He turned to speak to his officers. The station-master, finding himself forgotten, stood looking very ill at ease. In a few moments the order was signed, and Will took his leave. Hurrying through the streets, he remembered that he was hungry and stopped at a shop to buy bread and cheese. But putting his hand into his pocket for the money, he discovered that he was without a single peseta.
"I came away in a hurry," he said to the scowling shopkeeper. "Look, here is an order signed by the Jefe; my mission is urgent, I will pay you when I get back, at the offices of the British Asphalt Company of Guayana."
"Very well, señor," said the man, to whom the name of the Company was well known: and Will hurried off, carrying enough food to provide himself and his two companions with a substantial meal.
Five minutes afterwards he sprang on board the hydroplane, cast off, and set her going at full speed. The current was with him, and the vessel whizzed along at forty knots, Azito standing with his pole a few feet from the wind screen, holding in his left hand a hunch of bread from which he took a bite occasionally. Will employed his left hand in the same way, steering with the right.
Caracas, he knew, was several hundreds of miles distant from Ciudad Bolivar by water. The steamer would run with the tide to the mouth of the river, or strike out by one of its arms to the sea, and then follow the coast-line. Will knew that he could overtake it long before it reached the mouth. Indeed, in less than half-an-hour Azito reported that he saw its smoke in the distance. Five minutes afterwards it was clearly visible as a spot on the river's broad expanse, and in yet another five minutes the hydroplane was alongside, Will shouting to the crowded deck that he had a message of recall from the Jefe. The steamer slowed down and stopped: Will clambered on board and handed the order to the officer in command. The vessel was instantly put about; the engines were forced to their utmost, and huge volumes of black smoke poured from the funnels, the hydroplane being made fast with a rope and towed.
The steamer was now moving against the current, and it seemed to Will to go at a snail's pace in comparison with the hydroplane. He became so bored with the slow progress and the officer's questions about his vessel that he made up his mind to quit the steamer and hasten back in advance, to inform the Jefe that the troops were on the way to his relief. He called to José to start the motor and drive the hydroplane alongside, slipped over by means of a rope, and was soon careering ahead of the steamer at three times its speed.
When he arrived within a few miles of the city he heard heavy firing, and as he drew nearer he recognized that the attack was being pressed in two quarters. Evidently General Carabaño had made a very rapid march from the broken culvert. On reaching the quay, he left José and Azito in charge of the hydroplane as before, and hurried along the deserted streets to the Town Hall. The Jefe was absent. He had taken the command against General Carabaño on the south-west, while Captain Guzman was engaged with Colonel Orellana on the south-east. Will hastened on to find the Jefe. He discovered him a short distance south of the town, on rising ground, his front protected by the walls of two or three gardens.
The Jefe was decidedly flurried. He had only three or four hundred men against a force which he estimated to number nearly eight hundred. Will wondered how so many had been squeezed into the train. They must have been packed like sardines. Three guns had been drawn to the spot and unlimbered behind the walls; but the Jefe, when Will told him that the steamer was coming down at full speed, explained with much vehemence that when his artillerymen tried to fire the guns they found that the powder was mixed with sand. Will was not surprised. Some official had no doubt made a little fortune out of the contract.
General Carabaño's attack had been twice rolled back, but he had now divided his force into two portions. One threatened the front of the Jefe's position, from the reverse slope of a hill about a quarter of a mile distant; the other was working through a small wood to the west, with the evident intention of taking the position in flank. Indeed, just after Will arrived, an enfilading fire broke out on the right, and began to thin the ranks of the men holding the gardens, for the wood through which the enemy was approaching was at a somewhat higher level, so that the defenders lost the protection of the wall running at right angles to their front. The position was already no longer tenable, and the Jefe, who had no great confidence in his men's steadiness, began to withdraw them by twenties behind barricades thrown up at the end of two streets leading towards the middle of the city. The retirement was hailed with loud shouts by the enemy, who, emboldened by their success, came pouring out of the wood, pressing the Government troops hard. The last of these to leave the gardens were closely followed by the main body of the enemy under General Carabaño himself. They came yelling forward right up to the barricades. Then, however, they were met by a galling fire from the men already in position; and the General's voice could be heard ordering them to scatter and take refuge in the gardens which had lately sheltered their opponents.
It was obvious that the barricades could not be taken by direct assault without heavy loss, but the General was equal to the difficulty. While his men kept up a dropping fire from the garden, the flanking force, under Captain Espejo, skirmishing along under cover of broken country, gained a point some hundred yards beyond the barricades, and then, swinging to their right, charged through a cross lane, a movement which threatened the rear of the defenders and placed them between two fires. The Jefe saw his peril in time, and withdrew his men hurriedly from the barricade, occupying houses commanding the intersection of the streets with the lane.