"Perhaps I am," said Stevens, or Burley, again looking about him. "And _if_ I am, I need one good man I can depend on, to help me in the job. It's too big for one to handle, and the city is so full of spies that I wouldn't trust a native round the corner. But how do I know you will do your part, eh?"
"Try me and see," said Larkin with great firmness.
"All right, I'll try you." They were now walking through one of the side streets, which was but dimly lighted. "Here are my lodgings. Come in and we'll talk it over."
He opened the outer door with a pass-key, and Fred followed him up two flights of narrow stairs.
"Here we are," said Burley, opening a door. "Step right in, and I'll light up."
Larkin entered, but he was hardly over the threshold when he was pushed headlong to the floor, and heard the door closed and locked behind him.
A low laugh sounded from the entry. "'Help me out,' will you, you puppy?" whispered Burley through the keyhole. "You'll never help anybody out, in this world. Within ten minutes this house will be a heap of rubbish, and you will be in kingdom come. Good-bye! I'll report you at home!"
His steps echoed down the stairway, and then the house was still.
[3] Readers of _Cleared for Action_ will remember the previous career of the renegade Stevens. He was a graduate of the Naval Academy at Annapolis, and subsequently turned against his country. In an attempt to betray the Spaniards he was detected, arrested, and thrown into prison at Santiago just before the fall of that city.
Fred Larkin's first move, on finding himself trapped, was a perfectly natural one. He scrambled to his feet and rushed to the door. It took him some time to find the knob, in the darkness, and on turning it and pulling with all his might he was not surprised to discover that it refused to yield.
"It's a bad scrape," said the reporter to himself, breathing hard with his exertions, "but I've been in worse ones, unless that threat of blowing up the house is carried out."
He had been fumbling in his pocket, and now drew from it a box of wax vestas, one of which he struck. The light disclosed a small room, perfectly bare. A glance at the heavy door convinced him that it was useless to attempt a speedy escape in that direction. There were two low windows, both with the sashes fastened down and protected by outside shutters of wood.