Sure enough, about noon the next day (which had dawned calm), far out at sea a sharp, vivid line of white appeared, approaching rapidly.
“The norther! Hurrah! It is the norther!”
A norther never had been so welcomed before. The shipping was frantically lowering sails and putting out storm anchors. The war vessels at Sacrificios were riding under bare poles. The line of white reached them—they bowed to it, their masts sweeping almost to the water. On it came, at prodigious speed, in a front miles long. The white was foam, whipped feathery by wind. Suddenly all the shipping in the harbor was in a confusion of scud; the few American small boats plying between war vessels and beach were striving desperately, and see! The dunes had been veiled in a cloud of yellow dust driven by the gale.
The change was miraculous. So strong was the wind that it cleaned the walls of people. Like the rest, Jerry crouched in shelter, while the gale howled overhead.
The dunes were completely shut from view by the cloud of scud and sand. Firing from the city and castle ceased. There was nothing to do but wait and let the norther work. Somewhere under that sand cloud the Americans crouched also, fighting for breath and to keep from being buried. Here in Vera Cruz everybody was safe and happy, except Jerry Cameron. He was safe, but he was sorry for those other Americans, although he did not dare to say so.
It was a bad norther. It blew without a pause for two nights and days. Then, about noon of the third day, which was March 13, it quit about as suddenly as it had arrived. It left the ocean tossing with white caps and thundering against the sea-wall and upon the beach, but the air over the dunes cleared and all eyes peered curiously to see what had become of the American army.
Why, the flags were nearer! Some of them fluttered at the very inside edge of the hills, not much more than half a mile away, across the open space which skirted the city walls. There were signs that the ground was being dug out, as if for batteries. As soon as the ocean quieted a little, the boats again hustled back and forth, landing more guns and supplies. The forts and castle fired furiously at the American camps. But the Americans had not been stopped by the norther and they were not to be stopped by shot and shell.
Now more than a week passed in this kind of business, with the city and castle firing, and with the Mexican soldiers skirmishing in the brush to annoy the gringos, and with the Americans doing little by day, but each night creeping nearer. One morning a strange new token was to be sighted. To the south the ground had been upheaved, during the night, out from the edge of the dunes, and a line of earth extended like a mole-run into the cleared space. The Americans were burrowing.
The city forts lustily bombarded the place and evidently drove the Americans out of the trench, for there was no reply. In fact, very few gringos were seen, but their flags might be glimpsed, farther back. Where were their cannon?
After this fresh burrows appeared frequently. Still there was no firing by the American cannon. What was being done, in that brush, none of the Vera Cruzans could say from such a distance. Only——