CHAPTER VII
AN IMPORTANT DISCOVERY
RETURNING to the “Connecticut,” Phil told his remarkable experiences to Sydney.
“Phil, I believe we have blundered upon the way in which these insurgents are receiving their arms,” he replied excitedly.
“I am sure of it,” answered Phil; “and to think that our good minister’s name is being used in such a way. We must intercept these boxes before they reach their destination.”
“One thing is certain,” Sydney insisted; “the minister’s name will be removed from the boxes before they are sent to the insurgents. Juarez is too clever to allow himself to be discovered in this risky undertaking.”
“You are right,” agreed Phil, “and that means Juarez will land the boxes on shore here and remove all marks of identification. Come, we must find where the minister’s launch will land and try to discover when they will attempt to smuggle the arms to the insurgents. It will be by water, surely, for he wouldn’t dare attempt to pass through the lines of the loyal army with his bulky packages.”
Having received the required permission, the lads landed again on the great iron pier of La Boca.
They were both dressed in civilians’ clothes, but in this town of so few strangers, they were recognized immediately as coming from one of the men-of-war in port.
They walked up the water front, examining each wharf as they passed.
“There she is, Syd,” cried Phil, grasping his friend’s arm and pointing to a good-sized black launch tied up to a long dock running out into the bay.
“Careful,” Sydney cautioned; “don’t destroy our usefulness by being too much interested. There may be unfriendly eyes looking at us this very minute. Let’s stroll down and see what she is doing there.”
The boys sauntered down the wharf. They saw that the boxes had been removed from the launch.
“Those boxes are inside that warehouse,” announced Sydney, indicating a door abreast the launch. The warehouse was a long one, built on the jutting dock.
“La Fitte and Company,” murmured Phil, reading the name in large gilt letters over the door of the warehouse. “Where have I heard of that firm?”
“Why, that’s the firm,” cried Sydney, surprisedly, “that has been trying to get the concession of the Pitch Lakes away from the American Syndicate. I begin to see a reason for Juarez’s intrigue.”
“I don’t understand,” returned Phil, who had not followed Sydney’s thoughts.
“It’s perfectly clear,” said Sydney, convincedly. “La Fitte and Company are composed of foreigners, mostly Frenchmen; they have engaged Juarez to do the work of prejudicing the insurgents against Americans. If this rascal succeeds and the insurgents gain the reins of government, the concession will be taken from the American Syndicate and given to La Fitte and Company. This concession right is a very valuable one, worth many millions of dollars a year to those who are lucky enough to obtain it.”
“Syd, you are a wonder,” cried Phil, admiringly. “Come, we have no more business here.”
They turned about and walked past the unloaded launch.
The vice-consul, who had been inside the warehouse, came to the door as our lads passed.
He glanced at them, a startled look on his face, then he smilingly raised his hat.
“Good-morning,” he greeted in English, with a marked foreign accent. “You are off the ‘Connecticut,’ no? We are delighted to see our flag on such a fine large ship. If I can be of the slightest service I shall be highly honored,” he added in the suave tones of a Spanish grandee.
Our boys stopped and returned his greeting, thanking him for his considerate offer. Then they continued their walk.
Phil looked over his shoulder and surprised a sinister expression on Juarez’s face, before he could hide it in a smile of parting.
“I am sorry that fellow saw us; he may suspect that we know something of his secret,” confided Phil, as he and Sydney regained the street of the water front.
They had been on board their ship but a short while when the minister’s launch, with his flag flying in the bow, was reported heading for the “Connecticut.”
The marine guard and the band were quickly paraded on the quarter-deck and the officers, headed by Captain Taylor, all in full uniform, were at the gangway to do honor to the high American official.
The vice-consul accompanied the minister, and as he followed his chief through the formality of hand-shaking, Phil saw him grasp Lazar’s hand cordially and tell him in Spanish how glad he was to see him again.
Lazar smiled in his cold way, but Phil thought the ensign did not seem overjoyed to renew the acquaintance.
“So Lazar has known this scoundrel before,” thought Phil. “I wonder how much he knows of him.”
The thought was answered soon enough, and in a way that showed Lazar in his true character.
Phil had gone below to his room and was writing his weekly letter home, which of late his new and eventful life had caused him to neglect.
He was seated at his desk under the ventilator shaft, which brought fresh air from above. It opened into one of the numerous ventilator-cowls on the quarter-deck.
He could hear indistinctly above him the voices of two men, pacing the quarter-deck, but they did not disturb him until they stopped directly over his ventilator shaft, and he recognized at once the voices of Lazar and the vice-consul.
“So your precious conscience hurts you, does it?” the vice-consul was saying.
“It’s not a question of that,” Lazar’s voice answered, “and you know it, Juarez. But smuggling is too risky. I had a narrow escape from detection in New York a year ago, getting your goods ashore, and I don’t wish to go through that worry again.”
“You made a handsome sum out of it, didn’t you?” Juarez’s voice questioned.
“Not so loud,” Lazar cautioned, “it’s too dangerous; if this were known, I’d lose my commission.”
“You are losing your nerve, Lazar,” the vice-consul’s voice sneered; “there is no one about.”
“You can’t tell, and anyway, this is not the place to discuss such matters,” Lazar said decidedly.
“As you please, but, by the way, I might as well tell you; I know you dare not betray me,” the vice-consul’s voice said menacingly, “and I need your help.”
The speakers changed their positions slightly and their voices failed to carry distinctly to the eager eavesdropper.
Phil trembled with expectancy at the startling intelligence he had received.
So Lazar had been tempted to do something for which his commission would be forfeited if found out. What a terrible weapon to hold over his enemy if he continued his persecution. What was the secret Juarez had confided to Lazar? The arms surely.
The voices had now died out entirely, and a shuffling of feet on deck told Phil that the minister was ready to leave the ship.
He told Sydney all he had heard as soon as they had returned to their room after the departure of the American minister.
“I am not surprised,” exclaimed Sydney, when Phil had finished his story. “Lazar is capable of anything evil. We have another person to reckon with, however, in this arms smuggling. If he suspects we are attempting to intercept them, Lazar will, in hatred of you, try to defeat your plan.”
“Hadn’t we better confide in Captain Taylor?” questioned Phil. “We can thus cut Lazar’s claws.”
“We should not do that until we can prove our story fully,” answered Sydney. “The captain might believe our accusations were true, but he could hardly act officially upon them.”
“It seems hard that such a scoundrel should wear an officer’s uniform,” protested the lad, “but I dare say you are right, Syd. We must seek for more convincing evidence.”
“What is your plan for to-night?” asked Sydney, as he took his revolvers out of their case and examined them critically.
“I have decided to keep a watch during the day, and if no vessel large enough to carry the boxes leaves port before dark, then to lie in wait in the ‘Vidette’ at the entrance of the harbor, and overhaul any suspicious craft that comes out of port.”
“Excellent,” agreed Sydney. “I am quite confident that Juarez will use a steamer; the breeze is too light, and as he must go nearly twenty miles by water to reach the insurgent lines, a sailing vessel would be out of the question. The note you saw thrown by the native boatman undoubtedly set a rendezvous for this evening. They will want to get the arms to the insurgents as soon as possible.”
Phil and Sydney made their preparations quietly. O’Neil was called and told something of what was going forward and ordered to keep his launch, the “Vidette,” in readiness.
All afternoon the lads spent on deck, casting anxious glances toward the dock where the minister’s launch was tied. There were a number of other launches moving about the harbor, but there was only one other large enough to carry the boxes.
About 7 P. M., the sun having set a half hour before, it was dark enough to start, and they appeared on deck.
“We have the captain’s permission to use the ‘Vidette,’” Phil reported to the officer of the deck. “I have reported to Mr. Penfield. Will you have her called away, sir?”
Then Phil peered through the darkness, the deck lights not being lighted as yet, and saw Lazar was the officer of the deck.
“What could he do to prevent our going?” thought Phil nervously. “Nothing, he would not dare.”
“Very well, sir,” Lazar answered carelessly, and then he ordered the bugler to “call the ‘Vidette’ away.”
Ten minutes dragged by, and still the “Vidette” hung at the lower boom, motionless in the water.
A launch steamed by the battle-ship at fair speed, standing out of the harbor. Phil and Sydney strained their eyes in an endeavor to discover its identity, but the night was too dark and it was soon lost sight of in the distance.
Phil felt sure it was the cargo of arms. He could suppress his impatience no longer.
“Mr. Lazar,” he spoke abruptly, “may I go and find out what is holding the ‘Vidette’?”
“No, sir, I shall find out in plenty of time,” he sneered. “You young gentlemen seem to be in great haste.”
Finally he hailed the “Vidette” and inquired what was the trouble.
An answer came back in O’Neil’s voice.
“We can’t get any water in the boiler; the feed pump is jammed, sir,” he cried, in exasperation.
Phil’s heart sank. There was the prize slipping away before their very eyes. He knew that this must be Lazar’s work.
Turning quickly he rushed to the cabin and unannounced burst in upon the commanding officer.
“Some one has deliberately disabled the ‘Vidette,’” he cried excitedly. “I can’t tell you why now, but believe me, sir, it is very important for us to get away at once. I asked the officer of the deck, Mr. Lazar, for permission to go down into the boat, but he refuses.”
The captain glanced up startled, a look of annoyance on his face. Then he realized that the lad was in deadly earnest.
Picking up his cap he led the way on deck.
“Mr. Lazar,” he ordered sternly, “allow these two young gentlemen to go down into the ‘Vidette’ immediately.”
Lazar hesitated but an instant.
“Certainly, sir. If you say so,” he answered with a wave of the hand to the waiting lads.
The two boys scrambled hastily down the Jacob’s ladder from the lower boom on to the deck of the “Vidette.” Phil made his way to the machinery space.
The engineer and fireman were bending over the little feed pump, which supplied the boiler with water.
Phil glanced at the gauge glass; there was no water showing. He tried the test-cocks, then looked quickly at the steam gauge.
“The boiler is half full of water, but there is only fifty pounds pressure, and the fires are hauled,” he cried angrily.
“Put back your fire,” he shouted to the fireman, pushing him fiercely toward the furnace, then he started in himself to get the feed pump running.
O’Neil stood by petrified with astonishment at the way he pitched into the intricacies of the machinery.
“The engineer’s a new one, sir,” he whispered to Phil. “I don’t believe he knows much about this kind of engine. The officer of the deck took our regular engineer out and put this man in about an hour ago.”
Phil had been too much occupied trying to find the trouble to grasp the meaning of the coxswain’s words.
He followed up each pipe and made every test he had been taught at Annapolis to use in finding the trouble with these machines.
“We are beaten,” he cried despondently to Sydney, at his wit’s end.
The minutes flew by.
Then he gave a shout of joy, as he saw a tiny steel wedge jammed in between the moving parts of the pump.
A tap with a hammer and the pump started up, pumping precious water into the boiler.
In but a few minutes more the “Vidette” had cast off her line and was steaming with ever increasing speed toward the entrance to the harbor.
Both lads scanned the horizon to seaward. There was nothing in sight.
“It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack,” Phil exclaimed dejectedly. “We don’t even know which way they turned when they reached the entrance.”
“Begging your pardon, sir,” O’Neil interrupted earnestly, “there ain’t but one place for her to go, and that is to Mariel. I ran on a line of coasting steamers once and I know somewhat of the water about here. There ain’t no place to land the other way for fifty miles.”
“O’Neil, you are a trump,” cried Phil, much relieved. “We may catch her yet; she has over a half hour’s start, but we have four knots better speed.”
Reaching the harbor mouth, O’Neil put his helm hard astarboard and headed the “Vidette” to the westward along the coast line.
“How close to shore can we run?” asked Sydney, addressing the coxswain.
“After we round the next point of land, sir, as close as you please,” he answered.
The minutes dragged heavily along. The point was reached and rounded, then the “Vidette” was headed to close with the shore line.
“What is that on the bow there?” Phil asked anxiously, pointing to a dark shadow on the dimly lighted water.
There was not a doubt but that it was the prize scudding along. Great volumes of smoke poured from her stack. The smoke had betrayed her presence. She was too distant for her hull to be visible.
“Hold your course,” cried Phil joyously. “We can head her off on this line.”
Sydney took from his pockets his Colt revolvers and laid them beside the big navy Colts.
“Have you the rifles, O’Neil?” he asked.
“That I have, sir, and a hundred rounds of ammunition for each one,” replied the faithful man; “and me and Johnson there know how to use them.”
“Well, I trust it won’t be necessary,” said Phil immensely pleased, “but it’s better to be sure than sorry.”
The “Vidette” drew up slowly on the fleeing launch.
“They are surely making for Mariel,” O’Neil announced, “and we can catch them before they reach there.”
Of a sudden the engines, which had been running perfectly, suddenly seemed to slow.
Phil was on his feet in an instant.
“What is it?” he asked anxiously.
The engineer looked up, showing a white, scared face in the dim light of the solitary lantern.
“Running a little hot, sir,” he replied haltingly.
Phil felt the moving parts. They were cool. He looked up in surprise at the engineer and saw him put his hand quickly in his shirt.
Impulsively he grabbed the man by the wrist and held his hand to the light.
“Sand!” he cried in anger.
“Get this man out of here, O’Neil,” he suddenly ordered, forcibly pushing him from the engines and taking the man’s place at the throttle.
“None of your monkeying now,” O’Neil assured the engineer. “You’ve given enough trouble already.”
The engine bearings were thoroughly oiled and the throttle opened wide. Fortunately, Phil had detected the man in time, for if he had succeeded in getting the smallest quantity of sand in the bearings, the engines must have stopped.
The fleeing launch was now in plain sight, but the landing at Mariel was but a half mile away. He did not dare open fire on her. Would he dare attempt to cut her out under the eyes of the insurgents waiting their expected guns?
“Launch ahoy!” Phil hailed in Spanish.
Silence.
He hailed again and added: “I want to speak to you!”
From outward appearances, there was no one on the launch, but black smoke poured from her funnel and her white wake showed she was making a final spurt.
The bow of the “Vidette” was now inside and abreast of the launch’s quarter. It slowly moved forward. There was scarce ten feet of open water between the two boats.
With weapons in hand Phil and his men waited.
“Put her alongside,” Phil ordered, striving to control the nervousness in his voice.
The two launches came together, with scarcely a jar, and steamed along as one boat.
No one moved on the prize.
O’Neil instinctively had swung his bow around and headed the boats out from the land now only a few hundred yards distant.
Phil saw there were four men on the boat, but his eyes fell with pleasure on the boxes.
“Do you surrender?” Phil shouted fiercely to the man at the wheel, only five feet away from him.
The man glanced in terror at the pistol pointing at his head, in the hands of a gringo, one of those whom he had been told could hit a peso at a distance of a hundred metres.
“Si, señor,” he answered tremblingly.
As the two boats headed away, the whole shore line near them burst into flame, and the hiss of countless bullets sang warningly about them. Suddenly the suspected engineer threw up his hands and dropped to the deck.