CHAPTER V
AT THE MOUTH OF THE PALMONES RIVER
Scott had certainly done exceedingly well in his study of the chart, which Louis had obtained for him, and he remembered much more than might have been expected of him; but he had failed to mention several towers on the shore, which could hardly be seen at night. There was one of them about a quarter of a mile inshore from the mouth of the river. At two cables' length from the shore the water was ten fathoms deep; but at the mouth of the Palmones there is a bar, and the bottom in the vicinity was mud.
The pilot had obeyed his orders, and he was not to be blamed, though the steamer was now aground. As soon as the grating of the keel was heard, and the boat came to a full stop, Scott rang the bell to stop her, and then to back her. But she had run on the bar when going at full speed, and she did not come off so easily as desired.
"How does she head now, Musther Shcott?" asked Felix in a rallying tone.
"South south-west by north north-east," replied the pilot, who was always good-natured except when he got mad.
"Faix, I think she's headed down for the place the volcanos vintilate."
"She isn't making any headway in that direction," added Scott.
"She will come off in a few minutes, for it will not be high tide for some time yet," said Louis. "You may as well stop the screw and take it easy, for she seems to be stuck hard. We are in no great hurry."
"What do you call this river, Scott?" asked Felix.
"The Palmones."
"And what might that mean, Dr. Belgrave?"
"If you mean me, I don't know," replied Louis.
"Is there anything you don't know, Professor?"
"There is at least one thing in particular that I don't know, and that is why you call me doctor and professor, Flix. I am not a pedant, and if you call me by such names, I shall give you the highest-sounding title I can find," replied Louis, rather tartly.
"I won't do it then; I didn't mean to vex you."
"You didn't vex me; but you talk to me as though I set myself up for a very learned or a very pretentious fellow. Barbers and bootblacks call themselves professors in these days; and there is no honor in the title unless a man is really a graduate of a college, and is what the name implies. I don't know what Palmones means, and it may be the proper name of some Spanish don."
"The boat is close aboard of us," said Scott, coming out of the pilot-house.
"And we are in for an advinture," chuckled Felix.
"I don't see any adventure yet," added Louis.
"Steamer, ahoy!" shouted a man in the bow of the boat.
"Answer him, Scott," said Louis.
"En el vapor!" shouted one in the stern-sheets of the craft, as though he thought the steamer's people might not understand English.
"In the boat!" replied the pilot.
The strangers did not wait for anything more to be said, but came alongside the Salihé, the man in the stern grasping the rail to hold the boat. As well as they could be made out in the dim light of the moon, they were not English lords nor Spanish grandees. On the contrary, they were rather a piratical-looking set of men. They were talking among themselves, but in Spanish; and the man in the bow appeared to be the only one who spoke English.
Louis was not at all pleased with the situation; and he thought it was possible, after all, that there might be an adventure to wind up the moonlight excursion in the bay. He found his knowledge of Spanish was likely to be serviceable, for he could understand all that he could hear of what was passing in the after part of the craft. The man in the stern called to the one in the bow to leap on board of the steamer. The former looked like a cut-throat villain. He wore a woollen cap in sugar-loaf form with the point of it turned over on the side of his head.
It looked as though the party intended to board the Salihé, and Louis took Felix by the arm, and led him to the rail of the yacht, in order to prevent anything of this kind if possible. At the same time he told Scott to make another attempt to back the steamer off the bar. The pilot returned to the wheel and rang two bells. The screw began to revolve, and the boat began to shake, for Felipe had a full head of steam, having just replenished the furnace with coal, in preparation for the work he was now called upon to perform. For a minute or so the yacht was shaking under the pressure applied.
Setting the wheel amidships, Scott came out of the pilot-house, and placed himself at the side of Louis. In the adventure on the island of Teneriffe, in which his present companions, with the exception of the engineer, had been captured to obtain a ransom from the millionaires, Scott had been on the wrong side, and was engaged against his present friends. On the current occasion he seemed to be desirous of redeeming his character, so far as it had not already been done, and to prove his loyalty to the owner of the Guardian-Mother.
"Board her!" called the Spaniard in the stern in his own language, evidently supposing from the answer in English, and from the appearance of those on the forecastle of the steamer, that they could not understand him. "Board her, Gray!"
"No, no," replied the man called Gray, in Spanish. "We don't want any trouble about this business. This is Giles Chickworth's steamer; but he is not on board of her, so far as I can see."
"There is not a particle of wind, and we cannot sail the Golondrina down the bay," continued the Spaniard impatiently. "You waste time, and we shall all be lost, and all the goods with us."
This remark fully enlightened Louis in regard to the character of the villanous-looking fellows in the boat. They werecontrabandistas, as smugglers are called in Spanish. The town of San Roque on the hill has the reputation of being largely the abode of this class of people, and the surrounding country doubtless is inhabited by great numbers of them.
"Gibraltar is a free port, and a resort in consequence of Spanish smugglers, who drive an amazing trade by introducing contraband goods into Spain. The British government is not altogether free from a charge of a breach of faith, in the toleration it has given to these dishonest men; for it is bound by many engagements to use its best exertions to prevent any fraud on the Spanish revenues, in consequence of its possession of this peninsula." This is an extract from an English book, published in London. The writer has not set up a windmill for the purpose of giving the knight-errant on board of the Salihé a job to knock it down.
It was plain enough to Louis, who had read the account of Gibraltar from which we have quoted, that the occupants of the boat alongside had a small vessel in the Palmones, loaded for a voyage to some port in Spain. The wind had been tolerably fresh during the afternoon, but at sunset it had entirely subsided, and at the present time the surface of the bay was glassy in the moonlight. The custom-house officials from Algeciras or elsewhere might pounce upon them before morning, or the next day if the vessel was compelled to remain in the river for the want of wind.
"Is Captain Chickworth on board of the steamer?" asked Gray, addressing those on the forecastle of the steamer.
"He is not on board," replied Louis.
At this moment the engine, which had been doing its most vigorous work, triumphed over the mud, and began to move, to the great satisfaction of all the party on board, and perhaps to the discomfiture of those in the boat. She went astern very slowly, as though she had not yet fully conquered her enemy at the bottom of the bay. Gray, who was still holding on at the rail of the steamer, looked about him, as if to interpret the motion he could not help feeling. Then he said something to the man nearest to him, who passed up to him the painter, though those on board could not see what was done.
"All right now!" exclaimed Scott, as he ran into the pilot-house and grasped the spokes of the wheel.
"Don't crow till you are out of the woods," added Louis.
"She has got started and she will go it now," said Felix, as he went to the bow to see what progress the steamer was making.
The opportunity for which the boatmen had probably been watching appeared to have come when Louis turned his attention to the movement of the Milesian, for at that moment Gray sprang over the rail of the yacht to the deck, with the painter in his hand. There was a movement of his companions in the boat to follow him; but the English-speaking member of the band interposed, and prevented them from doing so.
"We will try gentle measures first," said he, as Louis interpreted his Spanish; and he spoke it very fluently, if not as correctly as Louis had been taught by his learned professor.
"If Captain Chickworth is not on board of the steamer, who is in command of her?" demanded Gray, as he made fast the painter of the boat at the rail.
"I am in command of her," replied Louis; and the situation seemed to call upon him to act without any election or appointment to the leadership of his party.
"Do you happen to have any name?" inquired Gray.
"My name is Belgrave, at your service."
"Then I suppose you hail from Belgravia in London."
"No, sir; I hail from Von Blonk Park."
"Then you speak English very well for a Dutchman. I never heard of the place you come from; but it is all the same," continued Gray, evidently proceeding to use the gentle measures of which he had spoken. "The Dutch are a very thrifty and money-making people."
"They are, like the Scotch, of whom you are one, I should judge, though you have but little of the dialect in your speech, and you speak English very well indeed, to return your compliment," replied Louis, seeing that Felix and Morris were keeping a close watch over the Spaniards in the boat.
If Gray wished to use gentle measures, the self-appointed commander of the Salihé was willing to meet him half-way, and was not disposed to resort to violence as long as it could be avoided, or even to harshness of speech.
"I am a Scotchman, and I am proud of my country," added Gray. "You are a Dutchman, though you speak English perfectly. I suppose you are ready, as Scotchmen and Dutchmen always are, to make a little money."
"I cannot say that I am," replied Louis rather coldly.
"Then you are a very odd Dutchman."
"And you are a very odd Scotchman."
"I dare say I am; but I do not see in what particular I am odd at the present moment."
"Why, you propose to give me a chance to make some money instead of making it yourself, which is not at all like a Scotchman."
"Quiere V. atropellar?" (Will you hurry up?) shouted the Spaniard in the stern of the boat angrily.
"My friend is impatient," added Gray.
"I see he is."
"Do you speak Spanish?" demanded the Scotchman, evidently startled at the suggestion of Louis's reply.
"I do not just now; but if your friend is impatient, I will not detain him or you a single moment more, and you can return to your boat at once."
By this time the Salihé was under full headway, and the boat was dragged at a rather uncomfortable speed for those on board of it. At this stage of the proceedings the pilot rang one bell to stop the steamer.