“Halloa! who are these fellows?” cried Tom, pointing in the direction in which he had seen a large body of the gauchos flourishing their long lances, as they galloped fiercely forward.
“They intend to try and cut us down, and so they will if we don’t drive them back with a warm volley,” cried Terence. “Prepare to receive cavalry!” The seamen had been drilled to act as light infantry, and being armed with muskets and bayonets were well able to use them. On came the wild horsemen firing their carbines, when, with lances at rest, they charged full down on the body of seamen. Several saddles were emptied, but not till they had got close up to the bayonets did they wheel round, apparently with the intention of retreating. Believing that they were doing so, the bluejackets rose from their knees, and imperfectly disciplined as they were for fighting on shore, without waiting for their officer’s orders, rushed forward in pursuit of the apparently flying enemy. Tom and Gerald, carried away by their ardour, took the lead, and having only their swords in their hands, got ahead of the rest. At that moment the horsemen, once more wheeling, charged with desperate fury against the partly broken square.
The seamen, however; again rapidly forming, fired a volley which prevented the gauchos from cutting their way through them. Two of the gauchos, however, as they came up, threw their lassos over Tom and Gerald, who were at that moment in the act of springing back to gain the protection of the bayonets, and greatly to their horror and dismay they found themselves dragged up on the saddles of the horsemen, who with their companions galloped off amid the showers of bullets which the bluejackets sent after them. Among the few who, amid the smoke from the muskets and the confusion, had seen the midshipmen spirited away, was Snatchblock.
“We must get the young reefers back, lads! It won’t do to lose them,” he shouted out, and followed by a dozen of the Supplejack’s crew, less accustomed to discipline than the rest, he started off in pursuit. Terence seeing them going, and not knowing the cause, called them back, but not hearing him they ran on, hoping to overtake the fleet horsemen. The gauchos, discovering from the flight of their party in other directions that the day was lost, continued their flight: had they turned back, they would probably have cut down the whole of their pursuers.
Snatchblock, compelled at length to return, told Adair what had happened.
“Rogers and my nephew carried off?” exclaimed Adair. “How did you fellows come to allow that?”
“We couldn’t help it, sir! indeed we couldn’t!” answered Snatchblock. “There isn’t a man among us who wouldn’t have given his own life rather than have let the young gentlemen be carried off by the savages, to be killed and eaten for what we know, but their horsemen came down upon us like lightning, and spirited them off before any of us saw what they were about.”
“Well, well, I am ready to believe that none of you could help it, and I am sure, Snatchblock, that you would have risked your life to save the youngsters,” said Adair, his rising anger appeased. “They have themselves alone to blame. We must now see what we can do to get them back, for the gauchos will look upon them as prizes of too much value to kill, and though they are savage enough, from all accounts, they are not addicted to eating men or boys either.”
“That’s a comfort, at all events, for I couldn’t tell what those wild chaps might do with the young gentlemen,” observed the honest sailor. “If we might go off in chase, maybe we should come up with them before long.”
“Without cavalry we shall have no chance of overtaking the gauchos, and I can only hope that they will not treat their prisoners ill. The lads have their wits about them; if they have the chance, they will make their escape,” answered Adair.