Behind the file of soldiers which formed their escort came Charbonde and Hank, both mounted on wiry little native horses. The latter held a handkerchief to his face, on which a large, dark bruise was rapidly forming. At that moment Hank would have ridden a much greater distance than the few miles to Miraflores to witness Ned’s execution.
At last they entered the town—a fair-sized place under a sloping bank of greenery. In front stretched the sea. In a vain hope of rescue from thence the sailors looked ocean-ward, but the expanse was empty of life. Not a sail or a funnel marred its glistening surface.
Through the town, while women joined the ranks of their tormentors, the dusty, worried Americans were marched straight up to a small building with barred windows.
“The prison!” flashed across Ned’s mind.
But he soon found that the place was a courtroom—dark, cool and dusty. At the head of a long table standing on trestles, which occupied the center of the chamber, Charbonde took his seat. There were some papers there and ink and pens. He wrote rapidly for several minutes, while the prisoners stood dejectedly amidst their guards at the other end of the table. Hank stood by the South American, leaning over and occasionally offering advice, or so it seemed.
At last Charbonde looked up. As he did so a thrill of horror passed through the boys. They realized at last that this room was the courtroom in which they were to undergo the mockery of a trial for their lives. As they waited several other officers sauntered in as if to a show. One of them addressed Charbonde as colonel. This explained at once his precedence at the so-called court-martial.
Standing up, Charbonde read rapidly in a sing-song voice from the indictment he had just drawn up. As it was in Spanish the Dreadnought Boys did not understand a word of it. So rapidly did the colonel—as we must now call him—read, in fact, that even Midshipman Stark and Stanley, both of whom understood the language, had but a vague idea of the charges.
“Well, gentlemen, what have you to say?” inquired Charbonde, as he finished reading from the document.