"As you say, sergeant. Here are the dispatches I wish you to hand to President Castro personally."
Handing this package to our hero, the colonel offered no further delay. With feelings akin to gladness, Ronie returned to his expectant companions.
"I hail it as good news," he said. "We are to meet the 'Little Captain,' President Castro, with what haste we can. I say we, for I have the honor of being selected by Colonel Marchand to choose such companions as I wish and hasten to the capital. You know whom I select."
Ronie was really pleased with this commission, as it would enable him to enter a wider range of inquiry concerning his mother than he had been situated to do so far. Thoughts of her were last in his mind as he lay down to rest after a day's campaigning and the first to arouse him in the morning.
"Poor mother! how I pity you, and wish that I knew where you are!"
Within an hour the little party was ready to start, deciding to go by the way of La Guayra, which they reached without adventure, This old-fashioned Spanish town is the chief seaport of Venezuela, as well as the entrance way to the capital, situated about five miles inland behind the series of mountain peaks whose chain runs down to the very edge of the water. Our young engineers did not fail to notice, as they looked out over the harbor, the close affinity to the same cerulean hue that touched both sea and sky, so it was difficult to tell where they met on the horizon, and blended like a curtain of the same soft texture. Under the reflections the vessels appeared to rest flat on the mirror-like surface, in the words of the poet:
"Like a painted ship upon a painted sea."
The most conspicuous spot about La Guayra is the little fortress made famous by Charles Kingsley, in his "Westward Ho," as the prison house of his heroine, the Rose of Devon. This was the residence of the Spanish governors in the days when Venezuela was a dependency of Spain. Past this ancient point of defense against attacks from the sea and the winds lead those three ways of travel to the capital, aptly illustrating the changes of centuries; first, but of least importance now, the mule path worn no doubt by the natives in their passages back and forth; second, the wagon track, cut, it may be, when the continent was young; and finally, that iron-banded course of modern construction, the railroad. Caracas is embowered among the mountains three thousand feet above the streets of La Guayra.
Their arrival was soon after the bombardment of Macuto by Venezuelan ships on account of an outbreak there. As this place was near to La Guayra, great excitement was prevailing in the latter place. In fact, the inhabitants everywhere were in an uproar. News came that General Riera, who, it will be remembered, was a passenger on the Libertador when our heroes were on that vessel, had captured La Vela de Coro, while the insurgents had also captured Barquisemoto, and Riera had sacked Coro, the capital of the State of Falcon.
Our party did not continue their journey to the capital, on account of the fact that Castro was toward Barcelona, where the revolution had become centered. With this bit of news came a rumor which, if it bore but a light bearing on the international contention focused on Venezuela, awakened an anxious interest on the part of Ronie Rand and his friends. Riva Baez first learned of it from a native who had come down from the mountainous districts. This man said an American woman was held by the insurgents as a hostage of war. He could not give the name of the woman, but believed she had not been long in the country.