BETRAYED
It grew warmer as we approached Gibraltar. Flying fish arose from the
water and shot over the surface like silver arrows. Porpoises frolicked
around us. Flocks of sea-gulls followed us as we passed the southern
coast of Europe. Through the Azores we sailed until we came in sight of
the red cliffs of St. Vincent, on the Portugal coast. Then we entered
the Straits of Gibraltar and caught our first sight of the mountainous
African coast.
I had better note here that three continents form the shores of the
Mediterranean Sea--Europe, Asia and Africa. The entrance to this sea
from the Atlantic is guarded by the Pillars of Hercules, formed by
Gibraltar on the European shore and "the Mount of God" on the African
side. These pillars, it interested me to discover, were thought by the
ancients to have been left standing by Hercules as monuments to his
might when he tore asunder the continents. It will be remembered that
along the sea these monuments of nature guarded, civilization had been
cradled. Art, architecture, law, poetry, drama, and religion had come
into being on these coasts. The treasure tomb that now nightly filled
my dreams had doubtless been laid in these early days.
And now, as the events of my story have so much to do with this North
African shore, let us have a clear understanding of its cities and
people. The coast is called Barbary, because the race that inhabits it
are named Berbers. They belong to the same stock as the Anglo-Saxons
and many of them have fair complexions, rosy cheeks and light hair.
They are fanatical Mohammedans, and despise us because we are
Christians. The Moors and Arabs, who are descended from the Mussulman
warriors who captured Africa centuries ago, abound here too, and are
the people with whom our quarrel lies.
Barbary is sometimes called Little Africa. It extends from Egypt to
the Atlantic Ocean and from the Mediterranean Sea back to the Sahara
desert. Just over the way from Gibraltar lies Morocco. It is a little
city with white walls surrounded by great hills. Most of the cities of
Barbary are similarly situated between mountains and water.
Next to the province of Morocco, lies Algeria, and farther on is
Tripoli, the farthest boundary of which adjoins Egypt.
Algeria, I learned, is five times as large as Pennsylvania. Algiers,
one of the largest cities on the coast, is its capital. Walls of
stone have been built across the harbor as fortifications. Algiers
resembles an amphitheatre. Its streets rise on terraces. The streets
are narrow; bazaars are everywhere. These are roofed over with matting
and lined with booths in which all sorts of goods are sold. The
booths are nothing more or less than holes in the walls in which the
dealer sits, while the customers stand out in the street and buy. One
bazaar is given over to the shoemakers; another bazaar is devoted to
jewelry; still another is set apart for the sale of perfumery. Tailors,
saddlers, rug sellers--each trade has a separate bazaar. Here are shops
selling carpets and rugs, and there is a café in which Turkish coffee,
as sweet as molasses, may be sipped. Yonder is the stand of an Arab
selling sweetmeats; beyond him a man in a long gown fries meat and
sells it hot from the fire.
There are solid-looking public buildings, and a great mosque that
covers several acres. A turbaned priest from the minaret which rises
far above the roofs of the shops and homes calls out the hour of
prayer, and the Mohammedans kneel.
A picturesque crowd pours through the dark, narrow streets. Arabs in
long gowns; brown Arabs from the desert; Berbers from their country
villages; Jewish girls in plain long robes of bright colors--pink, red,
green, and yellow; Moorish women in veils; Berber girls with their rosy
faces exposed; boys with shaved heads, wearing gowns and skull caps;
holy men and beggars innumerable. Some of these veiled Mohammedan wives
are only thirteen years old.
We anchored off Sale, a harbor of Morocco. I heard our skipper tell
the mate that he proposed to go ashore and inquire into the chances of
disposing of part of our cargo to advantage.
No sooner had he left the ship than I, whose task it was to keep
Murad's quarters tidy, began to make a thorough search of his
belongings. I was seeking that which only my suspicions told me
existed--the map showing the location of the treasure.
There was a sea chest in the cabin which Murad kept locked. In another
room of the ship, however, I had found a similar chest. The key to this
one I had taken, hoping that it would open the Egyptian's strong-box.
In this experiment I was fortunate--the key turned in the lock as if it
were made to fit it, and the lid was loosened.
I found in the top of the chest the volume that had been stolen from
the rector's library. The trail was hot. There was, however, no map
between its pages. Deeper into the chest I plunged. At the bottom I
pried up a false bottom and found a paper. It seemed to be a copy
instead of an original. I concluded that if this was the diagram of the
treasure site, Murad had taken ashore the original, and had left this
one aboard in case he lost the first one.
The map was simple enough. It showed a section of the southern coast of
the Mediterranean. The towns Tripoli and Derne were indicated. Between
them was a village lettered Tokra. In the neighborhood of this spot
were queer markings, which were explained by writing at the bottom of
the map. When I tried to decipher this I found that it was in Arabic.
The original was doubtless in English. Murad, in copying, had doubtless
changed the English to Arabic to keep the secret from prying eyes.
Towards midnight--while I was on watch--I heard a noise on the water
from the direction of shore. It sounded like rowing, and yet it was
too indistinct a sound for me to make certain. I decided that Murad
had given up his idea of spending the night ashore and was returning.
However, I asked Mr. Bludsoe to listen.
"Oars!" he said, his ear cocked over the landward side.
He listened again. "There are three boats at least!" he whispered, "it
looks like an attack. Pass the word for all hands!"
By this time both watches were on deck. Pistols and cutlasses were
passed out. We lined up along the bulwarks, peering out.
The mate stood near me. I heard him thinking aloud. "So this is the
way our precious skipper protects us from corsairs?" he muttered, "He
goes ashore and an attack follows. Looks queer. Wonder what slaves are
worth in Morocco? Maybe he's planning to sell a double cargo--goods and
men!"
We could hear the sounds plainly now. The splash of the oars struck
with a chill more than one of us, but we gripped our weapons and made
up our minds to sell our lives dearly.
Mr. Bludsoe had been sweeping the sea with a night glass. "They are
near us, men--four boats, swarming with cutthroats!"
He peered over the rail and shouted:
"On board the boats! This is an American schooner with whom you have no
business. Come nearer at your peril!"
Still the boats came on. The steady beat of the oars tightened our
nerves almost to the snapping point.
The mate shouted a second warning. It was not heeded. "It's either
their lives or ours," he said to us, "Pick out your marks. Fire!"
Our cannon belched forth flame. Shrieks and curses took the place of
the splash of oars. We saw two boatloads of men pouring into the water,
snatching at the remnants of their cutters. On board the remaining two
boats was havoc and confusion. We saw these boats at last turn stern
and make for the shore.
One of the boats managed to escape our fire and came up against the
schooner on the farther side. This boat was not in the group we had
first sighted, and in the excitement of the battle, it stole up on us
without discovery. I chanced to turn in its direction just in time to
see a dark head appear above the bulwarks. I caught up a cutlass and
ran with a cry to cleave the fellow's head. He ducked, and my blade cut
into the rail. The mate, with more presence of mind, had caught up a
heavy shot from beside the Long Tom and called upon others to follow
his example. Down into the boat they dropped the balls, smashing heads
and smashing boat. Before her crew could get a foothold on our chains,
she filled with water and sank. In this fashion we met and overcame our
greatest danger.
"Lower away a boat!" said Mr. Bludsoe, "we can't let those wretches out
there drown without making some attempt at rescue!"
We rowed out and brought in three men and a lad.
Mr. Bludsoe questioned them by the light of a lantern. We gathered
around in a circle. The boy could talk Spanish, which the mate also
could speak. They were dark, half-naked creatures, with something of
the appearance of sleek rats as the water dripped from their glossy,
matted hair.
Two of the Moslems were sullen and made no responses to the mate's
query. One, however, was explosive. His rage was directed not against
us, but against some one of his own party.
"Who is responsible for this attack? Answer truly, unless you want to
swung from yonder yardarm!" Mr. Bludsoe threatened.
The fiery individual, with frantic gestures, poured a response intended
for our mate into the lad's ears.
"The captain of your ship betrayed you," said the interpreter with
rolling eyes and flashing teeth. "He betrayed us too. He said that it
would be easy for us to capture you because he had assured you that you
were free from attack. He led us to believe that the guns had been
spiked and the weapons thrown overboard."
Mr. Bludsoe turned to the crew. "Murad made such an attempt. I found
him fooling with the cannon and scared him off. I suspected him after
that, and gave him no chance. He's sold us in advance to the pirates of
Morocco. They'll be putting out in pursuit of us as soon as they learn
of the failure!"
He had scarcely spoken when two lateen sails could be seen moving out
from shore. We were becalmed, and capture seemed certain.
"We can't beat off their warships! Man the longboat!" Mr. Bludsoe
ordered, "We'll have to trust to yonder mist to hide us. We ought to be
able to reach the Spanish coast if it holds!"
The moon had been clouded by a fog. We could feel the haze settling
upon us. The change seemed to precede a storm.
With the war-ships nearly upon us, we rowed off into the haze, taking
the prisoners with us.
When we were a league from the shore, we heard a gun fired. I thought
that the corsairs, who by this time had doubtless found that we had
deserted the ship, were cruising in search of us and had fired the gun
in our direction. No balls struck the water near us, however, and we
rowed on desperately.
Mr. Bludsoe questioned Mustapha. "It is the hurricane signal on
shore," the youth explained. "It means that the barometer has fallen
tremendously, and that a storm's on the way. You need have no fear of
pursuit. The ships that came out to attack you will seek shelter now.
We shall all sink if you do not make for the beach!"
Mr. Bludsoe ordered us to row towards the Moroccan shore, in a
direction that would take us clear of the harbor. Heavy gusts of wind
beat down upon us and floods of rain poured over our straining muscles.
The wind became a gale and threatened to come with greater intensity.
Furious waves leaped up on every side to swallow our boat. We gave up
hope of reaching the shore, and rowed on expecting every uncertain
stroke of our oars to be the last.
Suddenly Mr. Bludsoe's voice rang out calm and strong through the
tempest. "There's a ship ahead. It must be one of those that came out
to attack us. Yet it's better to take our chances aboard her than to
stay in this sea. Pull towards her!"
The ship loomed up larger than we had expected. Her sails were cut
differently from those of the corsairs. Against the gray of the storm
we caught sight of the American flag.
"By all that's holy," the mate cried, "she's a Yankee frigate!"
The frigate, whose commander was shifting her to the shelter of the
harbor, caught sight of us as we plunged towards her bow. Willing hands
dipped down to help us climb over her side.
The frigate's name was _George Washington_. Her commander, Captain
William Bainbridge, was bearing to the Dey of Algiers certain presents.
With great joy I learned that peace had been made between Algiers and
the United States, and that Alexander and his comrades were on their
way home. Of these things I shall have more to tell later. We were not
yet out of danger. The hurricane now seemed to be concentrated over
us. The wind's force must have been over a hundred miles an hour. The
tremendous gusts struck the heavy vessel with the force of battering
rams and drove her forward as if she were a cockle-shell. We could see
the shore looming up.
"Rocks!" someone shouted. We were within a hundred yards of them when a
miracle happened. The wind shifted its fury. It now blew in a twisting
fashion from the shore. Our ship turned with it. On another side of the
harbor there was a beach of yielding sand. Beating behind us with the
same terrific force, the hurricane sent the nose of the frigate into
the sand in a way that held her more firmly than a hundred anchors.
Here we stayed without listing. The first part of the cyclone lasted
about two hours. There was a lull and we thought the storm was over. It
returned an hour later, however, in all of its fury, and we expected
every moment to be torn from our haven and hurled across the harbor to
destruction--a fate that we could now see had overtaken many vessels,
for the shore was lined with wrecks. Whistling, roaring, devastating,
it whirled over us, lashing the waves until they dashed with savage
force over our decks. Our only comfort was that the onslaughts
gradually decreased in strength, and we saw the barometer rise rapidly
from its lowest point.
On shore, storehouses, castles, and residences were unroofed or
demolished entirely.
Spars, masts, and parts of wharves floated on top of the waves. I
shuddered as my eyes rested on a dead body floating amidst a mass of
wreckage. It seemed providential that we were not floating corpses.
A wreck lay near us. She had overturned and the water was washing
across her deck. She had a familiar look. Her stern was towards us. I
caught a glimpse of her name and read _The Rose of Egypt_.
Murad had played upon a youth's imagination to lead him into a trap.
The rascal's gift at story-telling had been drawn upon to add me to
those he hoped to lead into captivity that he might obtain ransoms. He
also, no doubt, had it in his mind to revenge himself on the commodore
by persecuting one of whom the sailor was fond. As my knowledge of
Barbary grew, I saw that it was quite possible for Murad to act as a
spy for one or all of these Barbary rulers. America was a new country.
The corsair princes desired information as to how rich she was; what
they had to fear from her navy, etc. It came out later that secret
discussions in Congress upon the subject of the Barbary powers were
promptly reported to the Dey of Algiers, so that when our envoys came
to negotiate with him he threw their secrets into their faces. But, be
that as it may, adventures were crowding upon me so swiftly that I felt
disposed to forgive Murad for the sake of the thrills he had sent my
way.