The Flag of Distress Part 35

"No. They're true as good. Not a bit of exaggeration, I a.s.sure you.

The gold only wants to be got at, and then taken."

"Ah! there may be difficulty about that?" rejoins the doubting Diaz.

"Do you expect to finger sixty thousand _pesos_ without taking the trouble to stretch out your hand?"

"Oh, no. I'm not so unreasonable. For that I'd be willing to stretch out both hands, with a knife in one, and a pistol in the other."

"Well, it's not likely to need either, if skilfully managed. I ask you again, are you the men to go in for it?"

"I'm one," answers Diaz.

"And I another," growls Rocas.

"I'm not going to say nay," a.s.sents Calderon, glancing significantly at the questioner.

"Enough!" exclaims De Lara; "so far you all consent to the partnership.

But before entering fully into it, it will be necessary to have a more thorough understanding, as also a more formal one. Are you willing to be bound, that there shall be truth between us?"

"We are!" is the simultaneous response of all three.

"And fidelity to the death!"

"To the death."

"_Bueno_! But we must take an oath to that effect. After which, you shall know what it's for. Enough now to say it's a thing that needs swearing upon. If there's to be treason, there shall be perjury also.

Are you ready to take the oath?"

They signify a.s.sent unanimously.

"To your feet, then!" commands the chief conspirator. "It will be more seemly to take it standing."

All four spring up from their chairs, and stand facing the table.

De Lara draws a dagger and lays it down before him. The others have their stilettos too--a weapon carried by most Spanish Californians.

Each exhibits his own, laying it beside that already on the table.

With the four De Lara forms a cross--Maltese fashion, and then standing erect, Diaz opposite, Rocas and Calderon on either flank--he repeats in firm, solemn voice, the others after him:

"_In the deed we this day agree to do, acting together and jointly, we swear to be true to each other--to stand by one another, if need be, to the death; to keep what we do a secret from all the world; and if any one betray it, the other three swear to follow him wherever he may flee, seek him wherever he may shelter himself, and take vengeance upon him, by taking his life. If any of us fail in this oath, may we be accursed ever after. Amen_!"

CHAPTER FORTY THREE.

THE "BONANZA."

The infamous ceremony duly ratified, a drink of the fiery spirit of the _mescal_ plant--a fit finale--is quaffed. Then they take up their stilettos, replace them in their sheaths, and again sitting down, listen to De Lara, to learn from him the nature of that deed, for doing which they have so solemnly compacted.

In a short time he makes it known, the disclosure calling for but a few words. It is after all but a common affair, though one that needs skill and courage. Simply a "bit of burglary," but a big thing of its kind.

He tells them of three hundred thousand dollars' worth of gold-dust lying in a lone country-house, with no other protection than that of its owner, with some half-dozen Indian domestics.

There are but two of them to whom this is news--Diaz and Calderon.

Rocas smiles while the revelation is being made; for he has been the original discoverer of the so-called "bonanza." It was that he communicated to De Lara, when, on the day before, he stopped him and Calderon at the _tinacal_ of Dolores.

It is not the first time for the seal-hunter to do business of a similar kind in conjunction with the gambler; who, like himself, has been accustomed to vary his professional pursuits. But, as now, he has always acted under De Lara--whose clear, cool head and daring hand a.s.sure him leadership in any scheme requiring superior courage, with intelligence for its execution.

"How soon?" asks Diaz, after all has been declared. "I should say the sooner the better."

"You're right about that, Don Manuel," rejoins Rocas.

"True," a.s.sents De Lara. "At the same time caution must not be lost sight of. There's two of you aware of what danger we'd be in, if just now we went near the town, or anywhere outside this snug little asylum of Senor Rocas--whose hospitality we may have to trench upon for some time. I don't know, Don Rafael, whether friend Diaz has told you of what happened last night?"

"He's given me a hint of it," replies the smuggler.

"Oh, yes," puts in Diaz; "I thought he might as well know."

"Of course," agrees De Lara. "In that case, then, I've only to add, that there will be no safety for us in San Francisco, so long as the English man-o'-war stays in port. He who broke our bank is rich enough to buy law, and can set its hounds after us by night, or by day. Until he and his ship are gone--"

"The ship _is_ gone," says Rocas, interrupting.

"Ha! What makes you say that?"

"Because I know it."

"How?"

"Simply by having seen her. Nothing like the eyes to give one a.s.surance about anything--with a bit of gla.s.s to a.s.sist them. Through that thing up there,"--he points to an old telescope resting on hooks against the wall--"I saw the English frigate beating out by the Farrallones, when I was up on the cliff about an hour ago. I knew her from having seen her lying in the bay. She's gone to sea for sure."

At this the others looked surprised as well as pleased; more especially Calderon. He need no longer fear encountering the much-dreaded midshipman either in a duel or with his dirk.

"It's very strange," says De Lara. "I'd heard she was to sail soon, but not till another ship came to relieve her."

"That ship has come," returns Rocas--"a corvette. I saw her working up the coast last evening just before sunset. She was making for the Gate, and must be inside now."

"If all this be true," says the chief conspirator, "we need lose no more time, but put on our masks and bring the affair off at once. It's too late for doing anything to-night; but there's no reason why we shouldn't act to-morrow night, if it prove a dark one. We four of us will be strength enough for such a trifling affair. I thought of bringing Juan Lopez, our croupier; but I saw he wouldn't be needed. Besides, from the way he's been behaving lately I've lost confidence in him. Another reason for leaving him out will be understood by all of you. In a matter of this kind it _isn't_ the more the merrier, though it _is_ the fewer the better cheer. The yellow dust will go farther among four than five."

"It will," exclaims the c.o.c.kfighter with emphasis, showing his satisfaction at what De Lara has done. He adds: "To-morrow night, then, we are to act?"

"Yes, if it be a dark one. If not, 'twill be wiser to let things lie over for the next. A day can't make much difference; while the colour of the night may. A moonlit sky, or a clear starry one, might get us all where we'd see stars without any being visible--through a noose round our neck?"

"There'll be no moon to-morrow night," puts in the smuggler, who, in this branch of his varied vocations, has been accustomed to take account of such things. "At least," he adds, "none that will do us any harm.

The fog's sure to be on before midnight; at this time of year, it always is. To-morrow night will be like the last--black as a pot of pitch."

"True," says De Lara, as a man with some experience of the sea, also having meteorological knowledge. "No doubt, 'twill be as you say, Rocas. In that case we'll have nothing to fear. We can get the job done, and be back here before morning. Ah, then seated round the table, we'll not be like we are now--poor as rats; but every one with his pile before him--sixty thousand _pesos_."

"_Carramba_!" exclaims Diaz, in a mocking tone, "while saying vespers to-night, let's put in a special prayer for to-morrow night to be what Rocas says it will--black as a pot of pitch."