The Hero of Panama Part 14

Sam ignored the huge negro--in fact ignored everyone aboard save Jim--in his anxiety to make a report direct to his master. "Yo see here," he called out, turning slightly so as to be able to look aft, and still clinging half to the launch and half to the fallen tree. "Yo come along and look fo yoself. Tom, yo great big elephant, yo git along to one side. There ain't no sorter room for a person when yo's hereabouts."

There was an air of suppressed excitement about the little fellow which caused Jim to leave his engine and hasten forward.

"Well?" he demanded curiously. "You've found something? What is it?"

"Reckon dem 'ere blackguard run in here full tilt, I do. Dey come whop up agin de tree, and precious nigh upset. Dere's a dent right here big enough to put de hand in. Stop a minute. Sam soon say if dey pa.s.sed."

Without waiting for his master, he slipped into the water, to discover it deep enough almost to submerge him. But Sam was more like a fish than anything. He struck out for the tree, reached it, and clambered down towards that portion which seemed to have sunk deepest. In the gloom they saw him stretching out a hand to the opposite bank. He gripped a branch hanging conveniently overhead, and then swung in the water.

"Dey come right along plump in here," he sang out "Den dey sheer off, and steam in alongside. Jest room enough. See here, Ma.s.sa Jim, plenty s.p.a.ce to swing de legs. Plenty room to float de launch; but I make extry sure. Yo see in one little bit."

They heard him splash down into the stream, while there came to their ears the swish of the branch suddenly relieved of his weight. Then the fitful rays played upon the splashes as the negro breasted the water and swam upstream. Presently the swish of his strokes ceased, and his voice was heard again, some little distance inland.

"Yo kin jest steer to de right ob dat stump, yo can, Ma.s.sa Jim. Plenty water. Reckon dem sc.u.m come along right in here. We hab um. Dere big lagoon way along a little furder."

Thus it proved when the party had forced the boat past the obstruction guarding the river exit. Jim pushed his lever over a very little, and sent his propeller whirling just for so long as would give the launch way against the sluggish stream. As he did so Tom leaned his ponderous figure over the stem, causing it to dip violently, and, gripping the tree, directed the boat into clear water. A few more revolutions sent the launch through, and in time brought her abreast of Sam. They found the little fellow poised on a branch overhanging the water, for all the world as if he were a monkey, and from that position he dropped like a cat on to the deck of the launch.

"What's this about a lagoon?" asked the Major eagerly. "You couldn't see it, surely?"

Sam made no answer for the moment. He took the officer's hand and led him right forward. Then, while Tom clung to a branch to steady the vessel, his smaller comrade bade the Major lie on the deck.

"Not see um if stand up," he explained. "Dem leaves and branches in de way; but Sam see um when he swim. Easy as talkin'. Dere's a young moon to-night, and now that we's right under de trees it's easy 'nough to look out into de open. Dere: ain't dat a lagoon? Gee! Ef I don't tink so!"

It was laughable to watch his eagerness, while Sam's curious language, often enough sprinkled with long and difficult words, of the meaning of which he had not the remotest idea, was sufficient to make anyone not morose by nature die of laughing. But in any case he had made no mistake. As the Major stooped, so getting beneath the line of overhanging trees and branches, he saw as if from a tunnel a widespreading s.p.a.ce filled by water, on the rippling surface of which the moonbeams played. Here and there a patch of rushes reared their heads into the air, while the far distance was hidden behind a cloudy, wet mist which smothered everything.

"And you are sure that those rascals are here?" he asked.

"Sure! Guess so, boss. Dere ain't no room for a mistake. Dem critters comed right in here. I see dere marks on de tree trunk, and den on the bank ob de stream. Dey stepped ash.o.r.e, I tink, just where we are, den go aboard agin. Dey here; Sam sure as eggs."

"Then, if there is no other exit from the lagoon, we have got them!"

came the exultant answer. "We have only to bar the stream, and then set out in search; for, after all, none but a madman would leave the lagoon for the forest. Just hereabouts it is intensely thick, to say nothing of the fever which haunts it. Then, too, savage natives are known to exist, though some of them are friendly. I think, Jim, that we may almost say that we have them. What luck to have pitched upon the very spot they made for!"

"Let us suppose then that they are here, sir," said Jim thoughtfully, as he cut his engine down till it did little more than just turn round.

"What is the next movement? To try and find them in that lagoon would be to set oneself the task of discovering a needle in a haystack. There is no chance, even with a bright moon, unless they happened to steam out into the centre. It seems to me that for to-night at least we have come to the end of our efforts."

"Quite so; I agree. We'll haul in somewhere and tie up. We shall all be glad of food and drink. Now, where is a likely place?"

"Right here, I should say," declared Jim briskly. "In the first place, we're in a sort of tunnel, which, therefore, is not easy to discover.

Then we lie right in the track those men would take if they were making out to sea. In fact, it's a blockade; we've bottled them so long as we occupy this channel."

It was not a matter which admitted of discussion, seeing that the suggestion was so full of common sense. The Major swiftly realized that fact, and promptly agreed to act upon it.

"Couldn't do better," he said. "Now, see here, boys, we've got to take some precautions. In the first place, we want food cooked, and that means lighting a fire; for no cooking can be done aboard this craft. It wouldn't be safe with our tanks filled with gasolene. Suppose we pitch our camp right away in amongst the trees, where a fire couldn't be easily seen; then we'll tie the launch up right across the stream.

She'll reach from bank to bank easily. A man can keep watch aboard her while the rest of the party turn in; how's that, Jim?"

"The very thing, I guess. Say, Major, I'm real hungry; don't mind how soon I sit down to a feed. See here, Ching; jest you and Tom collect those kettles and things, and take off into the trees. Sam, get along with them, and make sure you've chosen a spot where there's plenty of thick stuff about. Supposing we walk along to the edge of the lagoon, Major. By the time we've had a good look round they'll have the boat moored in position and the fire going. There's just a chance that we might have the luck to catch a sight of those two slippery fellows. It's almost as light as day out there, and they might be still moving."

Swinging themselves ash.o.r.e the two made their way along the edge of the stream slowly and carefully. Indeed, a good deal of care and of agility was required, for the bank was lined by a tangled ma.s.s of vegetation which often enough obstructed their path; but as both had encountered the same before, they had brought with them long cutting knives with which to sever the creepers. Underfoot they found the ground firm and even stony in places, while to their right the land seemed to rise abruptly. As to the lagoon, when once they were free of the long, tunnel-like archway of trees leading to the sea, they came into uninterrupted view of the huge expanse of water, for the moon was now well up, and flooded the scene.

"It's so bright that if we were to catch a sight of those rascals we'd be right off after them," said the Major. "But they know their way about. I have had information that this gang, with a few in addition who have left them for one reason or another, have visited many places along this coast. It seems that they came from the States; but they know this coast, and knowing it they will have met with lagoons and forests before. They will be just as careful to keep out of our view when there is light enough to see, as we are careful to hide up our fire at night; but I fancy we shall have them. Quick pursuit is one of the things they have not been accustomed to."

They stared out across the lagoon for some little while, noticing the tufts of reeds which cropped up here and there, and the white mist in the far distance. Then they turned their faces towards the spot they had left, and felt their way back towards the camp.

"We'll take a couple of grains of quinine apiece to-night," said the Major, halting for a breathing spell by the way. "No white man who comes out to a tropical country can afford to neglect that precaution. Even in the ca.n.a.l zone, where we have reduced the occurrence of malarial fever to an extraordinary figure, we still insist that all employees should take quinine regularly. And out away here it's far more necessary. That mist we've been watching spells malaria, fever that sticks to a man's bones till he's old, even though he gets safe home, and lives in comfort and warmth. Besides, listen to the hum of the mosquitoes; any fool could tell that these parts weren't healthy for a white man."

Jim agreed with him abruptly. He was thinking of his brother, and wishing at that moment that he had been a little more careful to take precautions; but George had been one of those l.u.s.ty, healthy fellows, never sick or sorry, who had laughed at fever and scoffed at precautions. And see what it had brought him to.

"My brother might have been alive now if only he had taken his quinine,"

said Jim. "You heard about him, Major?"

"I did. As one of the police at Colon his loss was reported to me as a matter of course. It was bad luck, lad; where did he go ash.o.r.e?"

"Miles away along this coast. I hunted high and low, as far as a man can hunt a jungle. Reckon he died in the undergrowth."

"Or fell into a swamp, lad. He died, that's sure enough; but come along.

There's the fire, and a good meal waiting for us. Gee! we've been getting along; this is better progress than I had dared to hope for."

Skilfully the Major drew Jim's attention from the tragedy which had fallen upon his young life, and very soon had him seated beside a roaring fire, and dipping his spoon into a steaming cauldron of stew which the wily Chinee had provided. In fact, it was a stew which had been prepared ash.o.r.e in the Major's house, and merely required heating.

"Plenty ob dat fo all, I guess," observed Tom, as he served out helpings all round, smacking his big lips as the savoury odour filled his nostrils. "By gum, but dis night air make a fellow hungry. Yo Sam, yo sit right along down dar, and I help yo. Not trust a little n.i.g.g.e.r same as yo to help hisself: eat too much. Little man, but plenty big tomach."

He held the huge cauldron in one hand, and with the fingers of the other pressed his small companion to the ground as if he were as weak as a baby. Then, despite his own words, he gave him a liberal helping, and, having done the same for Ching, sat himself down beside the cauldron.

"So as to see dat dat feller Sam don't play one ob him tricks," he laughed. "By de poker, 'spose him try, den shob him into the pot and cook um."

In the firelight his round, rolling eyes gleamed white. Tom looked a very terrible person for the moment. But he could never preserve an appearance of ferocity for long; his usual smile was soon wreathing his face, particularly when he had taken the first mouthful of stew.

"By lummy, but dat extry good!" he observed. "Hab more, yo fellows?"

In turn he offered it to them all, then helped himself again liberally.

In fact, it was not until the last spoonful of gravy had been finished that the party turned to their pipes. Nor was there much difference to be found between the variety of tobacco loved by the British tar or soldier and that favoured in particular by these American policemen. Jim watched them as they cut the cake with their knives and rammed the broken weed into the bowls; then columns of smoke rose amid the branches, while the scent of navy s.h.a.g made the air redolent.

"And now for the orders," said the Major, when the men had had time for a long smoke. "Sam has been keeping an eye on the water all this time.

We must relieve him, though he has hardly been doing duty in the ordinary sense of watchman. Let me see. There are three of my own men, three of yours, making six, and our two selves, eight altogether; suppose we watch in couples. You with one of my men for two hours, then Tom and a second policeman, Sam afterwards with the third, and I last of all with our friend Ching. How's that? Two hours each, four watches altogether, and a good sleep for all of us. It is now eight o'clock, the last spell takes us up to four o'clock in the morning; it'll be light by then. Since Ching will be on duty from two o'clock he can employ himself with our breakfast. By half-past four we shall be able to get the engine going and be under weigh. Now, Jim, get to your duty. One aboard the launch, and the second patrolling as far as the lagoon. Pipes not to be lit unless well amongst the trees. No one to call loudly to another unless there be need. Boys, you've blankets here; turn in."

Ashes were knocked out of pipe stems, and the men at once rolled themselves in their blankets. Then Jim and the comrade who was to watch with him shouldered their rifles, and with pouches filled with ammunition, attached to the belts round their waists, marched towards the stream.

"You get aboard," said Jim. "I'll make along to the lagoon. When an hour has pa.s.sed I'll come and take your place."

He wended his way through the jungle, and presently was on the bank of the lagoon, admiring its broad expanse of rippling water, which looked so solemn and so beautiful beneath the silvery rays of the moon. Indeed, it was an enchanting scene, and had our hero been of a romantic turn of mind he might well have been excused for giving free rein to his fancy.

But Jim was a hard, practical-minded fellow, with the world before him, and his way to make in it. It is not then to be wondered at that his mind strayed from the scene before him to the ca.n.a.l zone, to the gigantic undertaking America had determined on, to the host of workmen labouring there, and to the many problems which confronted them, problems undreamed of by Jim till yesterday, undreamed of now by thousands of Americans, yet problems, for all that, demanding the anxious thought and effort of the Commission staff, in whose able and painstaking hands lay the enormous enterprise. In his mind's eye Jim saw that hundred-ton steam digger again. He fancied himself in the driver's seat, with Harry watching every movement critically, and coaching his young pupil. His hands seemed to fall quite naturally on the levers, and then the hiss of steam came to his ears, just as it had done when he worked the enormous engine.

"Was it all imagination?" To tell the truth he was getting not a little drowsy, but that peculiar hiss was so realistic that----"Gee!" he recovered from his brown study suddenly, and opened his eyes very wide.

For there was reality in that hissing steam. He could actually hear it, not over loud, but without doubt steam or gas escaping from some narrow orifice. Moreover the sound came from the lagoon; yes, from the lagoon straight before him. A moment later a long, black shape stole into view from behind a ma.s.s of reed some few yards away, then lay still on the water. Silhouetted against the rippling surface he could make out the dusky outlines of a launch, her funnel amidships, the hood of the cab which sheltered pa.s.sengers when a sea was running, and the little mast on which her flag drooped. And there were figures--two of them. They stood sharply displayed against the light, perched on the deck of the launch, surveying their surroundings.

"Those villains; then they are here without a doubt. Gee, if they try to make out through the opening!"

Jim crouched a trifle lower under the trees beneath which he had taken his station, and watched the launch and her pa.s.sengers. And steadily, as he watched, the boat drew nearer and nearer.