UNLOADING AN ARMY.
After what they had passed through the previous night the boys, as may
be imagined, did not awaken till late next day, to find the sun
streaming through the porthole of their cabin and the ship rolling in a
heavy beam-end sort of a way that showed them at once that they were at
anchor. Hurriedly dressing they hastened on deck and found themselves on
board what was evidently a converted yacht, to judge by her brass and
mahogany fittings. Several machine guns, though, and the presence
forward of hundreds of ragged soldiers gambling and chicken-fighting,
showed them that they were not on board any pleasure craft, but one that
was equipped strictly for business—and the grim business of war at that.
They had hardly poked their heads out of the companion before a dapper
little man in a brass-buttoned sea uniform hastened up to them. This
personage introduced himself as Captain Hans Scheffel, of the vessel and
a former commander of a German passenger boat. In a few words he
informed the boys that the craft was one of the yachts purchased by the
revolutionists for conversion into gunboats and that she was at that
moment anchored a few miles south of Bluefields, where it was the
present plan that the revolutionaries should be put ashore and commence
a march to the Rama River, and possibly across it, to gain the main
body, as somewhere in the Rama country Rogero and his troops were
supposed to be encamped.
The boys were much relieved to learn that the vessel on which they found
themselves was not, as they had at first feared, one of the government’s
craft. They well knew that the government of Nicaragua was no friend to
Americans and that, in their case especially, Rogero’s enmity would make
it risky,—if not actually perilous,—for them to fall into the hands of
Zelayan troops.
After the first introductions and explanations of the stout little
German and the profuse thanks of the boys for their rescue, he led them
below to breakfast in what had been the elaborately decorated saloon of
the American millionaire who formerly owned the gunboat. All the “gilt
and gingerbread,” however, had been stripped from her when she was
converted into a fighting-craft, and now she was as plain as a barge in
her interior fittings.
The loss of their _Golden Eagle_ had been a severe blow to the boys and
they were not feeling in any too cheerful a mood as Captain Scheffel
ushered them into the room and motioned to a table on which was spread
an ample breakfast served by black stewards. They were just sitting down
to it with healthy young appetites, that even regret over the loss of
their ship could not dull, when one of the doors opening off the saloon
opened and a tall, black-mustached young man of unmistakably South
American descent entered.
He wore a uniform and a sword and walked with an air of assurance that
made it apparent that he was a dignitary of some sort, and that this was
the case was at once evidenced when the Captain, with a bow and
flourish, introduced to the boys:
“Señor General Ruiz, in command of this section of General Estrada’s
army.”
The name made both boys start.
“General Ruiz,” exclaimed Frank, “surely not General Ruiz—Mr. Chester’s
neighbor?”
“The same;” replied the young man, with a laugh at the boy’s frank
astonishment, “and you?”
“We are Frank and Harry Chester,” began Frank.
“Ah, I might have seen the family likeness,” interrupted the soldier
with a smile, “forgive me for my inattention.”
“But we believed that you were dead!” exclaimed Harry. “Jose, our
father’s servant, brought the news the day before we arrived in
Nicaragua.”
Ruiz raised his hands with an exclamation of grief.
“My poor wife,” he exclaimed, “it must have been a sad blow to her.
However, in a few days now I trust that we shall be on familiar soil and
I shall be able to atone to her for her worry and grief.”
“Familiar soil—” repeated Frank, delightedly; for this could only mean
one thing.
“Yes,” replied the general, “we are to join the main force somewhere
along the coast south of here and march toward La Merced. I understand
that—and I am sorry to convey the news to you—that Rogero has announced
that he is going to make it his headquarters.”
“His headquarters;” repeated both boys, gritting their teeth, “he would
not dare.”
“Rogero would dare anything,” replied General Ruiz. “If I had not made
my escape after the battle in which Jose believed me shot, I should not
be here now, but a victim of Rogero’s drumhead court-martial. As it was,
I had a narrow shave. Fortunately, however, for me, one of my guards was
a former servant of my family, and a small bribe, combined with his
loyalty to the Ruiz clan, sufficed to make him forget his charge for
awhile. I made my way north and then sent messengers to General Estrada,
who ordered me to take charge of the northern division which was
encamped at Mazucla, fifty miles north of here and bring it down the
coast on this gunboat.”
General Ruiz concluded his narrative with a few words of sympathy to the
boys for the loss of their _Golden Eagle_ which, he said, he had always
hoped to see, having heard such reports of it from Mr. Chester, but
supposed that would now be impossible.
“Not at all,” replied Frank bravely, “if you will come to New York six
months from now you will see the _Golden Eagle II_, a finer, stancher
craft even than the one that lies at the bottom of the Caribbean.”
Under General Ruiz’s direction the work of disembarking was gone about
immediately the meal was concluded. There were five hundred men to be
got ashore and runners despatched to learn the whereabouts of Estrada’s
force with which Ruiz had orders to combine, besides a camp site to be
found, all of which demanded expedition.
Frank and Harry watched with much eager amusement and interest the work
of getting the troops ashore. Not many of the men could swim and all of
them, like most Spanish-Americans, had a hearty dislike of cold water.
When every once in a while one of them happened to miss his footing, in
boarding the shore-boats, there would go up a cry that made even the
restful blue land-crabs in the mangroves ashore scuttle for shelter.
There were no lighters to be obtained at this point of the coast of
course and so the army was landed in the ship’s lifeboats—a tedious
process. The boys could not help thinking what a contrast the noisy,
confused scene offered to the orderly evolutions of American troops. All
about the boats, as they were rowed ashore,—landed gunwale-deep with
their chattering, ragged occupants,—there cruised ominously the black,
three-cornered fins of the man-eating sharks that abound along this
coast. Occasionally one of these monsters would actually cruise right up
alongside one of the boats. At such times the hubbub became louder than
ever and with a great shouting and waving of their broad-brimmed Panamas
the soldiers would endeavor to drive the menacing monsters away.
One of the last boats to leave the vessel’s side was loaded until the
waves almost lapped over her gunwales and it looked to the boys as if
she could never reach the shore in safety. It only needed the least
little ripple of a sea to send a wave toppling into her that would swamp
her in a wink and spill her crew out into the water and among the
sharks. Perhaps the sharks noticed this too for they clustered round
till the water was almost black with their wicked torpedo-like
evolutions.
“It’s a good thing there’s a smooth sea;” remarked Frank, as, with his
brother, General Ruiz and the fussy little captain, he stood on the
gunboat’s bridge.
“Ya;” replied the latter, “if der sea was smood not dere would food for
der fishes be by sundown. I regollect vunce yen I vas ad Ceylon dot——”
The worthy captain’s reminiscences, however, got no further. They were
cut short by a cry from the heavily-laden boat which by now was several
yards distant. Two of the men aboard were struggling desperately, having
clinched after a wordy war that had started when she left the vessel’s
side. The boys and their companions could hear the cries of protest of
the crew who manned the oars:
“Sit down or you’ll have us over.”
Their warning came too late, however. The unexpected disturbance to her
equilibrium had careened the overloaded boat till she was canted over to
a fatal angle and the water rushed into her. With loud shouts and cries
of fear her crew, and the soldiers aboard her, clung desperately to her
gunwales but the sheer weight of them pulled her down and the boys could
see with horrified eyes the black fins begin to rush in on the doomed
men.
There was a boat that had just returned from the shore lying at the foot
of the gunboat’s gangway and Frank, followed by Harry and General Ruiz,
leaped into this and ordered the crew to “give way.” The men pulled like
demons, at the sight of their comrades’ distress, and in a few seconds
were in the thick of the battle. Already several of the poor fellows had
been seized by sharks and the water about the capsized boat was
crimsoned. The ravenous monsters, however, far from being glutted, were
rushing in from all directions and their triangular fins shot about in
the water for a space of several yards surrounding the doomed boat.
The boys and General Ruiz worked like Trojans hauling in such survivors
as they could reach, and in a short time all but those the sharks had
taken toll of were aboard. It was then determined to right the other
boat and put some of the survivors into her and set them ashore. General
Ruiz leaped into her to bale her out but as he did so his foot slipped
and, with a desperate grab at the bulwark to save himself, he shot over
the side into the water already red with the blood of his followers.
A cry of horror burst from the throats of the onlookers as they saw this
accident. It seemed that their general was doomed to certain death. He
came to the surface, however, in a moment and struck out bravely; but
behind him came rushing through the water the fin of a huge shark. An
agonized shout for help broke from the general’s lips as he realized his
peril. He had faced death in battle a score of times but to die like
this appalled him.
“Save me!” he shouted.
“Fire, Frank, fire!” shouted Harry, wild with excitement, for his elder
brother with pale face and lips—but with a hand as steady as a rock—was
already standing in the stern sheets of the boat with his revolver
leveled.
“Steady on,” rejoined Frank, in a tense tone. “I don’t want to run any
chance of the bullet deflecting.”
In the meantime the rowers had sat paralyzed at the dreadful drama being
enacted under their eyes and made no effort to save the unfortunate
General Ruiz. Desperately the general swam for the boat. He saw Frank
standing upright in the stern and realized that the boy was waiting till
he could get a fair shot at the monster. Suddenly the swimmer gave a
cry, his hands shot above his head and he seemed to be literally dragged
out of view.
At the same instant Frank’s revolver opened fire.
One after another the ten shots poured out and before two had been fired
the men, with a cheer, saw a huge white-bellied body, armed with a
terrible triple row of saw-like teeth, rear itself out of the seas as if
in agony and then flop back with a mighty writhing that beat the water
into waves and threatened to swamp the boat.
And General Ruiz?
A few seconds after Frank’s first shot had left the automatic revolver
the swimmer was alongside the boat and being hauled inboard by a score
of hands. His first action was to take Frank’s hand and grasp it with a
pressure that showed him to be possessed of a muscularity rare in
Latin-Americans.
“We Spaniards do not forget;” he said, after he had uttered a few warm
words of gratitude to the boy who had saved his life.
“Oh,” laughed Frank, “it’s tit for tat. Didn’t you save us last night?”
General Ruiz looked grave.
“Laugh if you will, Señor,” he said, “you Americans take things more
lightly than we do; but perhaps some day the time will come when I shall
be able to render you service, and you will see that my words were not
spoken in jest.”
That was all, but there was a ring of sincerity in his voice that left
no doubt in his hearers’ minds that he meant what he said and, while
both boys hoped that no contingency would ever arise in which they would
be in such dire need of General Ruiz’s aid, at the same time they felt
that if it ever did they had a friend to count on.