JOHN LONGMORE’S REVENGE (_concluded_).
Señor Cisneros gave vent to a sigh of relief; so did Mr. Dartmoor. The
boys were both disappointed and pleased. If they could have seen a
war-ship destroyed without loss of life, the spectacle would have
thrilled them; or could they have been eyewitness to a naval engagement
in which both sides had warning, they would have enjoyed nothing better.
They understood perfectly the attitude taken by their seniors, and their
love of fair play told them that such methods of warfare as that
employed by John Longmore could have no honest approval.
Captain Saunders picked up his hat from a table, and, rising from the
chair where he had ensconced himself so as to look the better through
the telescope, he prepared to leave the veranda, and waited a minute
until the others could make ready. Several club members had hurriedly
taken their departure, anxious to avoid the crowd that would throng the
streets.
“Come, boys,” Mr. Dartmoor said, and he started toward the stairs.
“Just a minute, please, father?” asked Louis, who had taken a seat at
the telescope. Then he added, “I wonder what the _Blanco_ is signalling
for?”
“She is signalling, that’s a fact,” said Carl, who had taken up a pair
of marine glasses and was looking seaward.
“Hurry! Don’t you see you are keeping us all waiting?” insisted Mr.
Dartmoor.
“One second, please, one second! Oh, father, look! There’s another ship
coming up. See, that one to the south is leaving the line!”
Mr. Dartmoor turned and took the marine glasses which Carl handed to
him.
“Take a look, captain,” he said, after a minute. “I do believe another
ship is planning to take the cargo on board.”
Captain Saunders put his eye to the telescope and was heard to mutter:—
“You’re right, Dartmoor.”
He gazed at the oncoming vessel some few minutes longer, then added:
“Yes, sir; one of the transports is making in this direction. And I
think that I can understand the reason.”
“Are we still in doubt as to the outcome?” asked Don Isaac, who with
Señor Cisneros had returned to the corner.
“Yes. And if I am correct in my surmise, the plot will now succeed.”
“How so? Don’t you think that the _Blanco’s_ officers guessed the nature
of that cargo?”
“No. I don’t believe they did. If they had, she would probably have
stood off a short distance and put a shell into it, to test the
correctness of the suspicion. Instead of that, the admiral has signalled
another ship to approach. My strongest grounds for believing that the
ruse has succeeded are based on the nature of the vessel that has been
called from the line.”
“In what respect?”
“She’s a transport. Moreover, she was formerly in the coast service.”
“Yes?”
“If I am not mistaken, she is the _Loa_, formerly one of the Chilean
Transportation Company’s vessels. You will remember her. She was on the
Callao-Valparaiso run a year or so ago.”
“I remember her well,” said Mr. Dartmoor. “I once took passage on her to
Arica. Why has she been called?”
“Because she has machinery on board that can be used for lifting the
provisions from the lighter. There is a heavy swell outside, and the
_Blanco_ could not bring the small boat close enough to transfer the
green stuff; so the former coaster has been ordered to do it. She is
especially equipped, with steam winches and swinging cranes, which have
been used for that purpose for many years, up and down the coast. Watch,
and you will see that I am correct,” and he settled himself firmly in
the chair, convinced that the tragedy had been postponed, not avoided.
Other club members had noticed the manœuvre out in the open, and had
returned to their seats and positions near the railing; and still
others, who were descending the stairs, had been called back by their
friends. A movement had been noticed in the crowd on the beach, a wave
of humanity had receded toward the city when the _Blanco_ put out to sea
again; now the wave was sweeping back, for keen eyes all along the
water-front had noticed that change in position by ships of the enemy.
The _Loa_, one of the largest passenger steamers on the Pacific in that
day, had been bought by the Chilean government for the purpose of
carrying troops from Valparaiso to the Peruvian seaports. Pending the
embarkation of the large force that was ultimately to march on Lima, she
had been sent to the blockading fleet with supplies. The vessel was
almost new, her engines were of a late pattern, and she could steam a
good fourteen knots. Therefore her progress from the line was much more
swift than had been that of the _Blanco Encalada_. On she came, parting
the glassy rollers, throwing a curved wave to port and another to
starboard, smoke belching from the stack, and steam flying in gray
tangles from the escape pipe.
“What a shame!” remarked Señor Cisneros, as they watched her approach.
“I have heard that the poor fellows out there have been attacked with
scurvy. Think what a treat those vegetables would be to them after these
long months of salt pork and dry bread!”
“We can only hope that they will discover the plot,” said Mr. Dartmoor.
For ten minutes little was said by those on the veranda; then Captain
Saunders, who remained with his eye glued to the object glass,
exclaimed:—
“She’s shifted her helm and will bring the lighter on the shore side of
her.”
They noticed that she had altered her course; then she slowed down
perceptibly.
Five minutes later the _Loa_ appeared to be motionless; if she was
moving, it was very slowly; the lighter had been brought abeam.
Observers who had no glasses could tell the relative position of the two
craft, so clear was the air; those with marine glasses could see that
preparations were going forward to make the provision boat fast; through
the powerful telescopes every movement of persons on the deck and bridge
could be watched.
Captain Saunders commenced to describe rapidly what was happening, for
the benefit of those who had no lenses to aid their vision.
“The lighter is abreast the _Loa_,” he said. “They have let a rope down
over the side, and a sailor is descending to the boat. There! he has
found a footing and is making the rope fast to the bow. Another rope has
been thrown him, which he is making fast to the stern. Down this comes
another fellow, to help him, and another. Three of them are now on
board. Fenders are being thrown them to place between the sides, for she
is bumping heavily. Ah! nearly over!”
“What was nearly over?” Mr. Dartmoor asked. “The lighter?”
“Yes. She was almost swamped. I wish she had been. Perhaps that wrench
has dislodged the machinery of the mine. Now they are passing down poles
and these are being used between the sides, instead of fenders, so as to
keep her farther off. More men are going on board; there are fully a
score of them among the green stuff. I can make out a number of them
eating fruit. Poor fellows, what a treat all that does seem! Little do
they know that they are enjoying chirimoyas, paltas, and oranges while
standing on the brink of death! Now we shall be able to tell. The
suspense won’t last much longer!”
“What has happened?” asked Don Isaac.
“They have swung the crane around and are lowering the chain with a
basket attached.”
“That means they are loading with the green stuff first, I believe. You
said that was on top, did you not, Carl?” asked the editor.
“Yes, sir,” the boy replied, in a choking voice. “The fruits, the
lettuce, beans, and such things are scattered about over the meat and
larger vegetables. And flowers too.”
“Flowers?”
“An armful of them, sir,” Harvey said.
“Then that accounts for the bunch of red which I saw one of the men
throw on board just now,” said Captain Saunders. “There goes the first
basketful. It is going up rapidly; the crane is swinging inboard; it is
being dumped on deck. Now the crane is travelling back and the basket is
lowered again. The men fall to. They are loading with a will, for an
officer has gone down among them and is directing. I suppose the poor
devils stopped too often to taste the fruit. The second basketful is
going up! up! up! That also is dumped. What’s this? The basket is not
coming back! No, hooks are being lowered on the end of the chain. They
must have put in all the vegetables that were on top and have reached
the meat. Ah, they are commencing at the bow and not amidships. There
goes a shoulder of beef! Inboard with it! Out comes the crane arm again
and down go the hooks! Another shoulder of beef! Those fellows are
working like mad. Why, Dartmoor, they must be nearly famished. I suppose
they didn’t appreciate what a rich haul they had come across. Merciful
God, if Thou wilt but stay Thine hand!”
The brief, fervent prayer was echoed by all who heard. The faces of men
and boys had become ashen pale. Two hundred men were on the transport
_Loa_, two hundred hungry men, and there were thousands of others in the
fleet. The launch contained enough fresh provisions to give them all a
treat for at least one day.
The _Blanco Encalada_ had steamed only a short distance away, and then
had swung around and lay rolling in the trough, waiting, her crew
evidently watching the work that was being pushed forward. Other ships
of the fleet, realizing from the signals what was happening, had edged
closer in.
“They are working their way aft,” continued Captain Saunders. “Some
smaller pieces are being sent up the side. You say the infernal machine
is located exactly amidships?”
“Yes, sir,” answered Harvey, in a whisper.
“There, there!” The captain held his hand out, as if in a warning. “The
officer is bending over; a sailor bends over with him. The hook is being
made——”
The sentence was never finished.
A blinding flash sprang from the side of the transport, a flash that
dazzled the eye even in the bright day, and for one infinitesimal
measurement of time everything stood out plainly—the side of the ship,
the lighter, the men bending over, the men grouped among the provisions,
and those who had manned the chains. Then, in contrast with the
lightning-like movement of the great glare was the slow movement of the
steamship, parting in twain. She opened as though a giant wedge had
cleft her in two; she had been rent asunder by a force that was titanic.
And as she thus divided, a roar the like of which no man in Callao had
ever heard came thundering over the water. The great sound waves threw
themselves upon buildings, causing them to tremble to their foundations,
and thrust upon sensitive ear-drums with deafening force. Then they
swept on, over the seacoast city, over the pampas country, up to Lima,
rattling windows there, and passed from the City of the Kings to the
spurs of the Andes, which threw them back in a prolonged echo, so that
all the valley seemed filled with sound.
While the roar was spreading, a column of water had sprung into being
out in the bay, and spurting through it was a writhing mass of steam.
This vaporous geyser bore in its embrace fragments of men and fragments
of iron, steel, and wood; it carried dismembered human beings aloft in
its gray fantastic flight, and it also bore piston rods, segments of
crank shafts, plates, torn and twisted from the hull, hatch coverings,
deck railings, and sides of superstructures; it enveloped a medley of
wrought metals and rough wood, and a medley of quivering bodies. It bore
upward also the ragged ends of the transport _Loa_, lifting the segments
that had been torn asunder, so that the bow of the ship dipped down, and
the stern did likewise. Then these two parts plunged beneath the
surface, going in opposite directions, and as they went, the spout of
water fell, and the steam settled down over all. This steam could be
seen whirling and eddying, and when the light wind threw it to one side,
the water was seen to be whirling and eddying even as had done the
vapor, throwing up pieces of wood in places, and also black objects,
which those who still looked—and they were not many, for the great
majority had turned their heads because of the horror—knew to be the
bodies of men.
From the sides of the _Blanco Encalada_ boats commenced to creep; from
farther out in the bay other vessels of the fleet cast great columns of
smoke into the air as they made haste to the rescue.
The many persons on the veranda of the English Club said nothing for
fully five minutes, so struck with awe were they. Then Captain Saunders
found voice to call the boys.
“We had better go now,” he said. “You have witnessed what will go down
into history as the crime of the Chile-Peruvian War.”
His prophecy was true. That which Mr. Dartmoor and Señor Cisneros had
said also came to pass, for Peru as a nation mourned what had been done,
and the blush of shame came to the cheeks of many whenever the sinking
of the _Loa_ was mentioned.
Months later those in Callao who had watched this spectacle learned that
one hundred Chileans had been killed and fifty wounded by Old John’s
infernal machine.
“We had better go to Lima,” added the captain, when they had left the
veranda and had mingled with the thousands who were slowly leaving the
beach.
“Why? Do you think there will be a bombardment?”
“Assuredly there will be. The Chileans will be avenged to-night.”
They went to the capital, and so did thousands of other residents of the
seacoast city.
At sunset the Chilean fleet steamed in close under the guns, and paying
no heed to the fire from the forts, poured shot and shell into Callao
until morning came. Houses were destroyed, large buildings were lacked
through and through, and many fires were started. There was a death list
among those who remained in the town, and many persons were wounded.