Two Gallant Sons of Devon Part 4

Swayed thus between hope and fear, the hara.s.sed young lieutenant once more, and for the last time, mounted the hill and resumed his anxious watch of the town and harbour. But no indication of any happening of an unusual character, either in the town or in the harbour, was perceptible; everything seemed to be going forward precisely as usual; the only occurrence that in the slightest degree interested the watcher being that the crew of the galleon resumed their occupation of bending sails, which operation, proceeding with the same deliberation as before, they contrived to complete about half an hour before sunset; when d.i.c.k, unutterably weary and discouraged with his long and fruitless watch, arose and made his way down the hill to the place where the longboat lay hidden.

CHAPTER FIVE.

HOW THEY DISARMED THE BATTERIES ON TIERRA BOMBA.

As Chichester neared the now familiar spot where he had left the longboat, he suffered himself to indulge in a returning feeling of elation, for the notion somehow came to him that he would find Marshall in the boat calmly awaiting his return; and this feeling presently grew so strong within him that he could scarcely credit his eyes when, upon pa.s.sing through the screen of concealing foliage, he saw only the three seamen curled up in the boat. They roused themselves from their semi-somnolent condition and sat up to receive him, with glances of mute enquiry in their eyes.

For a few moments d.i.c.k remained silent, absolutely speechless with disappointment. Then he remarked:

"What, lads, has the Captain not yet returned, then?"

"No, sir," they answered in chorus. "We have seen naught of him, or indeed of anybody else, since you left us this morning."

"Then," said d.i.c.k, "I greatly fear that evil has befallen him and that he has been discovered and taken by the Spaniards. For this is the last day of our stay here; and his orders to me were that if he returns not by midnight we are to proceed to sea and rejoin the ship; for his failure to return will be due to the fact of his having been captured.

Still, there are six hours to run yet before midnight, and he may return even at the very last moment. Let us hope that he will. And now, men, give me some supper, for I have eaten nothing since I left you this morning."

The time between then and midnight was pa.s.sed by d.i.c.k in a state of feverish suspense, that toward the end became almost unendurable, causing him to start and jump at every trivial sound that reached his ear. A dozen times at least he sprang to his feet with the joyous exclamation of "Here he is!" when the flutter of a dry leaf falling from its parent bough, the soft rustle of foliage in the night wind, or the movement of some restless bird broke the silence of that secluded spot; but he was always mistaken. The Captain came not; and at length his watch informed him that the time was half an hour after midnight. Then he rose to his feet with a sigh of bitter disappointment and said:

"It is no good, lads; we must not delay our departure any longer; we have allowed the Captain half an hour's grace, and if he could have come he would have been with us before now. Without doubt he is a prisoner, and we can best serve him now by returning to the ship with all speed and reporting the fact of his capture to the others, who must then decide whether or not we shall sail into the harbour, attack the town, and endeavour to rescue him. Cast off the painter, and let us be moving without further delay."

Almost careless now whether or not they attracted attention, they hauled the boat out from her place of concealment and, stepping the masts, hoisted their sails and got under way, the wind just permitting them to lay their course down past the sand spit and out through the entrance of the cove into the lower bay without breaking tacks. Then, to save time, d.i.c.k determined to risk the pa.s.sage of the Boca Chica, the usual harbour entrance, instead of taking the longer route out to sea behind the island of Baru, relying upon the indifferent lookout of the sentinels as reported by Marshall to enable the boat to pa.s.s undetected. In this they were completely successful, the occupants of the batteries giving no sign that the pa.s.sage of the boat had been observed; and half an hour after emerging from their place of concealment they found themselves safely clear of everything and out at sea.

The night was dark but clear, with a fresh land breeze blowing, and a sky heavily flecked with fast-scurrying clouds, between which the stars and moon blinked down upon them intermittently. They were no sooner clear of the land than they began to look about them for the ship, and within a few minutes they caught sight of her signal lanterns about eight miles distant, dead to leeward. After that everything went quite smoothly; they hoisted their own signal lamp, and bore away dead before the wind, leaving it to the ship to pick them up, which she did about an hour later.

Their shipmates manifested the utmost interest in their return, all hands mustering on deck to see the boat come alongside and hear the news. When, upon the boat being brought to the lee gangway, d.i.c.k led the way up the side, he was met at the entrance port by Bas...o...b.. Winter, Dyer, and Harvey, each of whom at the same instant fired at him the question:

"Where is the Captain?"

"Lost--taken, I fear," answered d.i.c.k. "He left us four nights ago, intending to make his way into the city of Cartagena, for the purpose of learning precisely when the galleon is to sail, together with any other information which he might be able to pick up. His instructions were that I was to await his return until midnight to-night, and if he then failed to return it would be because something untoward had happened to him, in which case I was to rejoin the ship at once and report to you, when you would act according to your discretion after consulting together."

For a moment there was a dead silence; then Bas...o...b..turned to his fellow officers, and said:

"My masters, this loss of our general is a very serious matter, and needs looking into. Let us all, therefore, retire to the cabin and hear what Mr Chichester has to tell us about it; after which, as was arranged when Captain Marshall left us six nights ago, we must all consult together and decide what our next step is to be. Come then, gentlemen, to the cabin. Mr Chichester, you will be pleased to accompany us."

Therewith the three princ.i.p.al officers of the ship and the two gentlemen adventurers retired to the great cabin, where, seated upon the lockers, and with d.i.c.k occupying a chair in front of them, the tale was told of all that had befallen the boat and its crew, from the moment of her departure to that of her return, including the several expeditions to the top of the hill on Tierra Bomba, and the drawing of the chart.

"And where is that chart now?" demanded Bas...o...b.. "Have you it, or did Captain Marshall take it with him?"

"I have it," answered d.i.c.k, "and here it is," producing the sketch.

"Fortunately the Captain left it with me, not needing it himself, since all the information required to enable him to make his way to Cartagena he could carry in his head."

The four who were sitting on the opposite side of the table bent over the doc.u.ment, examining it closely for several minutes. At length Bas...o...b..looked up and said:

"My masters, if this chart be reliable--and it should be, judging from the pains taken by our Captain and Mr Chichester--it should suffice to enable us to take the ship right up to Cartagena and lay her alongside the galleon. And if that ship can be taken by surprise and without loss on our part, as I think she may, what is to hinder us from taking the town and demanding a good heavy ransom for it, part of which ransom shall consist in the return to us, sound and unhurt, of our Captain?

And if they refuse, or are unable to return our Captain to us in the condition specified, what say you to sacking the place and giving it to the flames? Depend upon it, by so doing we shall soon learn the fate of Captain Marshall, and where he is to be found, for there will be a hundred who will be only too ready to curry favour with us by telling us all that they know, in the hope that thereby we may be induced to spare their property."

"Ay, that will they, I warrant," answered Winter. "And woe betide the city and all in it if aught of evil has been done to our Captain! We will find every man who has been in anywise responsible for that evil, and will hang him before his own door for all men to see how dangerous a thing it is for a Spaniard to lay violent hands upon an Englishman!

Now, what say ye, gentles, shall we go in at once and do the work while our blood is hot within us?"

"Nay, sirs," answered d.i.c.k; "that may scarcely be. For if our Captain be indeed taken, as I greatly fear me he is, depend upon it the authorities will have identified him as an Englishman, in despite of any tale that he may have told them, and will, in consequence, suspect the presence of an English ship somewhere in the neighbourhood. And, following that suspicion, their first act would be to warn those in the forts on Tierra Bomba to be on the watch for that ship's appearance.

And once seen it will, according to the Captain's own account, be impossible for us to force our way into the harbour unless the guns in those forts be first spiked. Now, gentles, I am the youngest of you all, but I have been inside and seen the place. Moreover, I have been privileged to discuss with the Captain this very question of taking the ship up to the town, from which discussion arose my determination to make that chart; and my advice is, that we defer our attempt until to-morrow night, and that in the meantime I be permitted to return in the longboat to our former hiding-place, provided with hammers and nails for the spiking of the guns and such other necessaries as I may require, together with a crew of six of our best men. We can get back to our place of concealment before daylight, and there remain in hiding until midnight or later, when we will sally forth, steal into those two forts, overpower and gag the sentinels, and spike the guns, after which we will signal the ship by the burning of portfires where they cannot be seen from the town, when you will sail in, I meeting you outside and piloting you in. We can then land a party, destroy both batteries by blowing them up, capture the galleon and the town, and sail out to sea again, unscathed, when we have finished our business with the Spaniards."

"Thy plan sounds promising, young sir," answered Bas...o...b..presently, after considering the matter a little; "but there is one weak point in it, which is this. If, as you seem to think, the Spaniards have taken our Captain, and thereby are led to suspect the presence of an English ship in the neighbourhood; and, suspecting such presence, should warn the garrisons of those two forts to be on the lookout for her--all of which I grant to be more than likely--what hope have you of being able to surprise those forts and spike their guns?"

"The task will be a difficult one, I admit," answered d.i.c.k, with a shrug of the shoulders; "but, with all submission, sirs, my plan is the only one offering a chance of success. For--and this is the fundamental fact governing all else--the guns must be spiked and the forts destroyed before this ship can enter Cartagena harbour or, having entered, get out again. But the forts once in our possession the whole town and harbour, with all within them, will be at our mercy. The important matter, therefore, to be determined is: By what means can we ensure obtaining possession of the forts with the minimum of loss to ourselves?"

"Yes," agreed Bas...o...b.. "that is undoubtedly the point. Now, gentles, let us have your opinions. Has any one of you a better plan to offer than that of our junior lieutenant?"

At this moment a stateroom door opened and Stukely emerged from the smaller room. Approaching the table, he stood and looked smilingly down upon the company a.s.sembled.

"Your pardon, fair sirs," he said, "for thrusting myself uninvited into your counsels. The surgeon is supposed to know but little of warfare beyond the healing of such hurts as may be received therein, but I happened to be lying awake in my cabin when this conference began, and I could not avoid hearing all that has pa.s.sed, and I am of opinion that I can help you. As my friend, Chichester, here has put it, the problem which confronts you is that of securing possession of the forts without suffering loss of men. Now, the chief danger, to my mind, arises from the difficulty of entering the forts without attracting the attention of the sentinels, thus causing them to raise the alarm and bring the entire garrison about our ears. Is not that so?"

The party at the table signified that it was.

"Very good, then," resumed Stukely. "Now we can go on. Though you are probably not aware of it, my chief delight is research, the investigation of, among other things, the properties and action upon the human system of the juices of herbs. Now, while we were at Barbados I spent much time in the collection of the leaves, roots, seeds, and fruits of several plants; and since then I have been diligently experimenting with them, with the result that I have evolved from one of them a liquor, one inhalation of the odour of which will plunge a man into a state of such complete insensibility that, as I believe, a limb might be removed from him without his feeling it or being any the wiser.

My suggestion, therefore," continued Stukely, ignoring the expressions of wonder evoked by his statement, "is that I be permitted to go in the boat with Chichester, taking a vial of the liquor with me, and upon our arrival ash.o.r.e I will enter the forts with him, subject the sleeping sentinels--I humbly trust that they may be sleeping--to the stupefying influence of the decoction, whereby they may be bound and gagged without difficulty or the raising of an alarm which would put their fellow soldiers on the alert; and then between us the guns can be spiked at our leisure. The remaining details I leave to your riper judgment and experience, gallant sirs."

"But, doctor," demanded Bas...o...b.. "are you quite sure that this elixir or essence of yours may be depended upon to produce the effect stated?"

"I am," answered Stukely, with a smile, "for I have already tested it upon myself--no matter how--and the effect is everything that can possibly be desired."

"Then--what say you, gentles--shall we allow the surgeon to go with Mr Chichester and further test the efficacy of his decoction upon the Spanish sentinels?" asked the master.

"'Twould be folly in us if we did not avail ourselves of the virtues of Mr Stukely's most fortunate discovery," said Winter; "and I for one am in favour of acceding to his proposal."

"And I, also," agreed d.i.c.k, in response to a glance from Bas...o...b..

The two gentlemen adventurers, when appealed to for their opinion, at once agreed that the experiment was quite worth trying; and Bas...o...b..s proposal was accordingly agreed to _nem. con_.

"That matter, then, is disposed of," remarked Bas...o...b.. "Now, the next thing which we have to decide is this--a.s.suming that Mr Chichester succeeds in spiking the guns of the forts--what is to be our next step?

Are we to take the ship boldly into the harbour and proceed with our business of capturing the galleon and the town, trusting that Dame Fortune will so far favour us as to permit of our getting out again before the soldiers can unspike their guns; or should we anchor, as soon as inside, land a strong party, and capture and destroy the forts before attempting anything else? It is the guns, and they only, not the forts, which we have to fear; and if we could but permanently disable those guns, the forts and their garrisons might go hang, so far as we are concerned."

"Certainly, sir," cut in d.i.c.k, before anyone else could speak. "You have hit the nail on the head. We need trouble about naught except the ordnance, and them we must destroy. And I know how to do it, too. We will take with us enough powder to double charge each gun; having done which we will seal their muzzles with clay. I know where to find as much clay as we shall need; and then we will prime each piece, lay a quick match from priming to priming, light the match, and run for our lives. The guns will burst, and we can then do what we please with the galleon and the town. But in order to ensure complete success, the ordnance in both batteries must be fired as nearly as possible at the same moment; therefore a resolute man must be left in the lower battery to fire the match upon the instant that he hears the explosion of the guns in the upper battery, after which he must run for his life. I can see exactly how the thing is to be done, sirs; and if you approve of my plan we will be starting at once, with your good leave; for it is already late, and we shall have none too much time for the work which is to be done."

"You are right, young sir," agreed Bas...o...b.. "time is so valuable now that we dare waste no more in further discussion; therefore your plan, which is an excellent one, must serve. I would that I could go in your stead, for you appear to be already worn-out with fatigue and lack of sleep; but you have been over the ground already, and know it, therefore weary though you may be I fear that you must needs go. So pick your men, sir, as many as you need, remembering that your party must be strong enough to carry the powder up to the forts; procure from the gunner all that you require; and get you gone. And may G.o.d go with you!

Amen."

Half an hour later the longboat, under d.i.c.k's command, and with Stukely sitting in the stern-sheets beside him, was once more under way and beating in toward the land under a press of sail, while the _Adventure_, with all lights out, lay to in the offing, awaiting the signal of the explosion of the ordnance in the forts to fill away and stand boldly in toward the harbour. So sorely were they pressed for time that d.i.c.k dared not waste any in the attempt to elude observation by creeping in, as on the first occasion, behind the island of Baru; he headed as straight as the wind would allow for the Boca Chica, trusting that he might be fortunate enough to slip through un.o.bserved in the darkness, especially as it was now past three o'clock in the morning--and if the sentinels slept at all at their posts, after the warning to hold themselves on the alert which they might be supposed to have received from the authorities, they might be expected to be asleep now. His hope appeared to be justified; for the longboat slid past the smaller battery down on the beach, unchallenged, and some five minutes later, grounded on the sand about a quarter of a mile farther in. Then, silently as ghosts, the men lowered the sails, leaving the masts standing, and stepped out on the sand, each bearing his appointed load of powder upon his shoulder, while d.i.c.k and Stukely, with swords drawn, and the former carrying a coil of quick match wound round his waist, led the way.

They directed their steps southward toward the battery which they had sailed past a few minutes earlier, and which could just be distinguished as a darker blur against the blackness of the night. Not a light of any description showed about the building, nor was there a sound to be heard save the soft lap and splash of the water on the margin of the beach to the left of them, and the sough of the land breeze among the trees and bushes on their right. Noiseless as drifting shadows, the party sped forward, and within some five minutes of their landing arrived beneath the walls of the fort. Here d.i.c.k, Stukely, and a man named Barker removed their shoes and, walking to the northward angle of the fort, examined it to ascertain what means of ascent it afforded. They found, as Marshall had said, that although the walls were so smooth as to be quite unclimbable, the angles of the building were set with quoin stones of so rough a surface that an ascent by means of them might be made easily; accordingly Stukely, who by virtue of his discovery of the anaesthetic now claimed to take the lead, at once began to climb the angle, closely followed by d.i.c.k and Barker. In less than two minutes the trio had accomplished the ascent and found themselves standing on the platform which const.i.tuted the flat roof of the battery. The eight pieces of heavy ordnance, their muzzles projecting far over the low parapet, were easily distinguishable, as were also the great piles of shot, notwithstanding the darkness of the night; but for the moment no sentinels were visible. Whispering his companions to remain where they were, Stukely moved away with noiseless tread, swiftly making the circuit of the gun platform; and presently he rejoined the other two.

"It is all right," he whispered. "I found the rascals sound asleep, even as the Captain did, and, withdrawing the stopper from my vial, allowed them to inhale the vapour for a moment. They are now insensible, and will remain so for at least half an hour, therefore you may now do your share of the work, Barker. Come with me, and I will show you where they lie."

The two moved away together, Barker uncoiling a long length of fine line from his waist as he did so; while d.i.c.k, leaning over the parapet, dropped a small pebble down among the group below, as a signal that all was well and they might now safely make the ascent without fear of detection. All arrangements having been previously made, every man of the party knew exactly what he had to do; and within five minutes the platform was alive with English seamen, some of whom were engaged in hauling up powder and clay from below, while others were employed in silently loading the guns with heavy charges of powder, upon the top of which they tightly rammed down stiff clay, with which they filled each gun to its very muzzle. Then, when each piece had been similarly treated, the whole were very carefully primed, after which a length of quick match, long enough to allow of the safe retreat of the man who should ignite it, was securely inserted among the priming; the two insensible sentinels, bound hand and foot, and effectually gagged, were lowered to the ground, and the entire party retreated as they had come, with the exception of one man who volunteered to remain and ignite the length of match immediately that he saw a portfire burned from the wall of the castle which stood on the top of the adjacent hill. The whole business had occupied scarcely twenty minutes, and when it was finished there was nothing to show that the garrison had become aware of what was happening above their heads.

Once more a.s.sembled on the ground beneath the walls of the battery, the party was rapidly counted by d.i.c.k, to ascertain that all were present, save the man left above on the gun platform; and this formality having been quickly gone through, the unconscious sentinels were picked up and carried away to a distance of about a hundred yards from the battery, where they were effectually concealed in a thick clump of bushes, after which the Englishmen rapidly pushed forward up the hill. Arrived near the top, d.i.c.k halted them for a moment near a clump of bamboo, two long stout stalks of which were quickly cut down, and, without waiting to strip them of their leaves, converted into a light ladder by lashing cross-pieces of bamboo to them. Then, with this improvised ladder carried by two men, the party resumed its way, arriving about a quarter of an hour later beneath the frowning walls of the castle, which, like the battery below, was found to be in total darkness, at least so far as the face fronting them was concerned. They crossed the dry ditch without difficulty, and once on the other side, reared their ladder against the wall, finding it amply long enough for their purpose.