The Dust of Conflict Part 37

Appleby glanced at Harper, who clenched a big hand, and appeared to have some difficulty in restraining himself. "I don't think we will trouble you," he said. "You had instructions from the Colonel Morales?"

"He seemed anxious about your safety, senores," said the man.

Appleby turned upon his heel, and walked back the way he had come with Harper, murmuring anathemas upon Morales beside him, until the sergeant was out of sight.

"I expected it!" he said.

"Well," said Harper dryly, "this is not the only way out of the place.

We'll try another."

They walked back to the hacienda, pa.s.sed the sugar mill, and followed the little tram-line that wound through the cane until once more Harper came to a standstill, and his face grew a trifle grim. It was very hot, and the rails flung back the light dazzlingly between the tall green blades, but there was another suggestive blink of brightness among the long banana leaves in front of them.

"More of them!" he said hoa.r.s.ely.

They walked on a few paces, and then a non-commissioned officer of cazadores in dusty white uniform moved out on to the line.

"Well," said Harper brusquely, "what are you wanting here?"

The man made a little deprecatory gesture as he said, "We were sent."

Appleby made as though he would brush past him, but the soldier, moving a trifle, stood in front of him.

"With permission, senor, it is safer about the hacienda," he said.

"Still, if you wish to go out into the country I will send a man or two with you."

Appleby laughed. "Then you are not alone?"

The soldier called softly, and three or four men in uniform appeared amidst the banana leaves. "It seems," he said, "the Colonel Morales is anxious about the hacienda."

Harper glanced at his comrade ruefully, but an inspiration dawned on Appleby. "One appreciates his solicitude. It is conceivable that your comrades would know what to do with a bottle or two of cana. A little is beneficial when one has pa.s.sed the night in the open. There was, I think, a heavy dew."

"With thanks, but it is not permitted," said the man. "We did not, however, leave Santa Marta until there was a little light in the sky."

"Colonel Morales was good enough to send a strong detachment?"

The soldier shook his head. "A section of the Barremeda company," he said. "The Sergeant Hernando was to follow with a few files when he came in from picket duty. One does not understand it, for the country is quiet now, but one asks no questions of an officer."

"It is not usually advisable," said Appleby with a smile. "Still, if you change your mind about the cana you can come up to the hacienda and ask for me."

He swung round, and five minutes later sat down on a truck on the tram- line. Harper leaned against it, and looked at him.

"I guess Morales means to make sure of us," he said. "Well, we can only hope for Maccario. You couldn't ask him if the men you sent got through?"

"I made the venture, and he told me. It was last night I sent the men out, and the cazadores only started this morning. Morales blundered then, but it is rather more than likely he couldn't help himself. n.o.body would call him timid, but just now it would have been a risky thing for him to go back to Santa Marta alone."

Harper nodded. "There's not much you don't think of," he said. "Still, it seems to me quite likely that Maccario can't get through."

"Then so far as you and I are concerned I'm afraid the game is played out," said Appleby.

Harper pulled out his cigar case and wrenched it open. "Take a smoke,"

he said. "I don't feel like talking just now."

He sat down on a sleeper with his back to a wheel, while Appleby lay upon the truck with a cigar, which went out in his hand, gazing across the sunlit cane. It rose about him breast-high, a crude glaring green, luminous in its intensity of color, against the blueness above it, but Appleby scarcely saw it, or the gleaming lizard which lay close by suspiciously regarding him. He had made a very bold venture, and though Harding might yet benefit by it, he could realize the risk that he and his comrade ran.

There was, however, consolation in the thought that Morales could not have known he had sent for the Sin Verguenza, or he would have flung a company of cazadores into the hacienda. A few resolute men could, Appleby fancied, hold it against a battalion, for there were no openings but narrow windows, and those high up, in the outer walls, while, if the defenders tore the veranda stairway up, the patio would be apt to prove a death-trap to the troops that entered it. It also seemed to him that, now the prospect of complications with the Americans would everywhere stir the insurgents to activity, Morales would scarcely have men to spare for a determined a.s.sault upon the hacienda.

The longer Appleby reflected the more sure he felt that he had made a wise decision. It had, however, cost him an effort to face the risk, and now he wondered a little at his own fearlessness. He who had hitherto haggled about trifles and pored over musty papers in a country solicitor's office had been driven into playing a bold man's part in the great game of life, and the reflection brought him a curious sense of content. Even if he paid the forfeit of his daring, as it seemed he would in all probability do, he had, at least, proved himself the equal, in boldness of conception and clearness of vision, of men trained to politics and war, and he found the draught he had tasted almost intoxicating.

The exhilaration of it had vanished now, but the vague content remained and blunted the anxieties that commenced to creep upon him. Still, he fell to wondering where Maccario was, and how long it would take him to reach San Cristoval, for Morales would demand his answer soon after nightfall He lay very still while the shadow of the cane grew narrower, until the sun shone hot upon his set brown face, and then slowly stood up.

"I think we will go back and pay the men," he said. "The few pesetas mean a good deal to them, and I would sooner they got them than Morales."

They went back together silently, and the whistle shrieked out its summons when the mill stopped for the men's ten o'clock breakfast.

Appleby drew them up as they came flocking in and handed each the little handful of silver due to him.

"You will go back to work until the usual hour," he said. "If all goes well you will begin again to-morrow, but this is a country in which no one knows what may happen."

The men took the money in grave wonder, and Appleby, who did not eat very much, sat down to breakfast, but both he and Harper felt it a relief when the plates were taken away.

"You will keep them busy, if it is only to stop them talking," he said.

"I have wasted too much time already, and if I am to straighten up everything by this evening there is a good deal to do."

Harper went out, and Appleby, sitting down in his office, wrote up accounts until the afternoon. He dare leave no word for Harding, but that appeared unnecessary, for if Harding found San Cristoval in the possession of the Sin Verguenza he would, Appleby felt certain, understand and profit by the position. The room resembled an oven, and no more light than served to make writing possible entered the closed lattices; but with the perspiration dripping from him Appleby toiled on, and the last Spanish dollar had been accounted for when Harper and the man who carried the comida came up the stairway. Then it was with a little sigh he laid down his pen and tied the neatly engrossed doc.u.ments together. The life he led at San Cristoval suited him, and now he was to turn his back on it and go back once more, a homeless and penniless adventurer, to the Sin Verguenza. Glancing up he saw Harper leaning on a bureau and looking at him.

"That's another leaf turned down," he said. "A good deal may happen to both of us before to-morrow."

Harper nodded gravely. "Oh yes," he said. "That's why I'm going to make a kind of special dinner. I don't think I had much breakfast, and I don't quite know when we may get another."

The dinner he had given the cook instructions concerning was rather more elaborate than usual, and flasks of red and amber wine stood among the dishes and the piled-up fruit. Neither of them had much to say, but they ate, and when very little remained on the table Harper leaned back in his chair with a smile of content.

"That's one thing Morales can't take away from me, and I guess it should carry me on quite a while," he said.

They lay still, cigar in hand, for the most part of an hour and then as the sunlight faded from the patio Harper appeared to grow restless.

Appleby watched him with a little smile.

"You don't seem quite easy," he said.

Harper stared at him, and then broke into a somewhat hollow laugh. "It's a fact," he said. "I was kind of wondering if it wasn't time Pancho or one of the other men came back. I guess one could see them on the tram- line from the roof. Morales will be here in an hour or two."

He went out, and Appleby sat still, not because that was pleasant, but because he felt the necessity of holding himself in hand. He desired to retain a becoming tranquillity, and now he could only wait found that the tension was growing unendurable. There was no sound in the patio, where the light was failing, but he could hear Harper's footsteps on the flat roof above, and found himself listening eagerly as his comrade paced up and down. He stopped once, and Appleby felt his heart beating, for it seemed that something had seized Harper's attention. The footsteps, however, commenced again, and then Harper, who appeared to stop once more for a second, came hastily down the outside stairway.

Appleby felt his fingers trembling, and it was only by effort he sat still instead of moving to the door to question him. If Harper had seen anything it was evident his comrade would hear of it in a moment or two.

He came on down the stairway, and when he reached the veranda Appleby closed one hand as he moved in his chair, but Harper pa.s.sed on down the lower stairway, and Appleby sat still again, while a curious little s.h.i.+ver ran through him. Half an hour had elapsed before his comrade came in again and flung himself down in the nearest chair. He shook his head disgustedly, and his face was very grim.

"No sign of Pancho, and I'm not going back," he said. "I guess watching for folks who don't come gets kind of worrying. There's another thing. I went prospecting down the tram-line, and found that sergeant had brought his men closer in."

"I could have told you that," said Appleby. "If I had thought we could have got away I would scarcely have been quietly sitting here."

Harper's face flushed. "Well," he said, "it's Maccario or Morales now."