Part 4

Miss Hollister colored and concluded that she had stayed quite long enough. With a gracious word of farewell, she hastened to the upper deck. Nora Forbes had found a new companion, a lean, sandy man in faded khaki whose sad, freckled face had a noticeable pallor and whose head was wound about with a white bandage. He sat with his back propped against a boat in the shade of the awning, and Nora announced to her aunt:

“I want you to know Mr. Jack Gorham. He is the man who conquered that giant of a negro. Captain O’Shea says it was one of the finest things he ever saw.”

Gorham, a modest, shrinking soul, looked acutely uncomfortable and protested:

“I had to get him. He fetched me a couple of clips, but I feel pretty spry. I’ll be ready to hop ashore and perforate them Spanish officers at a thousand per.”

Oddly enough, Miss Hollister was no longer terrified by the presence of these men of war. Since meeting Johnny Kent she had suffered a sea-change. In the face of the veteran soldier she was able to read that same quality of respectful admiration. She had been vouchsafed a glimpse of the real spirit of this singular voyage. It was pure romance, reincarnated from the age when the world was young. She had been permitted to sail with men who were living an Odyssey, a saga, but they knew it not. She thought of Johnny Kent in his bunk, and now she looked at Jack Gorham, commonplace, unlettered, uncouth, and listened while Nora repeated the story of the fight with Jiminez. The soldier wriggled uneasily. His embarrassment was painful. When questioned he could only repeat:

“Well, I just had to get him. That’s all there was to it.”

“But you did not have to risk your life,” persisted Nora. “Captain O’Shea was ready with his whole crew to overpower the man.”

“The captain wanted to tackle him, but of course I couldn’t stand for that,” patiently explained Gorham.

“_Why_ did you do it?” asked Miss Hollister.

“I guess it was what you might call a question of duty,” he drawled.

“I have heard nothing else,” was the spinster’s wondering comment. “And yet you are all breaking the laws of your country. My standards of right and wrong seem all topsy-turvy.”

“You sure did land in queer company this time,” seriously affirmed Gorham.

Miss Hollister’s excursion into the debatable ground of conduct and ethics as applied to buccaneering in the Caribbean was interrupted by Captain O’Shea, who was in a mood of brisk action and curt speech. Paying no attention to the ladies, he halted in front of Gorham to say:

“We shall try to put the stuff ashore to-night. Will ye be fit to land with the Cubans, or will I carry you back home with me?”

“Of course, I’ll land, sir. The nigger didn’t cut me deep,” was the dogged response. “What’s the programme?”

“The cargo will be hoisted out of the hold this afternoon, convenient for droppin’ into the boats. If you are able, will ye stand by to boss a gang of Cubans? Ye need not bear a hand yourself. Just talk to them and make signs with the butt end of that old Springfield.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll manage to keep them busy.”

The news ran through the ship. By noon the patriots were seething with excitement. They were about to set foot on the beloved soil of Cuba, to be quit of the hateful, perfidious ocean. They became incredibly valiant. These forty men would face a Spanish army. They talked of marching to attack fortified cities. Magically revived, they scoured the rust from their weapons and brandished them with melodramatic gesticulation. They sang the battle-hymns of the revolution and wept at sight of the blue, misty mountain range of the distant coast. Jack Gorham regarded them critically.

One gang of Cubans went into the hold and another was stationed on deck. The heavy cases of rifles and cartridges were passed up through the hatchways and piled along the rail. Captain O’Shea sauntered hither and yon, once halting to remark in chiding accents:

“Better not bang those square boxes about so free and careless. ’Tis nitro-glycerine for making dynamite ashore.”

“I’ll land it myself,” said Gorham. “It will come in handy for blowin’ up Spanish troop-trains.”

Toward nightfall the _Fearless_ reduced speed and loafed along over a smooth sea at a distance of perhaps thirty miles from the coast. The crisis of the voyage had come. O’Shea must run his ship into a trap and get her out again.

As soon as darkness was at hand the _Fearless_ began the final dash for the coast. Johnny Kent had crawled from his bunk and wearily set himself down in the engine-room doorway to await orders.

“If anything goes wrong to-night, it’ll happen all of a sudden,” he grumbled to his first assistant. “Takin’ chances of getting bottled up in a bay don’t please me a mite.”

“There is nothing in sight, chief. It looks like an easy landing. The skipper knows his business.”

“But it would be just our fool luck to run into trouble with these two ladies aboard. Women complicate every game they draw cards in. But that Miss Hollister is certainly a queen, ain’t she, Jim?”

“She’s old enough to be my mother,” ungallantly observed the youthful assistant.

“And I’m ’most old enough to be your grand-daddy, you godless, disrespectful sculpin,” was the angry retort of Johnny Kent. “And I’m man enough to break you in two across my knees.”

The rash young man wisely held his tongue, and the chief engineer murmured to the world at large:

“Refinement and culture do make a heap of difference in folks. Now, if I had chased after refinement and culture when I was young, instead of incessantly pursuin’ rum, riot, and rebellion on the high seas--but what’s the use?”

Thereupon this pensive pirate turned to survey his chanting engines and wondered what the night might bring forth. The _Fearless_ maintained an even gait until the coast was no more than five miles distant. Then she drifted idly while Captain O’Shea swept the horizon with his night-glasses. His eyes and ears were acutely alert, but there was neither sight nor sound of Spanish blockading craft cruising to intercept him. Astern were piled six large flat-bottomed surf-boats, in nests, as fishermen’s dories are carried. These were now launched and towed, ready to be ranged alongside and filled with cargo.

The forty Cubans conversed in hushed tones. Every man had knapsack, blanket-roll, canteen, and loaded rifle. The _Fearless_ again picked up full speed and moved straight for the coast. Soon the mountains loomed like gigantic shadows blotting out the stars. It was a bold, sheer coast, indented here and there by small bays into which the rivers flowed from the passes and valleys. It was in a certain one of these bays that Captain O’Shea had been told by the Junta to beach his cargo. A force of Cubans led by General Maximo Gomez himself would be waiting to receive the munitions. As had been arranged, the _Fearless_ now showed a white mast-head light above a red. Captain O’Shea looked at his watch. Three minutes later his signal-lights flashed again. In the gloom of the mountain-side, a white light winked above a red.

“That looks good to me,” said O’Shea to the mate. “If there was anything wrong, the answering signal would warn us to keep clear. But I do not like this messin’ around in a bay. Give me the open coast and plenty of sea-room.”

The _Fearless_ had come so near the entrance of the bay that the shadowy headlands on either side were dimly discernible from the bridge. The speed of the tug diminished until she was cautiously moving ahead with no more than steerage-way.

The silence was intense. No one spoke above a whisper. The engines were turning over so slowly that their rhythmic clamor was no more than a faint, muffled throb, like the pulse-beat of the ship. Warily she slid into the quiet bay and made ready to drop anchor off a strip of white beach. The surf-boats were hauled alongside and the cargo began to tumble into them. It looked as though this game of filibustering might not be so hazardous as reputed. The seamen were in the boats, detailed to handle the oars and put the Cubans and the cargo ashore.

The deep-laden flotilla had not quit the _Fearless_ for the first trip to the beach when the vigilant skipper fancied he saw a shadow steal from behind a headland at the mouth of the bay. For a long moment he ceased to breathe, while his gaze followed the illusive shadow which he was not sure that he could distinguish from the darkened sea.

Then one or two sparks gleamed like fire-flies and were gone. This was enough. Captain O’Shea instantly concluded that the sparks had dropped from a steamer’s funnel. He was caught inside the bay. Perhaps the steamer would pass without sighting the _Fearless_. But the shadow halted midway between the headlands, and O’Shea cursed the treachery which he presumed had betrayed his destination. The snare had been cleverly set for him. The Cuban force in the mountains had failed to detect this Spanish vessel or they would not have signalled him that the coast was clear.

O’Shea had to make his choice. He could abandon his ship and flee with his crew and passengers to the beach and the jungle, or he could turn and try to smash his way out to sea. The thought of deserting the _Fearless_ was so intolerable that he made his decision without hesitating. Summoning the mate and Johnny Kent, he spoke hurriedly.

“’Tis bottled up we are. Look yonder and ye can see for yourself. Call the men aboard and cut the boats adrift. Give it to her, Johnny, and hold on tight. There may be the divil and all of a bump.”

“Goin’ to run her down?” asked the chief engineer.

“If she doesn’t get out of my way. ’Tis a small gun-boat most likely.”

III

The patriots were unable to adjust themselves to the sudden shift of events. One moment they were about to land, rejoicing and valorous, to be welcomed by the tattered legion of Maximo Gomez, and the next they were snatched away to surge hell-bent in the direction of the enemy and the detestable sea. Captain O’Shea might have delayed to dump them into the boats and turn them adrift to flounder about the bay, but in all probability the Spanish gun-boat would overtake and slay many before they could reach the shore. He did not love them, but it was his duty to safeguard them along with the cargo.

Less than ten minutes after the shadow had moved across the entrance of the bay, the _Fearless_ was swinging to point her nose seaward. As soon as the tug was fairly straightened out, O’Shea rang for full speed. It was no longer a silent ship. The patriots raised a lamentable outcry of grief and indignation, unable to comprehend this slip between the cup and the lip. They were unconvinced that the captain had really seen a gun-boat. They accused him of taking fright at phantoms.

Indeed, there was no such thing as slipping unperceived past the waiting enemy, for besides the loud protests of the Cubans, the engines of the _Fearless_ made a strident song that re-echoed from the wooded shores. No longer in ambush, the Spanish craft turned on a search-light whose streaming radiance picked the tug out of the gloom like a lantern-slide projected on a screen. The two vessels were perhaps four hundred yards apart. Straight into the path of the search-light rushed the _Fearless_, veering neither to right nor left. Her tactics were disconcerting, her insane temerity wholly unexpected. It was obvious that unless the gun-boat very hastily moved out of the way there would occur an impressive collision. And the tall steel-shod prow of an ocean-going tug is apt to shatter the thin plates of a light-draught, coastwise gun-boat.

Captain O’Shea himself held the wheel. The Spanish gunners hurriedly opened fire, but sensations of panic-smitten amazement spoiled their aim, and they might as well have been shooting at the moon.

“By Judas! ye are so gay with your search-light, I will just have a look at you,” muttered O’Shea as he switched on the powerful light which was mounted upon the wheel-house roof. The handsome gun-boat was sharply revealed, her sailors grouped at the quick-fire pieces on the superstructure, the officers clustered forward. Jack Gorham’s Springfield boomed like a small cannon, and a man with gold stripes on his sleeves toppled from his station and sprawled on the deck below.

The Cubans cheered and let fly a scattering, futile rifle fire, but the crew of the _Fearless_, convinced that they must fight for their skins, crouched behind the heavy bulwarks and handled their Mausers with methodical earnestness. The Spanish officers and seamen took to cover. They were not used to being shot at, and this filibustering tug was behaving like a full-fledged pirate. The commander of the gun-boat made up his mind to dodge collision and sink the _Fearless_ with his guns before she should flee beyond range outside the bay. His mental machinery was not working swiftly, because this was what might be called his crowded hour. He tried to swing his vessel head on and to sheer to one side of the channel.

Captain O’Shea climbed the spokes of his steering-wheel and swung the _Fearless_ to meet the manœuvre. He was bent on crippling the gun-boat. With leaky boiler tubes, the tug was in no condition for another stern chase and the Spanish gunners would certainly hull her through and through and explode the cargo before he could run clear of the hostile search-light.

A few seconds later, the foaming bow of the _Fearless_ struck the gun-boat a quartering, glancing blow that raked along her side. The Spanish commander had almost twisted his vessel out of the other’s path and O’Shea dared not swing to catch her broadside on, for fear of running aground. The impact was terrific. The Spanish craft had a low freeboard and the guns of her main-deck battery protruded their long muzzles only a few feet above the water. The steel stem of the _Fearless_, moving with tremendous momentum, struck them one after the other, tore them from their mountings and stripped the starboard side clean. The tug’s headway was checked and a tangle of splintered stuff held the two vessels interlocked. The Spanish gunners on the upper deck could not sufficiently depress the secondary battery to fire down into the _Fearless_, and on board the tug all hands had been knocked flat by the collision, so that for the moment there was no hostile action on either side.

So close together were the two steamers while they hung together that cases of cargo, toppling over, spilled through the crushed bulwark of the _Fearless_, and slid upon the gun-boat’s lower deck where the side had been fairly ripped out of her above the water-line. Then the tug very slowly forged ahead, tearing herself free and grinding against the gun-boat’s cracked and twisted plates until the twain parted company.

“We are still afloat, glory be, and the engines are turnin’ over,” cried O’Shea.

He spun the wheel hard over to pass out to sea between the headlands, and steered where he thought deep water ought to be. The gun-boat had not opened fire, and he began to hope that he might win the freedom of the sea. Nor was the hostile vessel making any effort to follow him, and instead of blazing his trail with her search-light it had been turned skyward to flash signals for assistance against the clouds.

“I jolted the ambition out of her,” joyfully exclaimed O’Shea. “I would not like to look at my poor old hooker, but she must be an awful hash on deck----”

The _Fearless_ suddenly yawed to starboard and took the bit in her teeth. The skipper tried to fetch her back on her course, but she failed to respond to the wheel. He instantly knew that a rudder chain had parted. He yelled down the tube to Johnny Kent to reverse his engines. The masterless tug was heading out of the channel and the incoming tide caught her bow and swung her away from the seaward passage, over toward the nearest headland and its submerged reef.

The _Fearless_ felt the powerful backward drag of her screw, but not in time. The disabled steering-gear wrought the mischief before the emergency tiller could be manned or an anchor dropped to hold her in the channel. Her keel scraped along the coral bottom and the hull trembled to the shock of stranding. The _Fearless_ was hard and fast aground and the tide lacked three hours of the flood.

Finding it useless to try to work her off, Captain O’Shea had the engines stopped. The plight was soon discovered by the gun-boat, which brought her search-light to bear on the tug. The Spanish commander laughed, no doubt, when he perceived that he could train his remaining guns and smash the _Fearless_ to pieces at his leisure. It was point-blank range at a conspicuous target, and the tables had been turned.

Captain O’Shea comprehended the fate that was about to overtake his helpless ship. His boats had been cut adrift and there was no means of conveying his people to the shore. They could only swim for it and try to find footing on the reef.

“’Tis no use showing a white flag and offering to surrender,” he said to himself while the sweat ran down his face. “We fired on them and we rammed their ship.”

There was a life-raft on the deck-house roof, and he was about to order it shoved overside in order to send Nora Forbes and Miss Hollister ashore in charge of Van Steen and the mate. It was a forlorn hope, because the gun-boat would most likely fire at anything seen afloat. Just then Jack Gorham climbed to the bridge and respectfully saluted the captain.

“We are up against it, Jack,” said O’Shea. “The Spaniard yonder is taking his time. He will anchor bow and stern and then shoot us to splinters. I will be grateful if ye will lend the mate and young Van Steen a hand with the ladies. If ye can fetch the beach, take to the woods and try to find the camp of General Gomez.”

“I have a proposition, sir,” returned the soldier, and for once his voice was unsteady with excitement. “When we were tangled alongside the gun-boat, some cases of cargo was jolted off our deck onto her deck where the woodwork and plates was all tore away. For God’s sake, put your search-light on her for a minute, quick, before she swings her smashed side away from us. She’s still turnin’.”

“And for what?” queried O’Shea, but he leaped for the lighting-switch, confident that the soldier knew what he was talking about.

“Two of them cases was nitro-glycerine, sir, and for a wonder they slid so easy that they didn’t go off. I know them when I see ’em. Just give me one sight of them.”

The search-light of the _Fearless_ swept across the gun-boat, which was slowly shifting her position to find the middle of the channel and a safe anchorage. There was cramped room to manœuvre, and she was swinging in a small arc which exposed for a little time the shattered side that had been rammed by the tug. A gaping hole above water disclosed the main-deck forward, and the search-light of the _Fearless_ played and flickered in and out, white and brilliant. It illuminated the wreckage and the heap of wooden cases which lay as they had slid across the fragments of bulwark that bridged the narrow gap between the interlocked vessels.

“Hold the light steady, sir,” said Jack Gorham as he dropped to one knee, shoved the barrel of the Springfield across the rail of the bridge, and laid his cheek against the stock. “It seems plumb ridiculous, but it’s worth tryin’.”

His wonderfully keen eyes had distinguished a square wooden case which sat exposed and somewhat removed from the others on the gun-boat’s littered deck. He had bragged of his marksmanship. Now was the supreme opportunity to make good. The gun-boat was moving. Her shattered side would be hidden from him before he could shoot more than twice or thrice.

As the sights of his beloved old rifle came true on the tiny target he pressed the trigger and the heavy bullet went singing on its way.

“Missed, by Godfrey!” grunted Gorham as he reloaded. “If I score a bull’s-eye, you’ll know it all right.”

Annoyed by this impertinence, the gun-boat let drive with a one-pounder which put a shell through the funnel of the _Fearless_ and showered the deck with soot. Gorham wiped his eyes and took aim for the second shot. Good luck and good marksmanship guided it. No need to wonder where this bullet struck. The case of nitro-glycerine exploded with a prodigious detonation that seemed to shake earth and sea and sky. The forward part of the gun-boat was enveloped in a great sheet of flame. The people of the _Fearless_ were stunned and deafened and the hull rocked violently against the reef. Burning fragments rained everywhere, and fell hissing into the bay. From the place where the gun-boat was rapidly sinking came cries for help.

“She is gone entirely. God help their poor souls,” brokenly murmured Captain O’Shea.

He turned to shout to the mate:

“Pull yourself together and paddle over yonder with the life-raft. Pick up all ye find of the poor men in the water and set them ashore. The Cuban army will take care of them as prisoners of war. And maybe you can find some of our boats. ’Tis an awful sight to see a fine vessel snuffed out like a candle.”

Jack Gorham sat on deck, his head in his hands, a disconsolate figure.

“I made a wonderful shot,” he muttered, “but I hope I’ll never have to make another one like it.”

“Bridge, ahoy!” roared Johnny Kent from the lower deck. “This is war. We beat ’em to it. Now let’s get this tug off the reef on the flood tide, if we rip the bottom out of her. This bay will be full of gun-boats and cruisers to-morrow.”

Going below for the first time since the _Fearless_ had entered the bay, the skipper found the decks in chaotic confusion. Broken bulwarks, smashed doors and windows, parted funnel-stays, twisted deck-houses, and other signs of the collision were strewn from bow to stern. Some twenty of the patriots had dived overboard. Of those left on board, several had been hurt, and the crew of the _Fearless_ were badly cut, bruised, and banged about.

O’Shea rallied all that were able to turn to, and set them to throwing cargo overboard. The guns and ammunition were packed in water-proof cases and could be fished up by the Cuban army at low tide. It was heavy material, and getting rid of two or three hundred tons of it must considerably lighten the stranded tug. At this back-breaking task doggedly labored Gerald Van Steen without waiting for an order. Captain O’Shea stared at him by the light of a lantern as though reminded of something important.

“The ladies!” cried he. “Are they safe and sound?”

“They are alive, thank you,” said Van Steen. “I stowed them in their room, and made them lie on the floor with the mattresses tucked against the wall to stop the bullets. I could think of nothing else to do.”