with you again on the way out."
"Remember--she is a very remarkable woman," said Whitney, as we left him and started for the tea room.
His tone was not exactly one of warning, yet it seemed to have cost him an effort to say it. I could not reconcile it with any other idea than that he was trying to use her in his own plans, but was still in doubt of the outcome.
We parted from him and entered the darkened tea room, with its wicker tables and chairs, and soft lights, glowing pinkly, to simulate night in the broad light of afternoon outside. A fountain splashed soothingly in the centre. Everything was done to lend to the place an exotic air of romance.
Alfonso and his mother had chosen a far corner, deeper than the rest in the shadows, where two wicker settees were drawn up about a table, effectually cutting off inquisitive eyes and ears.
Alfonso rose as we approached and bowed deeply. I could not help watching the two women as they greeted each other.
"Won't you be seated?" he asked, pulling around one of the wicker chairs.
It was then that I saw how he had contrived to sit next to Inez, while Kennedy manoeuvred to sit on the end, where he could observe them all best.
It was a rather delicate situation, and I wondered how Kennedy would handle it, for, although Alfonso had done the inviting, it was really Craig who was responsible for allowing Inez to accept. The Senora seemed to recognize it, also, for, although she talked to Inez, it was plain she had him in mind.
"I have heard from Alfonso about the cruel death of your father," she began, in a softened tone, "and I haven't had a chance to tell you how deeply I sympathize with you. Of course, I am a much older woman than you, have seen much more trouble. But I know that never in life do troubles seem keener than when life is young. And yours has been so harsh. I could not let it pass without an opportunity to tell you how deeply I feel."
She said it with an air of sincerity that was very convincing, so convincing, in fact, that it shook for the moment the long chain of suspicion that I had been forging both of her and her son. Could she be such a heartless woman as to play on the very heartstrings of one whom she had wronged? I was shaken, moreover, by the late discovery by Kennedy of the foot-prints.
The Senorita murmured her thanks for the condolences in a broken voice. It was evident that whatever enmity she bore against the Senora it was not that of suspicion that she was the cause of her father's death.
"I can sympathize with you the more deeply," she went on, "because only lately I have lost a very dear brother myself. Already I have told Professor Kennedy something about it. It was a matter of which I felt I must speak to you, for it may concern you, in the venture in which Mr. Lockwood and your father were associated, and into which now Mr. Whitney has entered."
Inez said nothing, and Craig bowed, as though he, too, wished her to go on.
"It is about the 'big fish' and the concession which your father has obtained from the government to search for it."
The Senorita started and grew a bit pale at the reference, but she seemed to realize that it was something she ought to hear, and steeled herself to it.
"Yes," she murmured, "I understand."
"As you no doubt know," resumed the Senora, "no one has had the secret of the hidingplace. It has been by mere tradition that they were going to dig. That secret, you may know or may not know now, was in reality contained in the inscriptions on an old Inca dagger."
Inez shuddered at the mention of the weapon, a shudder that was not lost on the Senora.
"I have already told Professor Kennedy that both the tradition and the dagger were handed down in my own family, coming at last to my brother. As I said, I don't know how it happened, but somehow he seemed to be getting crazy, until he talked, and the dagger was stolen from him. It came finally into Professor Norton's hands, from whom it was in turn stolen."
She looked at Inez searchingly, as if to discover just what she knew. I wondered whether the Senora suspected the presence of Lockwood's footprints in the sarcophagus in the Museum--what she would do if she did.
"After he lost it," she continued reminiscently, "my brother threw himself one day into Lake Titicaca. Everywhere the trail of that dagger, of the secret of the Gold of the Gods has been stained by blood. To-day the world scoffs at curses. But surely that gold must be cursed. It has been cursed for us and ours."
She spoke bitterly; yet might she not mean that the loss of the dagger, the secret, was a curse, too?
"There is one other thing I wish to say, and then I will be through. Far back, when your ancestors came into the country of mine, an ancestor of your father lost his life over the treasure. It seems as if there were a strange fatality over it, as if the events of to-day were but living over the events of yesterday. It is something that we cannot escape--fate."
She paused a moment, then added, "Yet it might be possible that the curse could be removed if somehow we, who were against each other then, might forget and be for each other now."
"But Senorita Mendoza has not the dagger," put in Kennedy, watching her face keenly, to read the effect of his remark. "She has no idea where it may be."
"Then it is pure tradition on which Mr. Lockwood and Mr. Whitney depend in their search for the treasure?" flashed back the Senora quickly.
Kennedy did not know, but he did not confess it. "Until we know differently, we must take their word for it," he evaded.
"It was not that that I meant, however," replied Senora de Moche. "I meant that we might stop the curse by ceasing to hunt for the treasure. It has never done any one good; it never will. Why tempt fate, then? Why not pause before it is too late?"
I could not quite catch the secondary implication of her plan. Did it mean that the treasure would then be left for her family? Or was she hinting at Inez accepting Alfonso's suit? Somehow I could not take the Senora at her face value. I constantly felt that there was an ulterior motive back of her actions and words.
I saw Craig watching the young man's face, and followed his eyes. There was no doubt of how he took the remark. He was gazing ardently at Inez. If there had ever been any doubt of his feelings, which, of course, there had not, this would have settled it.
"One thing more," added the Senora, as though she had had an afterthought, "and that is about Mr. Lockwood and Mr. Whitney. Let me ask you to think it over. Suppose they have not the dagger. Then are their chances better than others? And if they have"--she paused to emphasize it--"what does that mean?"
Kennedy had turned his attention to the Senorita. It was evident that the dilemma proposed by de Moche was not without weight. She had now coloured a flaming red. The woman had struck her in a vital spot.
"Mr. Lockwood is not here to defend himself," Inez said quietly. "I will not have him attacked by innuendo."
She had risen. Neither the ardour of Alfonso nor the seeds of doubt of the Senora had shaken her faith. It was a test that Kennedy evidently was glad to have witnessed. For some day she might learn the truth about the foot-prints. He understood her character better. The Senora, too, had learned that if she were to bring pressure on the girl she might break her, but she would not bend.
Without another word Inez, scarcely bowing stiffly, moved out of the tea room, and we followed, leaving the mother and son there, baffled.
"I hope you will pardon me for allowing you to come here," said Kennedy, in a low voice. "I did it because there are certain things that you ought to hear. It was in fairness to you. I would not have you delude yourself about Mr. Whitney, about--Mr. Lockwood, even. I want you to feel that, no matter what you hear or see, you can come to me and know that I will tell you the truth. It may hurt, but it will be best."
I thought he was preparing the way for a revelation about the foot-prints, but he said nothing more.
"Oh, that woman!" she exclaimed, as if to change the subject. "I do not know, I cannot say, why she affects me so. I saw a change in my father, when he knew her. I have told you how he was, how sometimes I thought he was mad. Did you notice a change in Mr. Whitney, or haven't you known him long enough? And lately I have fancied that I see the same sort of change beginning in Mr. Lockwood. At times they become so excited, their eyes seem staring, as if some fever were wasting them away. Father seemed to see strange visions, and hear voices, was worse when he was alone than when he was in a crowd. Oh, what is it? I could think of nothing else, not even what she was saying, all the time I was with her."
"Then you fear that in some way she may be connected with these strange changes?" asked Kennedy.
"I don't know," she temporized; but the tone of her answer was sufficient to convey the impression that in her heart she did suspect something, she knew not what.
"Oh, Professor Kennedy," she cried finally, "can't you see it? Sometimes--when she looks out of those eyes of hers--she almost makes people do as she pleases."
We had come to the taxicab stand before the hotel, and Kennedy had already beckoned to a cab to take her home.
As he handed her in she turned with a little shiver.
"Don't please, think me foolish," she added, with bated breath, "but often I fear that it is, as we call it, the mal de ojo--the evil eye!"