CLIFF PLAYS HIS PART
Cliff, on board the stranded _Senorita_, with Sam and Jim and the naval
patrol sailor, Jack, knew nothing of the exciting events that had just
occurred.
Nor did he guess that an escaping white boat full of desperate men was
laying its course to pass his station.
Tom’s effort to destroy the carbureter had drawn the attention of the
crew to the engineer’s repeated assertions that the leaky old carbureter
was wasting gas, and that they ought to be sure they had enough to run
the channel and escape.
“But where can we get any more?” said Senor Ortiga.
“On the wrecked _Senorita_, of course,” snapped his brother. “Her tanks
are almost full.”
“But with the cutter coming, how can we stop for gas?” demanded Tew.
“Easy,” said a sailor, and revealed a plan.
Of all that Cliff was ignorant. He, with Sam, Jim and the sailor, had
stood watch-and-watch through the night and up into the day.
But nothing had altered the monotony.
But excitement was coming, and coming fast!
Nicky and Tom had been unceremoniously roped and flung into the open
cockpit aft of the engine compartment. The cockpit was a low step higher
than the cabin flooring, but its coaming and sides were so high that all
the two chums could see was the sky and, when they ran close to an
islet, the tops of the trees where these grew near the water.
The cutter had been delayed for a moment to pick up Mr. Neale and
Brownie, who had rowed with all their might and had sighted the cutter
in time to hail her and to be taken aboard. Lieutenant Sommerlee wanted
Brownie, a good shot, and Mr. Neale would be able to play a part if
hand-to-hand fighting came about.
He sent Brownie forward and bade him scan the water closely as they put
full speed on to chase the _Libertad_, long since passed out of view
beyond the first island of the archipelago.
“I suspect they will try to do something to delay us,” the lieutenant
said. “They may drop something in the channel, for there is one place
where it is very narrow and quite shallow, and almost any large
object—an anchor, sticking up on the coral, would crush our bow planks
at the speed we’re making.”
Brownie kept a sharp watch, and soon discovered, as they approached the
narrowest and shallower part of the channel, something dark on the
bottom.
“Cliff and Jack and the colored men will stop them I hope,” said the
commander as they slowed and drew near to the submerged danger.
“They will, if they can do it,” Brownie said. He dropped over the bow
and discovered that his commander had foreseen exactly what had been
done; the _Libertad’s_ anchor had been cut loose, and, with some spare
engine parts, had been flung from the white boat’s stern into the
channel with the hope that the cutter would run onto them and be
entirely disabled, before they were noticed.
While the damage was averted, it took time to lift the heavy metal under
the water, and to displace it.
Meanwhile Cliff sat on the slanting deck of the _Senorita_, with Jack
and Sam, while Jim hung close above them on the top of the cabin, his
eyes fixed on the distances of the channel.
“What will you do if they come in daylight?” Cliff looked up at him to
ask.
“Shoot at the waterline and let the water in,” said Jack.
“But they’ll shoot back,” objected Cliff.
“That’s the chance we have to take,” Jack answered.
“We might load up the signal cannon with some slugs, or something,”
suggested Jim. He had begged Cliff’s pardon for his part in the tying-up
and other maltreatment aboard the _Senorita_; Jim was not a bad being at
heart; he had been employed by Senor Ortiga and Mr. Coleson and had only
done their bidding, with no animosity or cruelty in his actions. Cliff
had readily forgiven him. Jim, thus made happy, was just as determined
to help the side of right and justice as he had been, before, to earn
his pay honestly, as he saw honesty and his duty to his employers.
“The cannon wouldn’t carry the slugs any distance,” said Sam.
“But they’d have to pass within three feet of us,” said Jim.
He pointed overside to the channel, where the deep water was at the side
of the wrecked vessel. “This boat ran onto coral because her tiller rope
broke, remember! There’s plenty of water, and they can pass us, but
they’ll have to steer close.”
Cliff nodded.
“If you fellows won’t think I’m bossy,” he said, modestly, “and if Jack
won’t be mad and think I want to be the leader, I’d like to say
something.”
“Go ahead,” said Jack. “Always open to good ideas, buddy!”
Cliff expounded a plan: his first idea was that to fire at the vessel,
if she ever came, would bring about firing in response. If they could in
some way lure some of the hi-jackers onto the _Senorita_, without their
own numbers being endangered, several of them might board the other boat
and destroy her steering gear, or even capture her.
Jack liked the plan better than he did his own.
“I’m for it,” he said. “If you can get them to stop—if they come out at
all, and if they get past the cutter, which I don’t see how they can!”
“Jim, they know, is on board,” Cliff said. “My plan would be for Sam,
and you, Jack, and me, to hide behind the cabin where they couldn’t see
us, and have Jim hail them, if they come close enough and slow up enough
to let him jump aboard—and they might not. But if they didn’t, Jim could
be up forward on the cabin, and keep their attention on that end of the
boat, and when they come abreast maybe one or more of us could run
around the after end of the cabin and jump aboard.”
“Pretty wild chance,” commented Sam. “But it’s better than risking our
necks standing up to be shot at—we’d have at least the chance of
surprising them, and if we got aboard——”
“There’s a rocket!” cried Jack. “And another—” They all scrambled onto
the cabin and stared toward the distant coast. Three puffs of smoke hung
in the air, low over the trees.
“Nicky’s signal—or the cutter’s,” Cliff cried. “Be ready for—for
anything!”
The wait was tedious. Their nerves were taunt and their voices when they
spoke briefly were rather shrill and shaky. They did not know what was
happening or what might happen. Would they be called on, really, to try
to stop a band of hi-jackers? It seemed very easy when they discussed it
in calm security; but with those signals shredding into nothing in the
air, the reality and seriousness of their position came home to them
all.
The time seemed endless, but finally Jim, alone on the cabin roof,
whispered down, without moving enough to disclose the fact to his
oncoming adversaries, “here she comes—_El Libertad_—and a-hummin’.”
“How many on her? Who can you see?” asked Cliff, tensely.
The white craft came ahead at her full speed. After a brief wait Jim
answered Cliff. “I see my old boss, Senor Ortiga,” he said, “and Marse
Coleson! And some other men—why, it’s the men who used to be in business
with my boss, only they turned hi-jackers. Yes, sar, there’s Don Ortiga,
the brother—and Tew—and all o’ them, the very ones we sent you to with
that message in the can.”
“I know,” said Cliff. “Never mind, now—hail them, aren’t they near
enough?” Being under the cabin wall for concealment he was not able to
see.
“Now they are,” said Jim softly and sent a hail across the water.
“Take me off, stop and take me off—Master Coleson, it’s Jim!” he
shouted. There was no answer. The white boat, as he reported in low
tones, between hails, was slowing up, and coming closer, losing
way—stopping. Jim, to carry out his part, sprang down from the cabin.
Cliff, Sam and Jack crouched; they were no longer able to tell what was
happening, but they knew that Jim would call out “Bless you for saving
me!” if he got aboard and then they could act quickly, knowing that the
boat would be opposite their end of the cabin.
Instead, another voice came, loud and clear.
“We’ll see about taking you off; we’re stopping! We need gas.”
“How’d you get gas?” asked Jim, from the deck rail. “You ain’t got no
way to pump it from one tank to the other!”
“Yes we have,” called the voice. Cliff thought it sounded like Tew. “We
got a hose rigged to our bilge pump, and we’ll pump with that.”
The white boat scraped along the _Senorita’s_ tilted side, and men
swarmed over onto her deck; the crouching three heard their boots
scrabble, thud and clump about. They were forward, and Jim had run along
the forward end of the craft to continue his talk. The after end of the
_Senorita_ was, therefore, beyond the after rail of the shorter boat.
Cliff inched his way around the aft side of the cabin until he could
peer forward, taking a big chance, but feeling that he must see.
Jack, and Sam, creeping close behind him, waited in suspense.
Cliff took a swift peep and ducked back.
“They’re stretching a hose to the _Senorita’s_ forward tank,” he
breathed. “There are some men on the _Senorita_, and—let me look again!”
He protruded his head again, and then he thought he heard a low whistle.
Cliff turned, looking down toward the stern of the white vessel.
There, trussed up like two turkeys, in the cockpit of the _Libertad_,
lay Tom and Nicky, the latter grinning a little sheepishly.
Cliff turned to his companions. His voice came in swift, whispered
words. Jack nodded.
“We’ll do it!” he answered, hoarsely. “Inch as close as you can and
we’ll be behind you. You take the cockpit, and free your chums. I’ll
race forward, shooting, call Jim to help, and try to prevent the others
from getting off our wreck. Sam, you shoot—in the air, in the
water—anywhere; but shoot, load again and shoot—holler and try to scare
them if you can’t hit them!”
“All right,” said Sam. Cliff inched along the deck. He was in plain
view, now, from forward on the _Senorita_, or from the _Libertad_.
But the trio in the cabin of the latter vessel were deep in
conversation, and the men were busy with the hose.
“Start your bilge pump!” called a sailor. Tew, on the white boat, bent
and engaged a clutch; there was a heavy grind of gearing and the slow
pulsation of a pump.
“Now!” whispered Cliff, and dashed for the rail.
“Look out—we’re caught!” yelled a man, on guard atop the _Senorita’s_
cabin, watching for the cutter. He fired at Cliff, but Sam, reaching a
black arm over the cabin studding, yanked his leg, threw him off
balance, and spoiled aim. Shooting, yelling, Jack charged up narrow
deck, Sam at his heels.
Cliff leaped and landed beside Nicky!