FOR THE “CAUSE”
“Aw, Rodriguez, you’re just feeling kind of low down, that’s all,” Hal
soothed him. “In the morning you’ll be shipshape, you’ll see. Things are
just sort of looking black to you.”
“I am dying, Señor Hal!” Rodriguez repeated. “You must listen or I shall
not die peacefully!”
“Aw, all right, old top. If it eases you to tell me something, go ahead.
But you’ll be as fit as a top in the morning. From what I know of
Brazil-nuts, they’re pretty darn hard to crack,” Hal added facetiously.
The ghost of a smile flickered about Rodriguez’ ashen lips but soon he
was grave again.
“I am for the _Cause_,” he said faintly; “I pledged my life, my honor
for the _Cause_ if need be, Señor.”
“You don’t mean the rebels?” Hal asked, taking a moment to replenish the
fire.
“Ah, you call it that, Señor. To us it is the _Cause_. We want
freedom—political.”
“That’s what all you birds say. But go on, Rodriguez.”
“Señor Goncalves he is a comrade of mine, Señor—a comrade in the
_Cause_. And Señor Pizella....”
“Aha, we’re getting somewhere,” Hal interposed, taking a sudden
interest. “Pizella, huh, Rodriguez?”
“Yes, Señor. He was given command to follow your Señor uncle, for you
were suspect to what you call—thwart?... yes, thwart General Ceara’s
plans. The General he expect big munition shipment and your Señor uncle
he was suspect to perhaps prevent the guns from coming. So Pizella he
was told to find out if Señor Keen had letter and what it say about what
he was going to do.”
“And it was Pizella who took that letter from my uncle when we were
sleeping, huh?”
“Yes, Señor Hal. And that night when passengers are in saloon, Pizella
he takes letter to Señor Goncalves’ cabin and leaves it there for him to
decipher. They work together—no, Señor?”
“I hope to tell you they do,” Hal said thoughtfully. “Just as I
suspected from the beginning, but Unk wouldn’t listen to anything about
Goncalves. Yet he must have suspected something this afternoon ... but
go on, Rodriguez.”
“Señor Goncalves he find out from letter that your Señor uncle is on
trail of Ceara’s munition shipment—no? That Señor Goncalves is ordered
by Ceara not to let happen. He must do anything, everything to
prevent—yes? Señor Goncalves thinks one way—to invite your Señor uncle
up in plane with me—the plane she is crippled over the jungle and what
happens—no?”
“Yes,” Hal answered grimly. “I see. It was all a hoax—a plot, huh? Only
I was the fly in the ointment. To get Unk to fly, you people had to get
me interested, but it fell out anyway. Unk has probably found out
everything from the interventor by now—I wouldn’t doubt but that they’re
even suspecting foul play with me already. But Goncalves, they’ll get
him....”
“Ah, if they can, Señor. But the Señor he was gone after noon today. He
is now with the General Ceara and they are traveling toward a safe
hiding place in the jungle.” Rodriguez gasped at this juncture and lay
still a long time because of his extremely weakened condition.
Hal looked at him, sympathizing, yet doubting. Suddenly he leaned over
the Brazilian.
“But why are you telling me all this, Rodriguez? Isn’t it against your
famous _Cause_?”
“Ah, but yes,” answered the airman in such a whisper that Hal had to
listen intently. “But when one is dying ... one’s sins against one’s
brother man.... Señor Hal, my religion prompts this. My soul she would
never rest unless I asked your forgiveness.”
“Rodriguez, old scout, I still insist you’re not going to die, but if it
makes you get stronger, I’ll tell you that I have nothing in my heart
toward you but good will. What have you done to me? Oh, I know I _could_
have been cracked up plenty, but the thing is, I’m not.”
“Not yet, not yet. But you are two hundred miles perhaps from white man,
Señor. It is fever and jungle—no water, savage Indians before you get
out. Señor Hal, you will die and I am the cause. I send you to it and it
makes me afraid to die.”
“Bosh, old egg,” Hal said with a cheerfulness that he did not quite
feel. “I’m a lean horse for a long race and, as I told you, I’ve been
lost in the jungle before. Of course not quite as serious as this—I
didn’t have a lot of bloodthirsty Indians to take into account. Still, I
can handle that when I come to it. Where there’s a will, huh? But say,
let’s not talk of gloomy things—tell me how you managed to get that
plane crippled just at the crucial moment?”
“A powder, Señor, like sand,” he gasped. “She was poured into the
oil—enough to make her grind up the engine in the hour—no?”
“I’ll say it would. Clever trick. A gritty substance, huh? Enough to
completely disrupt the machinery. Well, it did all right. _And how!_ And
you were supposed to try and save yourself as best you could with the
chute, huh? Well, I’m sorry now we didn’t let you do it. You wouldn’t be
feeling so rotten now. Carmichael’s the kind that can skim through
things, I’m certain. I can’t believe he won’t get out.”
“It is my punishment, Señor, my religion she slaps back for thinking too
much of the _Cause_ and not enough of human life ... _your life_!”
“As I told you before, Rodriguez, forget about me. I’m not holding it
against you. I’m alive and kicking so far, and if I don’t keep it up,
well, then I’m not as good a guy as I thought I was. I’ve got brains and
the Indians haven’t. Fever and water and ... well, I haven’t got them
yet, but if I do, I’ll pull through.”
“And if not, Señor Hal, would you curse José Rodriguez?” asked the
airman pathetically. “Would you curse me if the Indians....”
“Absolutely not, old top,” Hal assured him. “You thought you were doing
right for the _Cause_—doing as you thought was right. Why should I get
peeved at _you_? Little Hal isn’t that way. Now rest yourself and forget
your worries. You must be tired out after all that chatter. Close your
eyes, old fellow.”
“I do not have the need, Señor Hal,” came the response. “Things are
fading—even your face, your bright eyes. I can no longer see them. They
are in a mist.”
Hal leaned forward, startled. Rodriguez’ hands were becoming colder,
more limp, but he did not think it was so near. He could not believe it
even then ... he had never seen anything just like it, never witnessed a
death so calm, so apparently without effort.
Rodriguez must have sensed Hal’s thoughts, for he nodded his head
feebly.
“One bleeds to death without pain, Señor Hal,” he whispered. “Do not
worry I am suffering. The world becomes dimmer but something else comes
in its place—a light that is bright and makes me happy. Since you have
say you will not curse José Rodriguez I see it clear.”
Hal could not talk—he could only grasp tightly the limp, cold hands in
his own. But Rodriguez seemed to understand, for his features relaxed,
and when the lonely owl again sent its despairing call through the
silent jungle night, he did not seem to start as before. His lips barely
moved, but Hal caught the words.
“‘Death to Thee who hears me,’ cries ‘the mother of the moon,’” he was
saying. “Death to me, Señor Hal; death to _you_! And when it comes,
remember to say a prayer for the departed soul of José Rodriguez!”
Hal promised, choking back a tremor in his voice. Suddenly he heard a
strange rustle in the tree opposite, and when he looked up, he saw a
glassy pair of eyes staring down at them in the firelight. “The mother
of the moon” had come to pay them a visit.
Hal shivered despite an effort to keep calm. The owl with its broad face
and strange, glassy eyes looked eerie as it sat perched upon the
swinging limb above them. Then, after what seemed an interminable time,
it flapped its wings and flew into the blackness beyond.
Hal was suddenly aware then that the pilot’s hands had ceased to return
his pressure. They became colder, limp. A sepulchral silence seemed to
envelop the little camp in that moment; nothing stirred save the elfin
breeze that whispered in the tree tops.
José Rodriguez was dead.