"Yes," said the skipper sternly, speaking in very fair Spanish, "you may
say you are a friend, but a friend doesn't come crawling into a camp
like a serpent. It seems to me you are a spy; and do you know what is
the fate of a spy at a time like this?"
"Yes, yes, senor; a spy would be shot."
"Right--to save other people's lives. Where were you going?"
"I was coming here, senor, to the hacienda."
"So I supposed; but what for?"
The man seemed to hesitate, and tried to speak, but no words would come,
for he was either suffering from agitation, exhaustion, or utter fear,
and Fitz Burnett's hands turned wet and cold at the thought of the stern
judgment that would be passed upon the trembling wretch if he could not
prove his words.
"Do you hear what I say?" said the skipper, in a stern, fierce voice.
"Yes, yes, senor," gasped the man at last, just when the two lads had
grasped hands, each to deliver a speaking pressure to the other.
"Tell me, then. Why were you coming here?"
"Because I believed that Don Ramon was here."
"Do you know Don Ramon?"
"Yes, senor; he is an old friend."
"We can soon prove that," said the skipper. "Here, Poole, the Don is
lying down asleep, utterly worn out, but he must be awakened to see his
friend," he added meaningly.
Poole gripped Fitz's hand tightly, as if to say, Come with me; and the
two lads hurried off to where the Don was lying asleep, guarded by four
of his men, under the shelter of a shed.
"I hope to goodness," whispered Poole, "that the poor fellow's told the
truth."
"Your father wouldn't have him shot if he had not, surely?"
Poole was silent for a few moments.
"I don't know," he said evasively.--"Yes, friends," he said, in answer
to a challenge in Spanish, "I want to speak to Don Ramon."
"He is asleep, senor, and must not be awakened," was the reply.
"I know he is asleep," said Poole sharply and authoritatively, "and he
must be awakened. It is a case of life or death."
The awakening was already performed, for at the sound of the lad's
half-angry voice the man he sought sprang up, revolver in hand, ready
for action.
"Yes?" he said. "Are they coming on?"
"No," replied Poole. "We have taken a spy, as we think, but he
professes to know you, sir, and asks to see you at once."
"I'll come," said the Don; and then turning to the lads with a smile:
"Friends are very scarce; I mustn't slight this one."
In another minute he was where the prisoner was anxiously awaiting his
coming, ready to utter a sigh of relief as the Don caught him in his
arms with--
"Miguel, my friend! What brings you here?"
"I knew you were in danger," was the reply.
"And you came to tell me--"
"Yes, and it was a risky task. What with your enemies and your
friends," he added meaningly, "I wonder that I am alive."
"Forgive me!" cried Don Ramon. "I had been looking upon you as one who
had forsaken me in my distress. But yes, you are right; I am in danger,
but still alive. Surely you have no worse news?"
"Yes, the worst."
"Well, tell me; I can bear anything now."
"You have beaten Villarayo off twice to-day."
"Yes, with the help of my friends," said the Don, turning in a courtly
way towards the English party. "And you have come to warn me that they
are just going to make another attack?"
"They are, but not yet. I have been with them at the risk of my life,
and I know that the men were so horribly discouraged by their losses
that they refused to attack again, and threatened to break up and return
to their homes; but at last Villarayo has prevailed upon them to stay,
and messengers went hours ago along the passes to Velova."
"Yes; what for?"
"With instructions that every fighting man from the fort and the
earthworks facing the sea, is to be withdrawn, and come through the
mountains to Villarayo's help. They will be here some time to-morrow,
and you must be overwhelmed, or flee at once."
"It is impossible," said Ramon coldly. "We are shut in here, and my sun
must rise or set to-morrow. This is my last stand."
"But your wife--your children! Think of them."
"I have thought of nothing else, waking and sleeping," said the Don
coldly. "But my wife would not look upon me if I forsook my country,
and my children shall not live with the knowledge that Ramon's is a
coward's name."
"Is this your decision?" said the messenger of bad tidings.
"Yes. Captain Reed, my brave true friend, look at him. He is half-dead
with hunger and exhaustion. Can you give him water and food?"
"He shall share what we have, sir, and I am sorry that we cannot give
him better fare than biscuit and water; but the rations we brought with
us were small, and they are nearly at an end. Don Miguel, I ask your
pardon for me and mine. You will forgive us our rough treatment? We
were fighting for your friend."
"I know," said the visitor faintly, and he took and grasped the
captain's hand.
A few minutes later he was sharing Don Ramon's shelter, and struggling
hard to recoup nature with the broken biscuit he was soaking in a
pannikin of water, while Fitz and his companions returned to their old
station to resume the watch.
They sat for some time thinking, for nobody seemed disposed to talk,
even the carpenter, the most conversational of the trio, seeming to
prefer the society of the piece of dirty-looking black tobacco which he
kept within his teeth; but the silence became so irksome, for somehow
the firing seemed to have driven every wild creature to a distance, that
Fitz broke it at last.
"I don't know when I felt so nervous," he whispered. "I felt sure that
something that would have seemed far more horrible than the fight was
about to occur."
"What, my father ordering that poor fellow to be shot? Yes, it would
have been horrible indeed."
"But would the skipper have ordered him to be shot, Mr Poole, sir?"
said Winks thoughtfully.
"I'm afraid so, Chips."
"Humph! Don't seem like him. He bullies us chaps pretty sharp
sometimes, and threatens, and sometimes the words he says don't smell of
violets, nor look like precious stones; but I can't see him having a
chap shot because he was a spy. Why, it'd be like having an execution
without a judge."
"Yes, very horrible," said Fitz, "but it's time of war; as in the Duke
of Wellington's time,--martial law."
"Who's him, sir? You mean Blucher--him as got into trouble over the
Army boots?"
"No, no," said Poole. "Mr Burnett means the law that is used in
fighting times when a Commander-in-chief acts as judge."
"Oh! All right, sir. But it sounds a bit harbitrary, as they calls it
in the newspapers. I should have thought a hundred dozen would have
been punishment enough, without putting a stinguisher on a man right
out. I suppose it's all right, but I wouldn't have given it to him so
hot as that. Well, I'm glad he come, because now we know what we've got
to expect to-morrow. Do you know what I should like if I could have
three wishes same as you reads of in the little story-books?"
"Camel to come up now with one of his hot steak-and-kidney puddings
boiled in a basin?"
"_Tlat_!" ejaculated the carpenter, with a smack of the lips. "And the
inions a-smelling looshus a hundred yards away. Nay, it warn't that."
"A carpenter's tools?" said Fitz.
"Nay, but you ain't far off, Mr Burnett. What I was wishing for was
one of them barge-loads of neatly-cut timber as you see piled upon the
Mersey, run right up this 'ere little river ready for all our chaps to
unload. My word! Talk about a fortification! Why, I'd make a
sixtification of it with them timbers, and so quickly that to-morrow
when the enemy come they should find all our Spaniels sitting behind the
little loop-holes like a row of monkeys cracking nuts, a-laughing and
chaffing the enemy, and telling of them to come on."
"Oh, bother!" said Poole. "Don't talk so much. It's enough to tempt
the enemy to sneak up and begin potting at us. I know what I should
like to do." And he relapsed into silence.
"Well, what?" said Fitz, when he was tired of waiting.
"Get all the men together and make a sally."
"A what?" said the carpenter. "What for? Blest if ever I heard of such
a dodge as that before. What'd be the good of a she-male at a time like
this? I could make a guy, sir, if that would suit you."
"Will you hold your tongue, you chattering old glue-pot!"
"All right, sir! Go it! Stick it on thick! Glue-pot, eh? What will
you call me next? But what would be the good of a Sally?"
"Sally! To issue forth all together, stupid, and surprise the enemy in
their camp."
"Oh! Well, I suppose they would be surprised to have us drop upon them
all at once; but if they heard us coming we should be surprised. No,
sir; let them come to us, for they're about ten to one. We are safest
where we are."
"Yes; Chips is right," said Fitz. "It would be very dangerous unless we
could get them on the run. I wouldn't do that."
"What would you do, then?" said Poole.
"Well," said Fitz, "you told me I was not a player, and that it was your
game."
"Yes, but that was before you began peppering the beggars with that
double gun."
"Now, that's too bad," cried Fitz petulantly. "There, I've done now."
"No, you haven't. You have got something on your mind, and if it's a
dodge to help us all out of this mess, you are not the fellow to keep it
back. So come; out with it."
"Well, I'll tell you what I've been thinking," said Fitz, "almost ever
since I heard what that Mr Miguel said about the reinforcements coming
from Velova."
"What, to crush us up?" said Poole. "Enough to make any one think! But
what about it?"
"Why, the fort and earthworks will be emptied and all the fighting men
on the way to-morrow to come and fight us here."
"Of course, and they'll be here some time to-morrow afternoon, and if
they don't beat us they will be going back with sore heads; but I am
afraid that those of us who are left will be going back as prisoners.
Is that what you meant?"
"No," said Fitz, and without heeding a faint rustling sound such as
might have been made by some wild creature, or an enemy stealing up to
listen to their words, he went on: "I was thinking that this is what we
ought to do--I mean your father and the Don--steal off at once without
making a sound, all of us, English and Spaniards too, down to that
timber-wharf."
"But suppose the enemy have got scouts out there?"
"I don't believe they have. After that last thrashing they drew off
ever so far, and that President is doing nothing but wait for the coming
of his reinforcements."
"That sounds right, Mr Poole, sir," said the carpenter.
"Well, it's likely," said Poole, and the faint rustling went on unheard.
"But what then?"
"Whistle up the boat. The men would know your signal."
"Yes?"
"Load her up till the water's above the streak, and let her drop down
with the stream. I noticed that it ran pretty fast. Land the men at
the mouth; leave them to signal for the schooner to come within reach--
they could do that with the lantern, or a bit of fire on the shore, if
they didn't hear the captain's pipe--and while they are doing that, four
men with oars row back as hard as ever they could go, to fetch another
boat-load."
"Boat-load?" said Poole. "Why, it would take about four journeys, if
not more."
"Very likely," said Fitz. "But there would be hours to do it in."
"And what then?"
"Get everybody on board the schooner and make sail for the north. Get
into Velova Bay, and you could take the town with ease."
"And what about the gunboat?" said Poole.
"Ah! That's the awkward point in my plan. But the gunboat is not
obliged to be there, and even if she were you could take the town if you
managed to get there in the dark; and once you've got the town you could
hold it, even if she knocked the fort to pieces."
"Hum!" grunted the carpenter.
"It'd be a tight fit getting everybody here on board our schooner."
"Nonsense!" said Fitz. "I could get a hundred men on board easily; and
besides, we should all be saved."
"And besides, we should all be saved," said Poole, half aloud. "Yes,
that's true. It does seem possible, after all, for there would be no
defenders hardly left at Velova, and we could fit up a defence of some
kind to keep off the enemy when they found we had gone and old Villarayo
came raging back; and that wouldn't be for another two days. Yes,
there's something in it, if we could dodge the gunboat again."
"Humph!" grunted the carpenter once more. "No; there's a hole in your
saucepan, and all the soup is tumbling out. The enemy is bound to have
some fellows on the watch, and likely enough not a hundred yards from
here, and they would soon find out that we were evacuating the place,
come and take us at a disadvantage, and perhaps shoot the poor fellows
crowded up in the boat. Oh no, my lad; it won't do at all."
"Humph!" grunted the carpenter again.
"Don't you be in such a hurry, Mr Son-of-the-skipper," said Fitz. "I'd
thought of that, and I should keep the enemy from coming on."
"How?" said Poole, rather excitedly now.
"Light three or four watch-fires--quite little ones--and put up a stick
or two amongst the bushes with blankets on them and the Spaniards'
sombrero hats. They'd look at a distance like men keeping the fire, and
we could make these fires so that they would glow till daylight and go
on smoking then; and as long as smoke was rising from these fires, I
believe not one of the enemy would come near until the reinforcements
arrived. And by that time, if all went well, we should be off Velova
Bay."
"Humph!" grunted the carpenter again.
"It won't do, Burnett," said Poole; "it's too risky. There's nothing in
it."
"Humph!" grunted the carpenter once more.
"And hark at that! You've set old Chips off snoring with your plot."
"That he aren't!" growled the carpenter. "I've heared every precious
word. It's fine, Mr Poole, sir--fine! There's only one thing wanted
to put it right, and that's them Sallies sitting round the fire. I
wouldn't have Sallies. I'd have guys. I could knock you up
half-a-dozen with crossed bamboos, each on 'em looking like
tatter-doolies looking after crows with a gun. I says the plan would
do."
"And so do I, carpenter," said the skipper, in his quick short tones as
he stepped out from among the trees, making the three start to their
feet.
"And I, my friend," cried Don Ramon excitedly catching the middy by the
hand.
"Poole, my lad," continued the skipper, "get one of the other men and go
cautiously down to the landing-place with every care, and if you reach
it unhindered, whistle up the boat at once. Carpenter, get others to
help you, and start fires as quickly as you can. _Very_ small. The
others can do that, while you contrive your rough effigies.--Now, Don
Ramon, you'll take the covering of our efforts with your men while mine
work. Remember, it is for our lives, and our only chance."