Part 7

“I will be so glad to have you inspec’ my camp,” said he, staring at her very boldly. “It is ver’ military. That Captain O’Shea”--an eloquent shrug--“he is good on the sea, but he is not a soldier, to know camps like me.”

“Captain O’Shea has offered to show me the camps. He is in command, I believe.”

“That fellow do not comman’ me. Will you come to-night? My soldiers will sing for you the songs of _Cuba Libre_.”

“No, I thank you.” Miss Hollister was positively discourteous.

“Ah, so beautiful a woman and so cruel,” sighed the colonel, ogling her with his most fatal glances.

Miss Hollister spied Johnny Kent coming at top speed, and she looked so radiant that Colonel Calvo spun round to discover the reason. With a contemptuous laugh he remarked:

“The greasy ol’ man of the engines! I do not like him.”

Johnny Kent had read the meaning of the tableau. The colonel was making himself unpleasant to Miss Hollister. And the breeze carried to his ear the unflattering characterization of himself.

“He’s playing right into my hands. It couldn’t happen nicer if I had arranged it myself,” said the chief engineer under his breath. His mien was as fierce as that of an indignant walrus as he bore down on the pair and, without deigning to notice Colonel Calvo, exclaimed to Miss Hollister:

“Was anybody makin’ himself unwelcome to you just now? If so, I’ll be pleased to remove him somewhere else.”

“You will min’ your own business,” grandly declaimed Colonel Calvo.

“You needn’t answer my question, ma’am,” resumed Johnny Kent. “This pestiferous Cuban gent wanders over here without bein’ invited and makes himself unpopular. It’s as plain as a picture on the wall.”

The spinster realized that it was her duty to intervene as a peace-maker between these belligerents, but she felt powerless to move from the spot, which happened to be in the middle of Johnny Kent’s imaginary pasture, between the brook and the hay-field. The proprietor thereof, advancing close to Colonel Calvo, thundered, “Ha! Ha!” and firmly grasped the warrior’s nose between a mighty thumb and forefinger. The colonel yelled with rage and pain, and fumbled for the hilt of his sword. With dignified deliberation the chief engineer released the imprisoned nose, turned the colonel squarely around by the shoulders, and kicked him until his spurs jingled like little bells.

“There! I hope you’re real insulted, right down to the heels,” commented the avenger.

Colonel Calvo painfully straightened himself, managed to haul the sword clear of the scabbard, waved it undecidedly and shrieked:

“Mos’ likely you have the pistol in your pants to kill me with. I will fight the duello with you. You have insult’ me in my mortal part. You refuse me to fight with pistols, quick, as soon as it can be arrange’?”

“Bully for you,” cordially answered Johnny Kent. “Sure thing. I’ll be delighted.” He had one eye on Miss Hollister as he continued in resonant tones: “We will duel to the death.”

“I will sen’ my frien’ to see your frien’, señor,” was the grandiloquent response of Colonel Calvo. “An’ I will kill you mos’ awful dead.”

“It will be a pleasure to turn up my toes in defence of a lady,” fervently declaimed the engineer as Colonel Calvo limped in the direction of his own camp, filling the air with such explosive imprecations that it was as though he left a string of cannon-crackers in his wake. Johnny Kent mopped his face, smiled contentedly, and turned his attention to the dumfounded spinster.

“But are you in earnest?” she gasped.

“Never more so, ma’am,” and he added, with seeming irrelevance, “I suppose you have heard that Cap’n O’Shea and Mr. Van Steen came near fightin’ a duel yesterday afternoon.”

“Yes, Mr. Van Steen admitted as much. It was a most inexplicable affair. What in the world has it to do with your terrible quarrel with Colonel Calvo?”

“You understand just why I am perpetratin’ the duel with the colonel, don’t you, ma’am?” asked Johnny Kent, showing some slight anxiety.

“I--I imagine--” She blushed, looked distressed, and said with a confusion prettily girlish, “I am afraid I had something to do with it.”

“You had everything to do with it,” he heartily assured her. “You don’t feel slighted now, do you? I thought you might take it to heart, you understand--being sort of left out. Says I to myself last night, there’ll be no invidious distinctions in Miss Hollister’s neighborhood. She deserves a duel of her own, and I’ll hop in and get her one the first minute that conceited jackass of a Colonel Calvo gives me a chance to pull his nose for him. That is strictly accordin’ to Hoyle, ma’am. Pullin’ the other fellow’s nose is the most refined and elegant way of starting a duel. Kickin’ him was an afterthought, to make sure he was insulted a whole lot.”

“I appreciate your motive,” murmured Miss Hollister, “but, oh, dear, it wasn’t at all necessary. You and I are too good friends to require a duel as a proof of esteem. And I did not feel in the least slighted.”

“Perhaps not; but you are bound to feel sort of gratified,” stubbornly argued the portly squire of dames. “It’s the nature of women to like to have duels fought over ’em. The colonel is as thin as a shad, and I suppose he’ll stand edgewise, but maybe I can wing him.”

“But what about you?” tremulously besought his lady fair, whose emotions were chaotic in the extreme.

“Me? Pooh! I’ve had too many narrow escapes to be bagged by a google-eyed shrimp like this Calvo person,” easily answered the knight-errant. “Now you just sit tight and don’t get fretty, ma’am. You can bank on me every time. I’m shy of culture, but my heart is as big as a basket. And when I see my duty plain, I go to it in a hurry.”

Miss Hollister’s perturbed glance happened to fall on the half-obliterated plan of Johnny Kent’s farm, in the midst of which she still stood. It appealed to her with an indefinable pathos. She could not understand why, but she began to weep, although a moment before she had perceived the wild absurdity of Johnny’s Kent arguments.

“Why, you ain’t supposed to cry,” he exclaimed in great agitation; “I’m trying to please you.”

“I--I--can see your good intentions,” she tearfully faltered, “but I shall go to Captain O’Shea and beg him to forbid this duel--to prevent bloodshed. I shall be perfectly happy without it.”

“Please don’t interfere in men’s affairs,” implored the alarmed hero. “Women are too delicate to go prancin’ in among us professional pirates. You’ll feel better after it’s over. I guess I had better leave you.”

He fled from the sight of her tears, greatly distressed, wondering whether he might be mistaken in his theories concerning the operations of the feminine mind. She had behaved as if she did not want a duel, but he reflected:

“They’re all geared contrariwise. You can never tell just what they do want. And it’s a good bet that she’d feel worse if I disappointed her about this duel.”

The first assistant engineer called him to repair the condenser, which had been set up on the beach, and it was there that Captain O’Shea found him some time later.

“For the love of heaven, Johnny,” exclaimed the skipper, “what infernal nonsense have you been up to now? The Cuban colonel came surging into me tent, foaming and sputterin’ like a leaky boiler. He got all choked up with language, but I made out that ye have handed him seventeen kinds of deadly insults, and agreed to fight him with revolvers. Are ye drunk? The Cuban crowd is hard enough to handle as it is, and you have been me right-hand man. Is it one of your bad jokes?”

“Not on your life, Cap’n Mike,” earnestly affirmed the engineer. “He made himself unpleasant to a friend of mine--ladies’ names are barred. We fixed up this duel in perfectly gentlemanly style, and as a favor to me I ask you to keep your hands off. It won’t be a public ruction.”

“You butt-headed old fool, he may shoot you!”

“Well, Cap’n Mike, speakin’ seriously,” and Johnny’s face was genuinely sad, “just between you and me, I wouldn’t care a whole lot. I’ve lost my ship, and I’ll never have money enough to buy a farm. And--well--she wouldn’t look at me twice if we were in civilization among her own kind of folks. I didn’t mean to slop over this way, but you are a good friend of mine, Cap’n Mike.”

O’Shea laid a hand upon his comrade’s shoulder and was moved to sympathy.

“You are making heavy weather of it, Johnny. Suppose I forbid this high-tragedy duel. I am still in command, ye understand. It would give me no great sorrow to see Colonel Calvo wafted to a better world, but I will be hanged if I want to lose you.”

“I ask it as a favor, Cap’n Mike. I’ve done my best for you, blow high, blow low,” doggedly persisted the other.

“’Tis not fair to put it that way, Johnny. Cool off a bit, and we will talk about it to-night.”

“You’re the boss, Cap’n Mike, and I’d hate to mutiny on you, but I’ve passed my word to the finest lady in the world that this duel would be fought. And a man that will break his word to a lady ought to be strung to the yard-arm.”

O’Shea walked away and sat down in front of his tent. The Cuban camp was buzzing with excitement, and a grumbling uneasiness was manifest among the crew of the _Fearless_. The two factions cordially disliked each other. The story of the duel had spread like a fire. If anything happened to Johnny Kent, the _Fearless_ men were resolved to annihilate the Cuban camp. Such intentions being promptly conveyed to the patriots, they swarmed about Colonel Calvo and announced their readiness to avenge him with the last drop of their blood.

O’Shea summoned Jack Gorham as his most dependable aid and counsellor. The melancholy sharp-shooter listened respectfully. O’Shea waxed torrid and his language was strong.

“Johnny Kent is a great engineer and I swear by him,” he declared, “but he is full to the hatches with sentiment, and it makes him as cranky as a wet hen. He is dead set on this comical duel, and I dislike to disgrace him by putting him under arrest. He would never sail with me again.”

“Better let them fight,” said Gorham.

“’Tis your trade,” replied O’Shea. “You are biassed. I want ye to figure a way to make this duel harmless. Let them shoot all they like, but don’t let them hit each other. You know how I feel about Johnny Kent, and little as I love Colonel Calvo, I am sort of bound to deliver him safe somewhere.”

“When is this pistol party scheduled to happen?” asked Gorham.

“Early to-morrow morning.”

“It will be easy enough to steal their revolvers while they’re asleep, sir, and work the bullets out of the shells and spill most of the powder. Or I could file down the front sights. Why not make ’em postpone it for another twenty-four hours? The seconds will have a lot of pow-wowin’ to do, and perhaps we can work out a better scheme.”

“I agree with you, Gorham. A duel should be conducted with a great deal of etiquette and deliberation. ’Tis not a rough-and-tumble scrap, but more like a declaration of war. We will do it proper, even if we are ragged and shipwrecked.”

Shortly thereafter Captain O’Shea issued his ultimatum to the combatants. They were to observe a truce until the morning of the second day. Meanwhile negotiations would be conducted in a dignified and befitting manner. Violation of this edict would be punished by confinement under guard. Johnny Kent grumbled volubly until O’Shea convinced him that the etiquette of the duelling code forbade unseemly haste.

“I take your word for it, Cap’n Mike. I don’t want to make any breaks. This affair aims to be strictly accordin’ to Hoyle.”

V

Shortly after sunrise next morning the sentries, the cook, and a few sailors and Cubans who were early astir discovered a faint smudge of smoke on the horizon to the northward. They shouted the tidings, and Captain O’Shea tumbled out of his tent, rubbing his eyes. A long scrutiny convinced him that the steamer was heading to pass within sighting distance of the key. She was coming from the direction of the Cuban coast. Possibly she might belong to the Spanish navy. On the other hand, she might be a cargo tramp bound to the southward and seeking a South American port.

There is such a thing as becoming accustomed to the unexpected. Those who dwell in the midst of alarms acquire a certain philosophical temper which views life as a series of hazards. On this lonely key in the Caribbean the daily routine of things had run along without acute symptoms of worry and dread, although the peril of discovery by a Spanish war-vessel was discussed by the evening camp-fires. So long as Captain O’Shea appeared unruffled, his followers saw no reason why they should lose sleep. To him it was like the toss of a coin. They were to be rescued or they were to be found by the enemy.

If he had seemed inactive, it was because this was an extraordinary shipwreck. To send the life-raft in search of succor was a forlorn hope, a desperate expedient, but even this was denied him. The wind was blowing steadily from the southward, day after day, and the raft would drift straight toward the coast of Cuba where no mercy was to be looked for. Because of the destruction of the Spanish gun-boat, these refugees were something else than castaways. They were men without a country, and death awaited them wherever flew the red and yellow flag of Spain.

Captain O’Shea turned from gazing at the distant smoke and awakened Johnny Kent.

“Rouse out, ye sleepy old duellist,” he called. “Take a look at this vessel.”

The engineer emerged from the tent and the two men stood side by side, their emotions weighted with poignant anxiety.

“We won’t be able to tell what she is for some time yet,” said Johnny Kent. “The sea is hazy. Yes, she’s sure enough comin’ this way, Cap’n Mike.”

“’Tis best for us to be ready, whatever she is,” replied O’Shea.

“I guess we’ll postpone the arrangements for my duel. What’s the orders?”

“All hands will move inside the earthworks right after breakfast,” briskly spoke O’Shea. “Take charge of the men in your department, Johnny. See that the rifles are clean and serve out plenty of ammunition. And store all the fresh water ye can.”

“If it’s a Spanish vessel, can we stand her off at all, Cap’n Mike?”

“She will have a hard time shellin’ us out, Johnny. That four-sided refuge we piled up with our shovels is nothing but a big sand-bank. Shells will bury in it without explodin’. ’Tis the theory of modern fortifications. We can do our best, and maybe luck will turn our way. Anyhow, ’tis more sensible than to be shot by drum-head court-martial, which is what will happen to us if we throw up our hands and surrender. If they find us a hard nut to crack, perhaps we can make terms of some kind.”

“What about the ladies? I was hopin’ they wouldn’t have to go up against any more excitement,” wistfully said Johnny Kent.

“I have delivered me cargo. It stands no longer between us and our guests, Johnny. And ’tis my opinion that you and I will not let them suffer for the sake of saving our own skins.”

“Right you are, Cap’n Mike. I don’t care a cuss what becomes of me if you can get Miss Hollister--I mean both of ’em, of course--on board a respectable vessel of some kind.”

Soon the camp was in commotion. The methods of the leaders were brutal and direct. This was no time for soft words. Jack Gorham moved quietly, in several places at once, and when a man would argue or expostulate he was threatened with the butt of that terrible Springfield. At his side, like a huge, black shadow, stalked Jiminez, a militant assistant who jumped at the word of command.

Johnny Kent, no longer a sighing sentimentalist, bellowed at his engineers, oilers, and stokers, and the discipline of shipboard took hold of them. There was the loudest uproar in the Cuban camp. Because of their race, the patriots had to be melodramatic, to defy the unknown steamer by running to the beach and brandishing their rifles and machetes at the ribbon of smoke that trailed across the opalescent sea. But Colonel Calvo, very much more of a man in this emergency than when he had been afloat on the bounding billows, drove them back to camp and got them well in hand.

The canvas shelters were hastily ripped down and set up inside the earthworks as a protection against the sun which blazed into this windless enclosure with fierce intensity. Johnny Kent paused to say to O’Shea:

“It’s goin’ to be hades in there for the women. They can’t stand it long.”

“They won’t have to, Johnny. This will be a short performance. Ye can expect a show-down between now and sunset.”

The haze had vanished. The steamer was visible beneath a far-flung banner of smoke. A tiny foremast, a ring around it, and O’Shea exclaimed:

“A fighting-top! It looks to me like the cruiser that chased us down the coast.”

“That’s her, dollars to doughnuts, Cap’n Mike. She ain’t in such a hurry to-day.”

“No need of it. We can’t get away.”

“Do you think she’s really lookin’ for us?”

“’Tis not a bad guess, Johnny. As soon as word was telegraphed to Havana that the gun-boat was destroyed, the whole blockadin’ fleet must have been ordered to watch for us at both ends of Cuba. They knew we had to round Cape Maysi or San Antonio to get home. And when we were not seen or reported anywhere they may have begun to look for us down here to the south’ard.”

“She can’t help sightin’ the wreck of the _Fearless_,” said the engineer.

“And then she will know who we are. ’Tis time for all hands to take to cover.”

The Spanish man-of-war, gray, and slim, and venomous, slowly lifted her hull above the sea-line, and was heading to pass to the eastward of the sandy islet. It was a fair conjecture that her captain was roving away from his station on the coast in the hope of finding the _Fearless_ disabled or short of coal. Some of the refugees surmised that she might pass them unobserved, but at a distance of two or three miles she turned and laid a course to pick up the key at closer range.

Captain O’Shea climbed the rampart and lashed an American ensign to a spar thrust into the sand. The bright flag was neither half-masted nor reversed as a signal of distress. The breeze flaunted it as a defiance, a message from men who had forfeited its protection, who cheered the sight of it for sentimental reasons which they could not have clearly explained. The governments of the United States and Spain were at peace. This was not an affair between the two Powers. It was a little private war, a singular incident. And yet it was somehow fitting, after all, that these outlaws should prefer to see the stars and stripes waving over their heads.

Presently Colonel Calvo planted beside this ensign the tricolor of the Cuban revolutionaries, with the lone star. It was done with a certain amount of ceremony which commanded respect and admiration. It signified that he, too, speaking for his men, was ready to make the last stand, to accept the decree of fortune. Johnny Kent grasped his hand and apologized.

The cruiser moved cautiously nearer the key, taking frequent soundings. The wreck of the _Fearless_ had been discovered and must have been identified, for the cruiser cleared for action, and the bugles trilled on her decks. The huge, four-sided mound of sand heaped upon the back of the key evidently puzzled the officers. After a long delay, the vessel let go an anchor a thousand yards from the beach and spitefully hurled several shells into the shattered hulk of the _Fearless_.

Then a pair of eight-inch turret-guns were trained at Captain O’Shea’s thick walls of sand. A string of small flags fluttered from the cruiser’s signal-yard. O’Shea comprehended the message without consulting the international code-book.

“She invites us to surrender,” he explained, “which I decline to do at present. Let her shoot away. Maybe she will tire of it and leave us.”

No white flag was displayed on the rampart, and the cruiser lost her temper. A projectile passed over the key with a noise like a derailed freight-train. Others followed until the sand was spurting in yellow geysers. Such shells as struck the earthwork burrowed deep holes without causing appreciable damage. The Spanish commander soon perceived that this impromptu fortification was costly to bombard. His gunners were merely burying shells in a large heap of sand, and his government had not been lavish in filling his magazines. A mortar battery was needed to discommode this insane crew of pirates. And undoubtedly, if a landing-party should be disembarked on the open beach, these rascals of Captain O’Shea would fight like devils. The cruiser had been ordered to fetch them back to Havana alive and they would be formally executed in the Cabañas fortress as a warning to other hardy seafarers in the filibustering trade. These men had not only fired on the Spanish flag, but they had also blown it out of water.

But how were they to be extracted from their refuge without sacrificing the lives of Spanish sailors and marines? _Carramba_, here was a tough problem!

It might be feasible to starve them out by means of a siege, but the cruiser had no abundance of coal and stores. A storm would compel her to steam out to sea, or run for the coast. And if the key were left unguarded a merchant-vessel might happen along and rescue O’Shea and his men. And for all the commander knew, they had already sent a boat to summon help.

The cruiser ceased firing. Thereupon Captain O’Shea convened a council of war within his defences. The enclosure had been deluged with flying sand, but there were no casualties.

“There will be no more bombardment,” he told his people. “The cruiser will do one of two things. She will lay off the key and wait for us to give in, or she will send her boats ashore to-night and try to rush us in the dark.”

“We’ll make it unhealthy for ’em,” stoutly declared Johnny Kent.

“Me and my men will die for _Cuba Libre_,” said Colonel Calvo, his theatrical manner fled, his words spoken with a fine simplicity.

“There don’t seem to be any way out,” observed Jack Gorham.

O’Shea gazed at them in silence. There was no reproach in their speech or manner, no thought of blaming him for this tragic predicament. And yet it was his responsibility and his alone. He might have abandoned the _Fearless_ in the bay and taken these people ashore where they could find refuge with the Cuban army of Gomez. If he had been guilty of an error of judgment, then he should pay the price. There dawned upon him a clear conception of his own private duty.