The Dust of Conflict Part 48

The stragglers were formed into their companies in the plaza, and Maccario, impressing a citizen whom he dragged out of his dwelling, sent him on with a scribbled summons to Morales to deliver up the cuartel.

The message was terse and laconic, and Maccario smiled dryly when the man departed very much against his wishes bearing a white handkerchief on a cane.

"One complies with civilized customs; it is required of him. And a rest of a few minutes will not hurt my men," he said. "Still, it is a waste of courtesy when it is known beforehand what Morales' answer will be."

While they waited there was a little derisive laughter as, with Harper on the flank of the first four, another band of the Sin Verguenza tramped into the plaza. They had, he explained disgustedly, found a feebly defended entrance by a narrow alley, and had lost their way during the pursuit of the handful of cazadores who had attempted to hold it. He had already left the ranks, and grinned at Maccario suggestively as he laid a bottle of red wine in Tony's hands.

"The boys struck a place where they sell it, and you're not an officer, anyway," he said. "It might come in handy, and if the others are stuck on discipline they needn't have any."

The men had refilled the magazines by this time, and were growing impatient when the citizen came back again. He carried a strip of paper torn across the middle, and made a little deprecatory gesture as he pa.s.sed it to Maccario.

"That is the only answer the Colonel Morales sends," he said.

Appleby smiled dryly, but a faint flush crept into Maccario's face.

"It is what one would have expected-and it is evident he understands,"

he said. "There is no room in Cuba for him and the Sin Verguenza."

Then he spoke sharply, there was a pa.s.sing of orders, and the Sin Verguenza swung forward down the broad highway that led to the cuartel.

The street was silent and empty under the scorching sun, with green lattices closed, and doors shut, but the men could see the square ma.s.s of the building towering white and grim, with the crimson and gold of Spain flaunting over it on the faint hot breeze. They marched in due formation now, but behind them came a rabble long held down by terror, men with bitter wrongs who carried rifles torn from the fallen cazadores, machetes, and iron bars. They had also a long score against Morales, and their time had come.

They were close on the cuartel, and still the white building was silent, when the Sin Verguenza stopped a moment or two and men with iron bars beat down the door of a house Maccario pointed to. Then the most part of one company vanished within it, and it was not until they poured out on the flat roof the rest went on. It seemed to Appleby that save for the tramp of feet the street was curiously still, though he noticed that now a green lattice was open every here and there.

Then the silence was suddenly broken by a crash of riflery, and the front of the houses was smeared by drifting smoke! Morales, it was evident, did not mean to hold his hand until they reached the cuartel.

Here and there a man staggered and reeled from the ranks, there was a sharp snapping upon the stones, but Maccario's voice rang through the din, and the Sin Verguenza went on at a furious run. They were met by the flash of a volley when they swept into the open s.p.a.ce in front of the cuartel, shrank back, and reeled into the sliding smoke again, while the rifles of their comrades swept the windows from the houses opposite.

Twice they beat the great door in the archway almost down, but those who swung the hammers and machetes melted away under the rifle flame, and then Harper went shouting at the door with a great iron bar. There were, however, men with grim faces from the alleys of Santa Marta behind him now, striking with torn-up railings, pounding with paving stones, while from roof and windows the rifles crashed.

Then the door bent inwards, and with a shout of triumph and execration the Sin Verguenza poured in across the barricade of stones and soil in cases. The din had grown bewildering, and the men seemed oblivious of sight and sound in their pa.s.sion, while Appleby, who shouldered his way through the press, noticed only the closed inner door of the patio, and the ruins of the torn-up veranda stairway. Again it cost the Sin Verguenza a heavy price to break that door down, but nothing would have stopped them or those who followed them now, and they fought their way up the wide stairway, driving the cazadores back until they poured out on to the higher veranda where Morales stood with a bright sword in his hand at the foot of the big flagstaff. There was a little cl.u.s.ter of cazadores about him, but Appleby did not know where the rest had gone, for the struggle had become general, and scattered handfuls of men were fighting independently all over the building. He, however, fancied by the shouts and the confused din that most of them and the Sin Verguenza had swept on up the higher stairway to the roof above, for he and Maccario and Tony were almost alone.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THEY WERE MET BY THE FLASH OF A VOLLEY."]

Maccario stopped suddenly and swung off his hat.

"The cuartel is ours how, and it would serve no purpose to waste more men. Your sword, senor," he said.

Morales made him a little punctilious salutation, and glanced at the bright blade in his hand. Then he turned to the men about him, and smiled grimly, as though in answer to the murmur that rose from them.

"Never while I live. It belongs to Spain," he said.

The little drama scarcely lasted a minute, but it forced itself into Appleby's memory, and he could long afterwards picture Morales standing very straight with set lips and a gleam in his dark eyes, the handful of men with rifles behind him, and the grim face of the slim young officer Harper had spared at the hacienda. Tony was gasping close at his side, and the flag of Spain streamed, a strip of gold and crimson, above them all.

Then more men grimed with dust and smoke poured into the veranda, and Maccario, who made a little deprecatory gesture, raised his sword.

"Then, with excuses, senor! Comrades, we must have that flag," he said.

A man beside Morales whose head was bound with a crusted bandage flung up his rifle, there was a flash, and one of the Sin Verguenza reeled and plunged down from the shattered stairway into the patio. Then there was a shout, a crash, and a whirling haze of smoke, and as Appleby sprang towards the flagstaff a cazador lunged at him with his bayonet. His finger closed on the pistol trigger, but there was no answering flash, and another shadowy figure seemed to slip in between him and the soldier. The latter went down with a man upon him, while Appleby pressed on through the acrid haze. A man whom he recognized as Harper seemed to reach the staff simultaneously with himself, a knife flashed, and a hoa.r.s.e voice cried in English as a rope was thrust into his hand.

"Haul!" it said. "Down she comes."

A moment or two later the limp folds of red and gold fell into Appleby's hands, and it was evident that other men on the roofs and in the patio had seen the flag come down, for a shout of exultation rolled across the town. Then Appleby who flung the flag from him, turned and glanced along the veranda with a little shiver.

Save for two or three who lay still in the glaring sunlight the cazadores had melted away, and he fancied they had been driven through the gap in the torn-up bal.u.s.trade or had flung themselves into the patio. The slim young lieutenant held himself up by a railing, with his face horribly awry, while Maccario stood still looking down on the olive-faced officer who lay close in front of him. His kepi had fallen off, but his brown fingers were still clenched upon his sword, and he stared back at the leader of the Sin Verguenza with sightless eyes.

Maccario, who apparently saw Appleby, stooped, and pointed to a little blue mark on the side of the officer's head.

"It is what one would have expected. A brave soldier!" he said.

Appleby said nothing, but looked round for Tony, and felt suddenly chilly when he did not see him. Then with horrible misgivings he turned towards a man who lay partly upon a fallen cazador with a rifle beside him. Just then the man lifted his head, and it was with a gasp he recognized the drawn, white face as Tony Palliser's.

"Tony, you're not hurt?" he said, with hoa.r.s.e anxiety.

Tony smiled wryly. "I think I am," he said. "This fellow got his bayonet into me, and I have a notion that I'm bleeding internally. I suppose there is a doctor in Santa Marta."

Appleby turned and seized Maccario by the shoulder. The latter, leaning over the bal.u.s.trade, called out sharply, and in a moment or two three or four of the Sin Verguenza came up and lifted Tony. As they moved away with him Maccario stooped and laid Morales' kepi over his face. Then he touched Appleby gently.

"I have seen a good many wounds, and I think the Senor Palliser will not fight again," he said.

x.x.xI - STRUCK OFF THE ROLL

IT was with difficulty a handful of the Sin Verguenza cleared a way for Tony's bearers through the clamorous mob below, and an hour had pa.s.sed when Appleby, who had seen his comrade safely bestowed there, came out, grave in face, from the Spanish banker's house. The doctor Maccario sent had, it was evident, no great hope of his patient's recovery, though he insisted that he should be left in quietness.

A messenger from Maccario was waiting when Appleby reached the patio, and it was a relief to find that he had in the meanwhile work to do.

Still, he stood almost a minute blinking about him with eyes that were dazzled by the change from the dimness of the hot room behind the closed lattices where Tony lay. The patio was flooded with glaring sunlight, and a confused din rose from every corner of Santa Marta. The hot walls flung back the tramp of feet and the exultant vivas of the mob, while from the tall church towers the clash of jangling bells rang across the town drowning the occasional crackle of riflery, for it was evident that scattered handfuls of the cazadores were fighting still.

Then the brown-faced man beside him made a little gesture of impatience when there was a crash of firing louder than the rest.

"Those cazadores are obstinate, and Don Maccario waits," he said.

Appleby went with him vacantly, for now the strain had slackened he felt limp and his thoughts were in a whirl. Tony, it seemed, was dying, and the almost brotherly affection Appleby had once cherished for his comrade came back to him. As yet he could only realize the one painful fact with a poignant sense of regret.

Maccario, however, had work waiting him, and the day dragged through, though Appleby never remembered clearly all that happened during it. It was noon when they had cleared the town of the last of the cazadores, and bestowed those who had the wisdom to yield themselves in the cuartel. The rest leapt to destruction from windows and roofs, or went down, grimly clenching their hot rifles, in barricaded patios and on slippery stairways. Appleby was thankful when the work was done, though he had taken no part in it for Maccario, with a wisdom his comrade had not expected, bade him organize a guard, and see that there was no purposeless destruction of property. It was not, he said, a foray the Sin Verguenza had made, but an occupation they had effected, and there was nothing to be gained by pushing the wealthy loyalists to desperation. He also observed dryly that their dollars might fail to reach the insurgent treasury at all if collected independently by the rank and file.

The task was more to Appleby's liking than the one he had antic.i.p.ated, and it was necessary, since the smaller merchants in Cuba and also in parts of Peninsular Spain have no great confidence in bankers, and prefer a packet of golden onzas or a bag of pesetas to the best accredited check. He also contrived to accomplish it with success, somewhat to the astonishment of those whose property he secured to them, when they found he demanded nothing for himself, while he fancied there was reason in his companion's observation as they went back to report to Maccario when there was quietness in the town. Harper sighed as they came out of the last loyalist's house.

"I guess Maccario knew what he was about when he sent you to see this contract through," he said.

"Well," said Appleby, "it was a trifle more pleasant than turning out the cazadores."

Harper grinned somewhat ruefully. "That's not quite what I mean. Any one else with our opportunities would have been rich for life. Now, you didn't seem to notice the diamond brooch the senora took out from her laces when she asked you to keep the rabble out of the house. It would have brought two hundred dollars in New York."

Appleby looked at him with a little dry smile. "I have asked you no questions, but your pockets are suspiciously bulky."

"Cigars," said Harper disgustedly, pulling out a handful.

"Worth a dollar a piece in my country by the smell of them, but I'm not setting up a tobacco store! If I ever get hold of another contract of this kind I'll take somebody else along."