CAPTAIN GARCIA’S STRATEGY
Captain Garcia’s face showed the midshipmen his keen disappointment.
“You are denying my men and myself a rightful pleasure,” he answered
after an appreciable silence. “They are acclaiming you their
deliverers and I fear they will not observe my orders when I counsel
secrecy. Señor O’Neil is already their idol; to a man they are wildly
enthusiastic over his rough and ready ways, and unless I am much
mistaken the praises for the three Americans will be sung in every
house in La Boca a short time after we have returned.”
“But, Captain Garcia,” Phil replied hastily, a sudden fear in his
voice, “you must tell the men that by speaking of our work on board the
‘Aquadores’ they will injure those to whom they wish well. Our future
careers in the navy may be jeopardized.”
“Never fear them,” exclaimed the captain earnestly, seeing the alarm
on the lad’s face. “My men know that they owe you their lives. They
shall be silent. I can vouch for that.”
Captain Garcia soon departed to lay his plans for the coming night,
leaving the boys in the cabin. It was the first time they had been
alone since the battle.
“Syd, you were a wonder during the fight,” Phil began enthusiastically;
“you appeared to be as cool as if you were only drilling.”
“I wasn’t cool,” Sydney confessed; “I was all-powerfully scared, I can
tell you. As the men deserted the guns, when the ‘Soledad’ fired her
torpedo and the shells were exploding, it seemed all about me, I felt
as near like making a mile run as I ever did in my life.”
“That’s only modesty,” Phil declared in admiration. “You acted like a
veteran under fire.”
“I am glad I didn’t show my true feelings,” he replied much pleased,
“but to me the greatest marvel was O’Neil; he doesn’t know what fear
is. I saw him, on two occasions, catch in his arms a man who had been
killed at his side by an exploding shell, lay him gently out of the
way of the guns, and go back to his work with jaws set like iron and
his eyes flashing with the joy of fighting. A crew of such men could do
miracles.”
“Syd, during the fight, when I saw O’Neil, I forgot the sense of fear
myself,” he cried gladly. “He was superb.”
“Did you really mean what you told the captain here,” questioned Sydney
anxiously; “that our careers might be endangered if the part we took in
the battle were known?”
“I fear I did,” he returned. “Our enemies could use it against us and
do us a great deal of harm. My conscience is clear, however; our lives
were in mortal danger and our actions were prompted by the natural law
of self-defense.”
“Will you tell Captain Taylor what we have done?” Sydney asked.
“Yes, I shall have to make a clean breast of it to him,” Phil declared.
“He may condemn our actions and even send us home in disgrace; but we
must take that risk. He should know all. From now on we must return to
our rôle as neutrals. I do not know what Captain Garcia’s plans may be,
but I feel sure he will not be satisfied until the torpedo-boat is
disposed of. She will remain a menace to the ‘Aquadores’ as long as she
floats and flies the flag of the rebellion.”
“Then we shall take no further part in the fighting,” exclaimed Sydney
ruefully.
“No, not unless we can do so justly,” his companion answered. “It
will have to be in self-defense. We dare not take the initiative in
a hostile act---- Hallo! We are moving rapidly,” he added glancing
through the gun-port, “and we seem to be heading toward La Boca. We
surely cannot be going to abandon the torpedo-boat.”
It took the midshipmen but a few moments to appear on deck. There
they saw that the “Aquadores” was steaming swiftly to the northward,
followed by the “Barcelo.” The harbor of Rio Grande was gradually
fading astern.
“What does it mean?” exclaimed Sydney. “If I were Captain Garcia I’d
make short work of the torpedo-boat before I left this port. One of
these dark nights she may steal into La Boca harbor and torpedo the
‘Aquadores.’”
“I am not so sure that he is abandoning the idea of destroying her,”
replied Phil thoughtfully. “I have come to consider him a clever naval
officer. There is some good reason for his action. Let’s go to the
bridge--I am sure he will enlighten us.”
The lads found Captain Garcia in the wheel house carefully studying the
chart of Rio Grande.
Phil shot a swift glance at Sydney as he divined the captain’s
intentions. “There’s more work ahead,” he whispered.
The captain raised his head finally and greeted the midshipmen.
“The more I look into this matter the more hazardous it appears,” he
confided, a worried look on his face. “I may undo the effect of our
victory by losing both ships. Yet I cannot return to La Boca and report
one vessel still at large and a menace to our cause.”
The captain paused and seemed in deep thought. The boys regarded him
intently in silence.
“I am resorting to strategy,” he finally explained, pointing ahead in
the direction of La Boca. “It is now three o’clock; there are three
more hours of daylight and by dark we shall be fifty miles from Rio
Grande. Our enemy will watch us pass below the horizon and I hope will
believe that we have continued our way northward. As soon as it is dark
I shall turn about and steam back for the harbor at full speed.”
The boys were consumed with delight at the plan.
“And then?” asked Phil.
“I have reasoned thus,” continued Captain Garcia smiling in spite of
himself at the lads’ eager faces: “the torpedo-boat, believing we have
gone, may leave the harbor and go outside to reconnoitre. She will go
out to the locality where the ‘Soledad’ sank; there is a great deal
of wreckage there which has undoubtedly been seen from ashore. I am
depending upon the curiosity of my countrymen to see the ill-fated
spot. If she should leave the harbor now she would be back inside
before I could turn and head her off, but if she delays until sunset
she will find me waiting here at the harbor’s mouth on her return.
When we reach the entrance the ‘Barcelo’ will leave us and search to
seaward.”
“And if she is still inside?” questioned Phil.
“Then I shall sacrifice the ‘Barcelo,’” the captain answered quickly,
“in an attempt to run the mine fields to engage the enemy inside. The
night will be moonless and the advantage will be with the attacking
force.”
The boys could not hide their admiration of the captain’s strategy.
“How could you ever have thought of it?” cried Phil delightedly. “I
believe that is exactly what she will do.” Then a thought came to him.
“But if she is outside will she not discover you before you see her?
You dare not use your search-lights, for she can then easily avoid you
and escape into shallow water, where you could not follow her.”
“That is the risk of war,” Captain Garcia answered grandiloquently. “If
she torpedoes us we must sink her even if we ourselves are sunk. My
government can buy another ‘Aquadores.’”
The two vessels steamed swiftly away from their enemy. The sun sank
slowly toward the horizon to the westward. The midshipmen watched the
molten ball dip into the fiery sea. Darkness came quickly, for in these
latitudes there is no twilight.
Inside of ten minutes night had settled down over the sea and the
war-ships had turned about and were steaming at full speed toward the
enemy’s harbor.
The hours passed with leaden feet. Cloud banks which had been visible
on the horizon before sunset slowly spread a filmy mantle over the sky,
blotting out the brilliant tropical stars. The night became darker.
With all lights screened, the gray hulls moved noiselessly through the
calm sea.
“If she is outside the night is in her favor,” Captain Garcia said,
peering through the inky blackness. “We couldn’t see her five hundred
yards away, while from her low deck she could see our hull at nearly
twice that distance.”
“Maybe our better chance is to enter the harbor after all,” exclaimed
Phil, losing heart.
“But think of the mines and the guns of the forts,” replied the
captain; “for me, I’d rather find her outside. She can hardly be lucky
enough to sink both ships, and I have confidence that we shall sink her
if we see her.”
He turned to Phil questioningly.
“May I count upon my American friends for aid?” he added.
Phil hesitated. If the torpedo-boat attacked them it would be surely
self-defense for them to help defend the cruiser.
“We are entirely at your service, sir,” he declared, “if the boat is
outside. I am sorry, but our aid cannot be given otherwise.”
Captain Garcia seemed perplexed.
“I find I become ever more heavily your debtor. Are all American naval
men like you and your companions?” Then he added sincerely, “I pray
that some day I shall be given an opportunity to show my gratitude.”
The boys took his proffered hand and wrung it warmly.
O’Neil stepped hesitatingly on the bridge. The lads seized upon the
sailor and brought him up beside them.
“What is it now?” he inquired, peering into the darkness ahead.
The situation was quickly explained.
The boatswain’s mate’s face lit up with pleasure for a moment, then he
turned to Phil, a troubled note in his voice.
“Them dagos can’t hit even the water at night,” he whispered; “some of
them have been begging me to come and find out what’s going to happen.”
“But the enemy’s sailors are just as much afraid of the dark,” Phil
declared in a low tone.
“These men ain’t sailors,” he answered disgustedly, “they are soldiers,
landlubbers. All the sailormen of the country are with the rebels.”
A sudden idea struck the lad. He turned from O’Neil toward Captain
Garcia, wrapped in his own thoughts.
“Captain Garcia, O’Neil says all your men are soldiers,” he cried
anxiously.
The captain nodded.
“I had to take them,” he returned; “the sailors were disloyal to a man.
I was naval attaché at the outbreak of the war in Washington and was
forced to be satisfied with the men my government sent to me to man my
ship.”
“How many prisoners have you?” Phil questioned hurriedly.
Captain Garcia’s face brightened.
“I see your drift,” he cried. “I believe I can depend upon them. We
have over a hundred.”
“Put them at the guns, sir, and have your soldiers stand over them.
I’ll make them shoot straight when I tell them it’s ‘Davy Jones’
locker’ if they don’t,” O’Neil urged.
In a short time the hundred rebel sailors were liberated from the lower
hold and put at the guns. The old crew, rifles in hand, were placed as
sentries about the ship.
“Me for the rigging if those chaps mutiny,” laughed O’Neil, pointing to
the scores of riflemen, carelessly handling their pieces, guarding the
captured sailors at the big guns. The loom of the land near Rio Grande
was now dimly discernible on the starboard bow.
The two cruisers slowly closed in toward the shore. The vibrations of
the engines lessened. The war-ships were soon motionless in the water.
The harbor entrance had been reached.
Phil glanced apprehensively through the darkness. He could see dimly
the smudges of forts, but he knew from them the “Aquadores” and her
mate, although but a scant half mile distant, were quite invisible;
their steel gray sides blended in with the dark sea and sky, showing an
unbroken line.
His companions were at their stations at the guns. Every gun was loaded
and ready to be fired instantly.
Phil from his station at the range finder above the battery deck peered
down on the scene below him. He could make out the shadowy figures
of the men at the guns; he saw the men at the sight telescopes and
the anxious loaders behind the breech of each gun, with the shell and
powder ready. O’Neil stood almost directly under him; he seemed to be
the unconscious man-of-war’s man surrounded by perils.
“Put down those firing keys,” he cautioned. His voice was low, but
it sounded distinct and commanding over the silent deck. “You’ll be
getting nervous and shooting off before we clap eyes on her.”
The “Barcelo” steamed by; she had received her orders from Captain
Garcia to search the neighborhood of the wreck for the enemy.
They watched her slowly dissolve in the night.
Phil’s pulses beat fast. The moment was fraught with grave perils. The
unseen torpedo-boat might be even then aiming a deadly blow at the
motionless cruiser.
The crew were all watching intently; keyed to the highest pitch of
nervous excitement; their eyes set fixedly, staring into the total
gloom about them; alert for the first sound of the approaching enemy.
The attitude of the prisoners was reassuring; they could not load as
rapidly as O’Neil had made the soldiers do; but they were used to naval
warfare, they were on their own element, the night and the unseen
danger held for them many terrors, but they were not so terrified as
their soldier comrades; also they had been told that they would all
be drowned if the “Aquadores” was torpedoed and that if they refused
to fire they would suffer death from the soldiers’ rifles. Phil felt
confident the sailors could be depended upon. He glanced aloft at the
search-light platforms, high above the bridge deck; the operators
stood ready, like shrouded statues, silhouetted against the starless
sky.
Captain Garcia was the man of action, one hand on the telegraph to the
engine room and his other on the switch for the search-lights, his eyes
peering into the night.
Phil read his intention at a glance: on the discovery of the enemy
to start ahead at full speed and flash both search-lights on her
simultaneously.
“The ‘Barcelo’ should be there by now,” the captain said in a tense
voice to the lad beside him. “Will my strategy fail? Have I made an
error in my judgment of my countrymen?”
Phil was silent. His nerves were at too high tension to speak.
“The ‘Barcelo’s’ orders were if she discovered the torpedo-boat,”
Captain Garcia continued in a nervous whisper, “to turn her
search-light upon the enemy and steam at full speed toward us. We shall
remain dark. My dread is that our enemy may be now returning to the
harbor and will suddenly find me in her path.”
“But even if that happens will she be able to fire a torpedo
immediately?” questioned Phil in a voice he tried hard to control.
“Her torpedoes will be in the tubes,” he answered, “and probably primed
ready to be fired, but she must first aim her tube at us and not
suspecting that we are near, there should be a sufficient interval for
us to sink her.”
Captain Garcia had been so fully occupied gazing to seaward that he
had failed to notice that the tide entering the harbor was slowly
setting the “Aquadores” in toward the forts. An exclamation from the
lad at his side made him throw an apprehensive glance over his shoulder
at the near-by shore. It seemed very close. He seized the engine
room telegraph and signaled for full speed ahead. But a flash from
the batteries and a sullen roar showed him their thoughtlessness had
discovered them to the watchful enemy. The shells screeched over their
heads and struck the water with a spiteful hiss.
“We have lost,” Captain Garcia exclaimed in bitter anguish; “if the
torpedo-boat is out she can easily avoid us, knowing we are near. From
her deck she can see us long before we can sight her. My hope was that
they would not be watchful; now they have been warned and will run
cautiously.”
The “Aquadores” slowly gathered speed and, turning, steamed out to sea
in the direction taken by her consort.
Shell after shell followed her, but in the darkness the fort’s aim was
bad; the gunners ashore could not know the range.
Suddenly Phil saw a flash far out on the ocean.
“See, a shot,” he cried breathlessly, grasping the captain’s arm in his
excitement. A distant boom came to their ears.
Flash followed flash in rapid succession, as if a firefly were flying
low above the horizon. Then a white shaft of light cut the blackness,
swung undecidedly to and fro, and then held steadily on the water.
Phil’s glasses trembled as he gazed at the end of the light shaft.
Captain Garcia’s voice rang out joyfully when his keen eyes saw the
small white object under the search-light’s ray, far out on the ocean.
“Be ready, men, she’s coming this way. Either they will sink, or we
shall. You must choose--I promise full pardon to all--if we sink her.”
A low murmur ran along the decks. In it were betrayed both joy and
fear:--joy for the promised reprieve, fear at the sudden unknown danger
of the approaching torpedo-boat.
O’Neil’s clear voice was raised in cautioning.
“Steady, men. Don’t fire; she’s too far away. Wait till I give you the
word. Then fire for your lives.”
The “Aquadores” turned swiftly toward the object illuminated by the
search-light of the “Barcelo.” The former ship was in complete darkness.
“Can you read the range?” questioned the captain’s eager voice.
Phil put his eyes to the range finder and moved a switch which made
the torpedo-boat’s bright hull appear as a line of light. He moved his
wheel and brought the direct and reflected rays together.
“Five thousand yards,” he announced.
“Let me know when she is twenty-five hundred yards away,” said Captain
Garcia.
The “Aquadores” was steaming at full speed toward the rapidly moving
torpedo-boat. They were approaching each other at terrific speed, yet
to the overwrought midshipman it seemed an age when his range pointer
reached the distance given him by the captain.
“Twenty-five hundred yards,” he cried, his voice rising with an
excitement he was powerless to control.
A second afterward the blinding flashes from the “Aquadores’” guns,
accompanied by ear splitting discharges, made the scene on the cruiser
one of terrible splendor.
The “Barcelo’s” search-light still illumined the enemy, but she had by
her superior speed drawn out of range of the former’s guns.
Phil’s fascinated gaze held to the torpedo-boat with grim tenacity.
“She’s lost her,” he cried, as the end of the “Barcelo’s” search-light
swept uncertainly over the water. The boat had vanished into the night.
“Cease firing,” cried O’Neil’s stentorian voice, as he saw the
torpedo-boat had slipped away from the discovering light.
The “Aquadores’” lights were flashed and groped about in despair for
the lost vessel. The sailors stood terrified at their guns. O’Neil
walked coolly along the deck, shaking men roughly to wake them out of
their stupor of fear--some had fallen to praying on their knees.
“When we pick her up you’ll need all your prayers,” he cried, “if you
don’t shoot.”
Phil felt he was nearer a panic than he had ever been; he walked up
and down, his eyes following one struggling beam and then the other;
he almost resolved to go up to a search-light himself. Captain Garcia
during the moments of uncertainty had turned his vessel toward the
harbor’s entrance. He would brave the fire of the forts if that could
prevent his prize from escaping. He was ready to sacrifice his ship in
this last attempt.
Suddenly through the black night Phil saw a darker shade on the surface
of the water. It seemed but a stone’s throw away. His voice was
paralyzed. He tried to speak but it was impossible. His lips gave out
unintelligible sounds. Grasping Captain Garcia’s arm, he pointed a
trembling finger at the dread object.
“Port quarter, quick, your search-lights,” shouted the captain.
The lights, before uncertain, now swung obediently to the assigned
direction, and in the bright glare, the torpedo-boat flashed in sight
heading bows on to the luckless cruiser.
“Don’t look. Shoot,” cried O’Neil to the gunners fascinated, terrified;
while he and Sydney stormed among them.
It seemed ages before the tension was relieved by the discharges of
their own guns.
The torpedo-boat was so close that the range finder could not get her
distance. She could not be over five hundred yards away and coming on
with terrific speed. Even now a Whitehead torpedo might be speeding
below the inky water on its mission of destruction.