Four Bells: A Tale of the Caribbean

by Ralph Delahaye Paine

A rifle flashed and then another. He threw himself flat. A bullet kicked a splinter from a plank beside his head. Several whined over him. He watched the flashes. Don Miguel had shrewdly scattered his men in various hiding-places. Without fatally exposing himself, Ricardo was unable to look over the bulwark and gauge the progress of the Valkyrie’s boat. He dared withhold his machine gun fire not another minute. It was the card he held in reserve, but if a rifle bullet should kill or cripple him, Mr. Duff and his shipmates would be exposed to slaughter.

He knelt behind the gun and carefully marked the flashes of the rifles. A bullet grazed his left arm. Another chipped an ear. Then he let drive with all the cartridges remaining in the belt. It was a sustained, furious chatter of explosions. He sprayed the quarterdeck from starboard to port and back again. It silenced the enemy’s fire and granted him a fleeting opportunity.

Jumping to his feet, he lifted the machine gun in his arms and tossed it overboard. This one, at least, could not be reloaded and turned against his own crew. Then he ran aft, jerking out the heavy revolver.

For an instant he halted behind the mainmast, in the middle of the ship, to reconnoiter. It was as he expected. Don Miguel’s men knew he had blown away all his ammunition. They were coming out from cover, but not eagerly. Don Miguel was roaring at them from the cabin roof where he had been trying to pot Cary with a rifle. It was he himself who leaped down to aim the after machine gun. He was guilty of a blunder. His intention was to rake the Valkyrie’s boat before it passed from sight under the schooner’s bows, leaving his men to dispose of Richard Cary.

Instead of this, he saw a tall, glimmering figure dart from behind the mainmast and come charging aft. His attention was diverted. He hesitated. Then he opened fire at the swiftly moving wraith of a man, expecting to crumple him in his tracks. Ricardo was too canny to make himself an easy target. He ran a zigzag course, on a headlong slant toward one side of the deck and veering toward the other side. It was a disconcerting, bewildering onset even to an experienced campaigner like Don Miguel O’Donnell.

Cary was running like the wind, and as he ran he blazed away with the revolver which barked like a small cannon. A machine gun on a deck deeply shadowed was a clumsy weapon with which to stop a man determined to capture a ship single-handed or perish in the attempt. Don Miguel stood stoutly at his post, loudly swearing at the men who were ducking the bullets from that infernal revolver. The yellow tiger swerved again and bounded to the quarterdeck. He hurled the empty revolver at the man behind the machine gun. It was a missile propelled by an uncommonly powerful arm.

Unseen by Don Miguel, it struck him in the face. He reeled and fell. One of his men stumbled over him. Another lurched into them. In this moment of confusion, Richard Cary laid hands on the machine gun and wrenched it around to command the quarterdeck. A touch of the finger and he could have riddled the nearest group of three, huddled as they were, but the deed was abhorrent. Don Miguel had shown no mercy for the luckless Valkyrie party at the treasure camp, but this modern Richard Cary felt inclined to offer quarter. A machine gun was a detestable weapon for men who loved good fighting.

“Get below, you swine,” he shouted, “before I turn loose on you! Pronto, now, and drop your rifles.”

The two sailors with Don Miguel dragged him to the companionway, and he went bumping down into the cabin. Others were still skulking in the dark. Two or three came forward with hands upraised. They were glad to surrender. Cary called out a final summons. From the other side of the deck, a die-hard took a futile snap-shot at him with a pistol. Picking up the machine gun, Cary climbed to the cabin roof and deliberately swept the quarterdeck with a hurricane of fire. It smashed through woodwork and searched out the dark corners. It was the blast of death.

A wounded man came whimpering from his hiding-place. Another sprang up with a scream and hung limp over the rail. It was enough. Richard Cary shouldered the machine gun and ran forward with it. He had achieved the vital purpose. His comrades had been saved from destruction. With a thankful heart he shouted to them: