I let him frighten himself thoroughly until we were nearing the landing-stage. “Now I want you to understand things. I shall either be one of the best friends you ever had or I shall ruin you lock, stock and barrel. That rests with you. I know all you have been doing and what your appointment was for to-day. Give me the papers you have and tell me candidly all you know about these people’s plans, and I shall be the friend. Refuse, and I shall be the reverse. And I can be a very ugly enemy, M. Dagara. We shall not talk on the way to the yacht and you will have ample time to think over your position and decide. But I must have the papers at once, lest you should take a fancy to pitch them into the harbour.” He hesitated in positively pitiful fear. “If you do not give them to me now without trouble, my men on the launch will take them from you by force.” That threat had a wholesome effect. After a moment he handed me an envelope which I pocketed, and he gave no more trouble. In consequence of some repairs to the roadway the carriage had to stop some fifty yards short of the landing-stage, but he walked to the launch without demur, and when I told him to conceal himself in the little cabin he obeyed at once. As soon as we reached the _Stella_ I led him into the saloon. “Now I’ll have your decision, Dagara,” I said sharply. “Will you really try to shield me?” “Yes, I give you my word--but no half measures, mind. I know quite enough to test the truth of all you say.” “I’m the most miserable man in Portugal, Mr. Donnington, and this double life is killing me;” and then out came his story. It was very similar to Vasco’s case--except that Dagara’s wife had been the means of his undoing. She had friends among the revolutionaries and had been in league with them some time before he discovered it. She had wormed things out of him, as wives can and do out of husbands who love and trust them, and had handed on the information to her friends. Barosa had learnt this and naturally jumped at the chance of getting a man in such a position into his clutches. It was not difficult to lay a trap for him, and he found himself suddenly faced with the alternative of giving a little information of a comparatively harmless description, or of seeing the wife he loved denounced to the Government as a revolutionary. Love for wife triumphed over fealty to employer, and the information was given. It concerned only some arrangements for the disposition of a body of troops and police on one occasion when the king was returning to the capital from a shooting party. But it was given in writing--Barosa took good care of that, of course--and from that hour Dagara was a bond-slave and had never known a minute’s peace of mind.