Chapter Thirty Four.
In Dangerous Proximity.
The spot upon which the ex-man-o’-war’s man has stretched himself is soft as a feather-bed. Still he does not fall asleep. The rain, filtering through the sand, soon finds its way under the boat; and, saturating his couch, makes it uncomfortable. This, with the cold night-air, keeps him awake.
He lies listening to the sough of the sea, and the big drops pattering upon the planks above.
Not long before other sounds salute his ear, distinguishable as human voices—men engaged in conversation.
As he continues to listen, the voices grow louder, those who converse evidently drawing nearer.
In a few seconds they are by the boat’s side, where they come to a stand. But though they have paused in their steps, they continue to talk in excited, earnest tones. And so loud, that he can hear every word they say; though the speakers are invisible to him. The capsized boat is not so flush with the sand as to prevent him from seeing the lower part of their legs, from the knees downward. Of these there are four pairs, two of them in trousers of the ordinary kind; the other two in calzoneras of velveteen, bordered at the bottoms with black stamped leather. But, that all four men are Californians, or Spaniards, he can tell by the language in which they are conversing—Spanish. A lucky chance that he understands something of this—if not for himself, for the friends who are dear to him.
The first intelligible speech that reaches his ear is an interrogatory:
“You’re sure, Calderon, they’ll come this way?”
“Quite sure, De Lara. When I stood by them at the hotel-bar, I heard the younger of the two tell one of the American officers that their boat was to meet them at the wooden muello—the new pier, as you know. To reach that they must pass by here; there’s no other way. And it can’t be long before they make appearance. They were leaving the hotel at the time we did, and where else should they go?”
“Not knowing,”—this from the voice of a third individual. “They may stay to take another copita, or half-a-dozen. These Inglese can drink like fish, and don’t seem to feel it.”
“The more they drink the better for us,” remarks a fourth. “Our work will be the easier.”
“It may not be so easy, Don Manuel,” puts in De Lara. “Young as they are, they’re very devils both. Besides, they’re well armed, and will battle like grizzly bears. I tell you, camarados, we’ll have work to do before we get back our money.”
“But do you intend killing them, De Lara?” asks he who has been called Calderon.
“Of course. We must, for our own sakes. ’Twould be madness not, even if we could get the money without it. The older, Crozier, is enormously rich, I’ve heard; could afford to buy up all the law there is in San Francisco. If we let them escape, he’d have the police after us like hounds upon a trail. Even if they shouldn’t recognise us now, they’d be sure to suspect who it was, and make the place too hot to hold us. Caspita! It’s not a question of choice, but a thing of necessity. We must kill them!”
Harry Blew hears the cold-blooded determination, comprehending it in all its terrible significance. It tells him the young officers are still in the town, and that these four men are about to waylay, rob, and murder them. What they mean by “getting back their money” is the only thing he does not comprehend. It is made clear as the conversation continues:
“I’m sure there’s nothing unfair in taking back our own. I, Frank Lara, say so. It was they who brought about the breaking of our bank, which was done in a mean, dastardly way. The Englishman had the luck, and all the others of his kind went with him. But for that we could have held out. It’s no use our whining about it. We’ve lost, and must make good our losses best way we can. We can’t, and be safe ourselves, if we let these gringos go.”
“Chingara! we’ll stop their breath, and let there be no more words about it.”
The merciless verdict is in the voice of Don Manuel.
“You’re all agreed, then?” asks De Lara.
“Si, si, si!” is the simultaneous answer of assent, Calderon alone seeming to give it with reluctance; though he hesitates from timidity, not mercy.
Harry Blew now knows all. The officers have been gaming, have won money, and the four fellows who talk so coolly of killing them are the chief gambler and his confederates.
What is he to do? How can he save the doomed men. Both are armed; Crozier has his sword, Cadwallader his dirk. Besides, the midshipman has a pistol, as he saw while they were talking to him at the Sailor’s Home. But then they are to be taken unawares—shot, or struck down, in the dark, without a chance of seeing the hand that strikes them! Even if warned and ready, it would be two against four. And he is himself altogether unarmed; for his jack-knife is gone—hypothecated to pay for his last jorum of grog! And the young officers have been drinking freely, as he gathers from what the ruffians say. They may be inebriated, or enough so to put them off their guard. Who would be expecting assassination? Who ever is, save a Mexican himself? Altogether unlikely that they should be thinking of such a thing. On the contrary, disregarding danger, they will come carelessly on, to fall like ripe corn before the sickle of the reaper.
The thought of such a fate for his friends fills the sailor with keenest apprehension; and again he asks himself how it is to be averted.
The four conspirators are not more than as many feet from the boat. By stretching out his hands he could grip them by the ankles, without altering his recumbent attitude one inch. And by doing this, he might give the guilty plotters such a scare as would cause them to retreat, and so baffle their design.
The thought comes before his mind, but is instantly abandoned. The fellows are not of the stuff to be frightened at shadows. By their talk, at least two are desperadoes, and to make known his presence would be only to add another victim to those already doomed to death.
But what is he to do? For the third time he asks himself this question, still unable to answer it.
While still painfully cogitating, his brain labouring to grasp some feasible plan of defence against the threatened danger, he is warned of a change. Some words spoken tell of it. It is De Lara who speaks them.
“By the way, camarados, we’re not in a good position here. They may sight us too soon. To make things sure, we must drop on them before they can draw their weapons. Else some of us may get dropped ourselves.”
“Where could we be better? I don’t see. The shadow of this old boat favours us.”
“Why not crawl under it?” asks Calderon. “There Argus himself couldn’t see us.”
Harry Blew’s heart beats at the double-quick. His time seems come, and he already fancies four pistols to his head, or the same number of poniards pointed at his ribs.
It is a moment of vivid anxiety—a crisis dread, terrible, almost agonising.
Fortunately it is not of long duration, ending almost on the instant. He is relieved at hearing one of them say:
“No; that won’t do. We’d have trouble in scrambling out again. While about it they’d see or hear us, and take to their heels. You must remember, it’s but a step to where their boat will be waiting them, with some eight or ten of those big British tars in it. If they got there before we overtook them, the tables would be turned on us.”
“You’re right, Don Manuel,” rejoins De Lara; “it won’t do to go under the boat, and there’s no need for us to stay by it. Mira! yonder’s a better place—by that wall. In its shadow no one can see us, and the gringos must pass within twenty feet of it. It’s the very spot for our purpose. Have with me!”
No one objecting, the four separate from the side of the boat and glide silently as spectres across the strip of sandy beach, their forms gradually growing indistinct in the fog, at length altogether disappearing beneath the sombre shadow of the wall.