Silently as a cat Billie crept up the stairs behind his unknown companion. Near the top the man stopped and a minute later he flashed an electric light against the stone overhead. Another minute and he heaved with the top of his head and the slab slid back. "And now," exclaimed Billie in a deep voice, "put your hands over your head!" Whether from fear or from the unparalleled surprise caused by hearing a human voice at such a time and in such a place, instead of obeying Billie's command, Strong's hands--for Strong it was--fell limp at his side and his electric torch fell to the stones beneath his feet. "All right," continued Billy, "if that's the way you feel about it; but just remember that a single false move and I'll cut this automatic loose among your ribs. Now climb out a step at a time." With face as white as marble at the shock he had just sustained, Strong obeyed implicitly and Billie was soon standing on the stone patio, looking Strong in the face. "You're a good one, you are," he said sarcastically. "I should think you'd be ashamed to call yourself an American." "What do you mean?" asked Strong in a trembling voice. "Why, first of all, stealing from the bank, and then selling your own countrymen to the Mexicans." "Who have I sold?" "Do you mean to say that you didn't sell Gen. Funston to the greasers for ten thousand dollars?" "Of course I do!" in a somewhat stronger voice. "Perhaps you'll deny that you are Strong, the mountebank. You don't think for one minute that I don't know you in spite of your make-up, do you?" "No, I'll admit that I'm the mountebank. As for my name that is of small importance in a country like this. But I did not sell Gen. Funston, as you put it. I knew the man I pointed out was not Funston and I knew that as soon as the Mexicans found it out they would let him go. Some one might have told them rightly. As it was I spoiled their game and I got the money. Do you think it any crime to do that?" "That's a matter I am not in a position to discuss," was Billie's answer. "But how about robbing the bank?" "I had as much right to the box as any one." "You'll have to prove that to some one besides me; all I can do is to turn you over to the authorities." "Never!" cried Strong. "I'll die before I'll rot in a Mexican jail!" He uttered a peculiar noise and before Billie could imagine what it meant, he felt himself seized from behind by a pair of hairy hands. He had been in that clutch once before and recognized in an instant that he was in the grip of the ape. He gave one loud cry for help and then turned loose with his automatic.