Frontier Boys in the South Seas Part 16

The Senor made an exclamation of intense

"It is the large eucalyptus on the margin of the grove," continued Jim.

"Yes. Yes. You seem to know all."

"All I must know to aid you effectively," said Jim, earnestly. "You speak about the money, but your daughter, what of her?"

"That is arranged. She is to be seen by me before the money is given up.

She is to be near at hand. I am to see her, it is promised, sitting in a small boat near the sh.o.r.e, and in the care of a good woman who has been her companion."

Jim could not restrain a laugh. The idea of applying any such word as "good woman" to the virago on board the Sea Eagle.

"Captain Broome's sister?" suggested Jim, inquiringly.

"Captain Broome's sister," repeated the Senor. "It is not possible. The captain is a comrade, a friend, engaged by me to carry arms and armament to my confreres in Cuba. Ah, what am I saying to you, James? My secret, in my anxiety for my daughter, my secret I have told, you must not repeat or disclose."

"Your secret is safe, Senor, but your daughter is on board the Sea Eagle now, and Broome, whatever he may be, is not to be trusted."

"I am amazed. It is true the Sea Eagle is in the harbor. So I was told by the innkeeper this morning. But I knew for what purpose, and I was glad to think that someone was near on whom I could rely in case of need. Then I have my trusted man, as you surmised, in the tree to give aid if called upon. But how know you all and so many of these things?"

"Perhaps I know more. You arranged all the plans through a certain lawyer in San Francisco?"

"Yes. Yes."

"And he sold you out."

"What do you mean?"

"That he plotted with Broome to get your daughter into his hands, that they might wring another five thousand out of you."

"How dare they!" He thought a few moments, his face livid with suppressed rage. Then he continued, "They probably counted on my intense interest in Cuban affairs, of which I told you, to save themselves. But they are mistaken. I will kill them both."

"Just now," interrupted Jim, "we must attend to the business in hand."

"I put the matter in your control."

"At the hour named," suggested Jim, "do you go to the appointed place.

I will be in hiding near at hand with the others of my party. There will be five of us."

"And what am I to do?"

"Do exactly as you have planned. Do not, I beg of you, vary one iota.

Let your man in the tree know that he must be ready for quick action."

"You have ever my thanks!" said the Senor.

Very carefully, Jim went over in antic.i.p.ation every move of the arrangement. When about to take leave, the Senor wrung his hand expressing his grat.i.tude and they parted. Jim rejoined his party and found them eating the lunch they had brought with them from the ship.

During the afternoon Jim scouted around the country to the north of them with a result that had much bearing upon the future, but he was on hand with the others long before the appointed hour.

CHAPTER XI.

ON BOARD THE SEA EAGLE.

We must now revert to the afternoon on which the redoubtable Captain Broome sailed from the harbor of San Francisco. It will be recalled that his was the first of the three vessels to leave the harbor. The captain was sitting in the cabin of the Sea Eagle in consultation with the Mexican dwarf whom, concealed in a hamper, he had smuggled on board. It was their purpose to have the boys think that the dwarf had been drowned at the time he had slipped from the professor's grasp and plunged into the waters of the bay.

The captain was sitting in a revolving chair in front of the desk, whose top was strewn with papers and charts over which he had been pouring.

His thoughts apparently had not been particularly pleasing, for there was a scowl upon his hard face which looked harder than ever, and there was an ugly glitter in his eye which boded evil for whoever crossed his path. Nevertheless, the dwarf, who was seated, or rather perched, upon the top of a worn and battered sea chest at the opposite side of the room, regarded him with indifference. If there was anything upon the face of the earth or of its waters of which the Mexican was afraid or which had the power to make him blench, he had never met it.

For a moment or two the captain glared at the dwarf, who returned his look indifferently.

"A nice mess you've made of this business," growled the captain.

"It wasn't my fault," returned the dwarf surlily.

"Then I suppose it was mine," snapped the captain.

The dwarf shrugged his shoulders.

"You wouldn't let me put a knife in him," he snarled venomously. "The sharks would have had him now."

"Bah!" sneered the captain. "Can't you think of anything better than that? Besides, there are four of them. That's too clumsy, anyway. And,"

he went on after a moment's pause, "I don't believe you could have done it. Jim Darlington is too smart for you."

If it was the captain's intention to arouse all the malignity and vindictiveness of the hunchback's nature to the utmost, he certainly succeeded. The dwarf's eyes blazed with fire, his form trembled with rage and his voice when he spoke resembled more the hiss of an angry snake than the utterance of a human being.

"Leave him to me now," he hissed. "I will make an end of this Senor James and his whole tribe."

There was a devilish malignity in the way he spoke that stirred even the captain, callous as he was.

"All right," replied the captain, "if that's the way you feel about them, I guess you'll take care of the matter all right."

Getting upon his feet with an inarticulate growl, the captain lurched across the cabin and up the companion way to the deck, where a quick glance around a.s.sured him that there was no one within eavesdropping distance. Returning to the cabin he dropped heavily into the chair again.

"So the professor is back again?"

The dwarf made a surly gesture of a.s.sent.

"Why didn't you get the chart?"

"How could I? I paid the porter five dollars to let me handle the bag for a minute, but there was nothing in it."

"Why didn't you take the bag?"

"What was the good? There was nothing in it, and beside there was no chance."