He planned that it would take him at least three days to walk fifty miles, and perhaps longer, for the roads were not very good in some places. He knew that he would find many villages and towns along the way, too, for the island was thinly settled in this neighbourhood. So if he were obliged to rest, he would never be at a loss for a place to get a bed. Archie couldn’t help thinking, as he walked along the road outside Manila, this first morning, that he might find a body of the insurgents in possession of one of these towns. They were very bold, he had heard, and they probably knew that there were no American troops anywhere in the neighbourhood, outside the city of Manila itself. And, knowing this, he knew they wouldn’t hesitate to camp at the very gates of the city, for they were marvellously successful in getting away into the interior whenever an American force made its appearance.
As he thought of this possibility, Archie couldn’t help being a little fearful of what might happen to him should he fall into the hands of the insurgents, and he began to wonder if he had not been a little foolhardy, after all, in starting off on such a wild-goose chase. “But I will have something new to send Mr. Van Bunting about the interior towns,” he said to himself, “and if I am captured, why, I will have a great deal to write about when I am released.” This thought made the lad happy again, and he trudged along the road with as much vim and energy as he had displayed during those weary days when he was walking to New York to make his fortune. And it was a much more interesting country in which to walk than the New York State counties had been. The vegetation was rich and luxuriant everywhere, palm-trees, vines, and flowers growing in profusion all along the road. In every dooryard, in front of every hut, there grew what seemed to Archie a veritable fairy bower of the most richly coloured flowers in existence. And they were growing, apparently, without cultivation. He had seen nothing like them before, even in California, and he longed to pluck some of them to send home, if they had only been wax instead of nature’s blossoms. As it was, he kept his arms filled with them for awhile, but after a time he grew tired carrying them, and was obliged to drop them by the roadside.
The country looked as if it might have been very prosperous at one time. There were plantations laid out in excellent fashion, and the soil seemed rich and fertile. But instead of growing crops, and storehouses filled with spices and coffee, there was desolation everywhere, and it was easy to see that the Spaniards had determined to leave but little behind them for the Yankees. Every other farmhouse and wayside hut was deserted, their occupants having gone, apparently, to join Aguinaldo, and the whole country, outside the towns, seemed to be wholly deserted and left to grow up in weeds and tangled vines.
The sun was warm, the sky was a perfect blue, and it seemed a delightful day in every way. But it made Archie sad to walk through a district which had been made so desolate, and he hadn’t walked many hours before he wished that he might soon reach a town, where he could find some life, and where he could remain overnight. For by the middle of the afternoon he was tired walking, and made up his mind that fifteen miles was enough for any one to do in one day. But he was obliged to keep on walking for two hours longer before he reached a village, and the great sun was just sinking behind the blue hills in the distance when he entered the one main village street, which was long and narrow, winding in and out among the cabins and huts, as if it had been laid out after the houses were built, for the convenience of the people. It was a poor excuse for a public thoroughfare. There had probably been a pavement of some sort at one time, but now the street was a mass of rubbish of every sort, straw, dust, old bricks, and bits of stone being thrown together in every rut, so that it was exceedingly difficult to walk along with any comfort.
There was no life visible in the settlement. Almost every hut had its shades drawn at the windows, and there was absolutely no one to be seen in the street. As he passed down the road, Archie could catch occasional glimpses of black eyes staring at him through a lattice, or he could hear some muttered word as he walked close to a window. From these signs he knew that he was observed, and he felt very much embarrassed as he continued his walk down this deserted lane, for he felt instinctively now that hundreds of eyes were watching his every movement.
Finally, he came to the public square, and he sat down here to look about him. From general appearances, he judged this to be a town of some two thousand inhabitants, for there was a very respectable administration building, and a good-sized church. There were but two streets of any consequence, the one by which he had entered the town, and another running at right angles in the opposite direction. In this latter street, as he stood in the square, he noticed a three-story structure with a sign outside, and he decided to go there and make inquiries as to where he might be able to secure a lodging for the night. It looked as if it might be an inn of some sort, or at least a store, so he walked rapidly up to the entrance and knocked twice upon the door. This place, in spite of its sign, looked more deserted and shut-up than any other building he had yet seen in the town, and he wondered whether he would receive any answer to his knocks. It was indeed a long time before he heard a sound within, but at last there was some muttering inside, the door flew open, and Archie found himself in the arms of three Filipinos, who threw him upon the floor and bound him, hands and feet. It was all so sudden that he had no time to cry out, and before he could say anything at all he was thrown into a dark room, and the door shut behind him.
CHAPTER XVI.
A PLEASANT CAPTOR—BRAVE BILL HICKSON ALLOWS ARCHIE TO ESCAPE—FIRST
GLIMPSE OF AGUINALDO.
FOR a long time Archie lay still upon the floor, being unable to move a muscle from the shock of his encounter with the men, and because he was tightly bound with ropes. And then he at last went off to sleep, feeling frightened because he was in the hands of strange men, and a little satisfied, too, because he was the victim of some adventure which might turn out in a very interesting way.