Four Bells: A Tale of the Caribbean

by Ralph Delahaye Paine

It was a memorable moment when the guest was helped to lift himself from the pallet of straw. He swayed against the straining Palacio, their arms across each other’s shoulders. In this manner they staggered into the cellar by arduous stages and thence to the chamber inside the tunnel entrance. The guest expected his weight to crush the spare Palacio, but it was do or die. The achievement made them hilarious. Palacio uncorked a treasured bottle of red wine. Later he knelt at the shrine of Nuestra Señora de La Popa and humbly offered thanks for the recovery of his dear friend and guest.

In the underground room the hours passed without impatience. Light filtered through the gullied opening in the roof. The air was never sultry. A roving armadillo tumbled through the hole and consented to stay a while, lured by bits of food. It curled up in its scaly armor and slept under a bench. Its serene attitude toward life was worthy of imitation.

“But I can’t stay here curled up in my shell,” said Señor Cary to the placid armadillo. “For one thing, I am imposing on Palacio’s good nature with no way of repaying him. And the old codger is pretty well worn out. As soon as my legs will hold me up, I must work out some plan of campaign or other. But why fret about it now? Mañana!”

With a steady mind he returned to the situation day after day. To try to smuggle himself aboard a Fruit Company’s steamer was one possibility. It was thrashed out and dismissed. Ignorant that Colonel Fajardo had ceased to be the Comandante of the Port or anything else, he pictured him as venomously vigilant to watch and search every vessel leaving Cartagena. Without friends or money it was out of the question to try to reach some other port by land. The delta of the Magdalena was one vast wilderness of swamp and water-courses.

He was still ensnared, but no longer a frenzied fugitive without a refuge, and he possessed the unquenchable optimism of a strong and competent young man.

Very often his thoughts dwelt with Teresa Fernandez. Her kisses were dearly remembered, her voice echoed in his heart, and the gay fortitude with which she met the buffets of life appealed to his chivalry. She was a woman worth loving forever and a day.

A fortnight more, and the Tarragona would be steaming across the Caribbean, on another southern voyage, to pick up her landfall for Cartagena, sighting the abrupt and lofty hill of La Popa from many miles at sea. Now that his strength was flowing back, Richard Cary could not remain buried like a mole. Inaction would soon become both irksome and cowardly. One thing was certain. He swore to find Teresa Fernandez, returning in the Tarragona, and to hold her in his arms.

There was only one hope of attaining this desire, of making the resolve more than an empty boast. Teresa’s uncle, that “funny old guy” Señor Ramon Bazán, had shown a liking for him during that brief visit in the moonlit patio. “A delicious hit,” Teresa had called it. This might mean nothing at all. A man in his dotage, tricky and whimsical, had been the impression left by the shriveled uncle with the little brown monkey perched upon his shoulder.

What his relations might be with the officials of Cartagena was impossible to surmise. He had been a person of consequence in earlier years, a figure in the political affairs of Colombia. This much Teresa had conveyed in the remark that he had once been sent to Washington by the Government at Bogotá. Would he feel inclined to protect an American refugee whom the authorities were hunting like a dangerous animal? What of the obligations of the hospitality which he had so warmly proffered? A rope of sand, as likely as not. Spanish courtesy in its finest flower had been displayed by the lowly Palacio, but with Señor Ramon Bazán it was a very different situation. Doubtless he knew what Richard Cary had done and why he was branded as a criminal condemned to execution.

Ah, well, what else was life than a gamble on the turn of a card? A proper man ought not to hesitate whenever the stake was worth the hazard. Teresa Fernandez would risk as much for him, of this Richard Cary felt convinced. She was that kind of a woman. Win or lose, he would try to meet her in the house of Uncle Ramon Bazán while the Tarragona was in port.