CHAPTER XXIDICK MAKES A BOLD VENTURE
Some delicate and important work was being done, and Stuyvesant had had his lunch sent up to the dam. Bethune and Dick joined him afterwards, and sat in the shade of a big traveling crane. Stuyvesant and Dick were hot and dirty, for it was not their custom to be content with giving orders when urgent work was going on. Bethune looked languid and immaculately neat. His speciality was mathematics, and he said he did not see why the man with mental talents should dissipate his energy by using his hands.
“It’s curious about that French liner,” Stuyvesant presently remarked. “I understand her passengers have been waiting since yesterday and she hasn’t arrived.”
“The last boat cut out Santa Brigida without notice,” Bethune replied. “My opinion of the French is that they’re a pretty casual lot.”
“On the surface. They smile and shrug where we set our teeth, but when you get down to bed-rock you don’t find much difference. I thought as you do, until I went over there and saw a people that run us close for steady, intensive industry. Their small cultivators are simply great. I’d like to put them on our poorer land in the Middle West, where we’re contentwith sixteen bushels of wheat that’s most fit for chicken feed to the acre. Then what they don’t know about civil engineering isn’t worth learning.”
Bethune made a gesture of agreement. “They’re certainly fine engineers and they’re putting up a pretty good fight just now, but these Latins puzzle me. Take the Iberian branch of the race, for example. We have Spanish peons here who’ll stand for as much work and hardship as any Anglo-Saxon I’ve met. Then an educated Spaniard’s hard to beat for intellectual subtlety. Chess is a game that’s suited to my turn of mind, but I’ve been badly whipped in Santa Brigida. They’ve brains and application, and yet they don’t progress. What’s the matter with them, anyway?”
“I expect they can’t formulate a continuous policy and stick to it, and they keep brains and labor too far apart; the two should coordinate. But I wonder what’s holding up the mail boat.”
“Do they know when she left the last port?” Dick, who had listened impatiently, asked with concealed interest.
“They do. It’s a short run and she ought to have arrived yesterday morning.”
“The Germans can’t have got her. They have no commerce-destroyers in these waters,” Bethune remarked, with a glance at Dick. “Your navy corralled the lot, I think.”
Dick wondered why Bethune looked at him, but he answered carelessly: “So one understands. But it’s strange the French company cut out the last call. There was a big quantity of freight on the mole.”
“It looks as if the agent had suspected something,” Stuyvesant replied. “However, that’s not our affair,and you want to get busy and have your specifications and cost-sheets straight when Fuller comes.”
“Then Fuller is coming back!” Dick exclaimed.
“He’ll be here to-morrow night. I imagined Bethune had told you about the cablegram he sent.”
“He didn’t; I expect he thought his getting a scratch lunch more important,” Dick replied, looking at his watch. “Well, I must see everything’s ready before the boys make a start.”
He went away with swift, decided steps through the scorching heat, and Stuyvesant smiled.
“There you have a specimen of the useful Anglo-Saxon type. I don’t claim that he’s a smart man all round, but he can concentrate on his work and put over what he takes in hand. You wouldn’t go to him for a brilliant plan, but give him an awkward job and he’ll make good. I expect he’ll get a lift up when Fuller has taken a look round.”
“He deserves it,” Bethune agreed.
Though the heat was intense and the glare from the white dam dazzling, Dick found work something of a relief. It was his habit to fix his mind upon the task in which he was engaged; but of late his thoughts had been occupied by Clare and conjectures about the Adexe coaling station and the strange black-funnel boat. The delay in the French liner’s arrival had made the matter look more urgent, but he had now an excuse for putting off its consideration. His duty to his employer came first. There were detailed plans that must be worked out before Fuller came and things he would want to know, and Dick sat up late at night in order to have the answers ready.
Fuller arrived, and after spending a few days at theworks came to Dick’s shack one evening. For an hour he examined drawings and calculations, asking Jake a sharp question now and then, and afterwards sent him away.
“You can put up the papers now,” he said. “We’ll go out on the veranda. It’s cooler there.”
He dropped into a canvas chair, for the air was stagnant and enervating, and looked down at the clustering lights beside the sea for a time. Then he said abruptly: “Jake seems to know his business. You have taught him well.”
“He learned most himself,” Dick answered modestly.
“Well,” said Fuller with some dryness, “that’s the best plan, but you put him on the right track and kept him there; I guess I know my son. Has he made trouble for you in other ways?”
“None worth mentioning.”
Fuller gave him a keen glance and then indicated the lights of the town.
“That’s the danger-spot. Does he go down there often?”
“No. I make it as difficult as possible, but can’t stop him altogether.”
Fuller nodded. “I guess you used some tact, because he likes you and you’d certainly have had trouble if you’d snubbed him up too hard. Anyway, I’m glad to acknowledge that you have put me in your debt. You can see how I was fixed. Bethune’s not the man to guide a headstrong lad, and Stuyvesant’s his boss. If he’d used any official pressure, Jake would have kicked. That’s why I wanted a steady partner for him who had no actual authority.”
“In a sense, you ran some risk in choosing me.”
“I don’t know that I chose you, to begin with,” Fuller answered with a twinkle. “I imagine my daughter made me think as I did, but I’m willing to state that her judgment was good. We’ll let that go. You have seen Jake at his work; do you think he’ll make an engineer?”
“Yes,” said Dick, and then recognizing friendship’s claim, added bluntly: “But he’ll make a better artist. He has the gift.”
“Well,” said Fuller, in a thoughtful tone, “we’ll talk of it again. In the meantime, he’s learning how big jobs are done and dollars are earned, and that’s a liberal education. However, I’ve a proposition here I’d like your opinion of.”
Dick’s heart beat as he read the document his employer handed him. It was a formal agreement by which he engaged his services to Fuller until the irrigation work was completed, in return for a salary that he thought remarkably good.
“It’s much more than I had any reason to expect,” he said with some awkwardness. “In fact, although I don’t know that I have been of much help to Jake, I’d sooner you didn’t take this way of repaying me. One would prefer not to mix friendship with business.”
“Yours is not a very common view,” Fuller replied, smiling. “However, I’m merely offering to buy your professional skill, and want to know if you’re satisfied with my terms.”
“They’re generous,” said Dick with emotion, for he saw what the change in his position might enable him to do. “There’s only one thing: the agreementis to stand until the completion of the dam. What will happen afterwards?”
“Then if I have no more use for you here, I think I can promise to find you as good or better job. Is that enough?”
Dick gave him a grateful look. “It’s difficult to tell you how I feel about it, but I’ll do my best to make good and show that you have not been mistaken.”
“That’s all right,” said Fuller, getting up. “Sign the document when you can get a witness and let me have it.”
He went away and Dick sat down and studied the agreement with a beating heart. He found his work engrossing, he liked the men he was associated with, and saw his way to making his mark in his profession, but there was another cause for the triumphant thrill he felt. Clare must be separated from Kenwardine before she was entangled in his dangerous plots, and he had brooded over his inability to come to her rescue. Now, however, one obstacle was removed. He could offer her some degree of comfort if she could be persuaded to marry him. It was obvious that she must be taken out of her father’s hands as soon as possible, and he determined to try to gain her consent next morning, though he was very doubtful of his success.
When he reached the house, Clare was sitting at a table in the patio with some work in her hand. Close by, the purple creeper spread across the wall, and the girl’s blue eyes and thin lilac dress harmonized with its deeper color. Her face and half-covered arms showed pure white against the background, but the delicate pink that had once relieved the former wasnow less distinct. The hot, humid climate had begun to set its mark on her, and Dick thought she looked anxious and perplexed.
She glanced up when she heard his step, and moving quietly forward he stopped on the opposite side of the table with his hand on a chair. He knew there was much against him and feared a rebuff, but delay might be dangerous and he could not wait. Standing quietly resolute, he fixed his eyes on the girl’s face.
“Is your father at home, Miss Kenwardine?” he asked.
“No,” said Clare. “He went out some time ago, and I cannot tell when he will come back. Do you want to see him?”
“I don’t know yet. It depends.”
He thought she was surprised and curious, but she said nothing, and nerving himself for the plunge, he resumed: “I came to see you in the first place. I’m afraid you’ll be astonished, Clare, but I want to know if you will marry me.”
She moved abruptly, turned her head for a moment, and then looked up at him while the color gathered in her face. Her expression puzzled Dick, but he imagined that she was angry.
“I am astonished. Isn’t it a rather extraordinary request, after what you said on board the launch?”
“No,” said Dick, “it’s very natural from my point of view. You see, I fell in love with you the first time we met; but I got into disgrace soon afterwards and have had a bad time since. This made it impossible for me to tell you what I felt; but things are beginning to improve——”
He stopped, seeing no encouragement in her expression,for Clare was fighting a hard battle. His blunt simplicity made a strong appeal. She had liked and trusted him when he had with callow but honest chivalry offered her his protection one night in England and he had developed fast since then. Hardship had strengthened and in a sense refined him. He looked resolute and soldierlike as he waited. Still, for his sake as well as hers, she must refuse.
“Then you must be easily moved,” she said. “You knew nothing about me.”
“I’d seen you; that was quite enough,” Dick declared and stopped. Her look was gentler and he might do better if he could lessen the distance between them and take her hand; he feared he had been painfully matter-of-fact. Perhaps he was right, but the table stood in the way, and if he moved round it, she would take alarm. It was exasperating to be baulked by a piece of furniture.
“Besides,” he resumed, “when everybody doubted me, you showed your confidence. You wrote and said——”
“But you told me you tore up the letter,” Clare interrupted.
Dick got confused. “I did; I was a fool, but the way things had been going was too much for me. You ought to understand and try to make allowances.”
“I cannot understand why you want to marry a girl you think a thief.”
Pulling himself together, Dick gave her a steady look. “I can’t let that pass, though if I begin to argue I’m lost. In a way, I’m at your mercy, because my defense can only make matters worse. But I tried to explain on board the launch.”
“The explanation wasn’t very convincing,” Clare remarked, turning her head. “Do you still believe I took your papers?”
“The plans were in my pocket when I reached your house,” said Dick, who saw he must be frank. “I don’t know that you took them, and if you did, I wouldn’t hold you responsible; but they were taken.”
“You mean that you blame my father for their loss?”
Dick hesitated. He felt that she was giving him a last opportunity, but he could not seize it.
“If I pretended I didn’t blame him, you would find me out and it would stand between us. I wish I could say I’d dropped the papers somewhere or find some other way; but the truth is best.”
Clare turned to him with a hot flush and an angry sparkle in her eyes.
“Then it’s unthinkable that you should marry the daughter of the man whom you believe ruined you. Don’t you see that you can’t separate me from my father? We must stand together.”
“No,” said Dick doggedly, knowing that he was beaten, “I don’t see that. I want you; I want to take you away from surroundings and associations that must jar. Perhaps it was foolish to think you would come, but you helped to save my life when I was ill, and I believe I was then something more to you than a patient. Why have you changed?”
She looked at him with a forced and rather bitter smile. “Need you ask? Can’t you, or won’t you, understand? Could I marry my victim, which is what you are if your suspicions are justified? If they are not, you have offered me an insult I cannot forgive.It is unbearable to be thought the daughter of a thief.”
Dick nerved himself for a last effort. “What does your father’s character matter? I want you. You will be safe from everything that could hurt you if you come to me.” He hesitated and then went on in a hoarse, determined voice: “You must come. I can’t let you live among those plotters and gamblers. It’s impossible. Clare, when I was ill and you thought me asleep, I watched you sitting in the moonlight. Your face was wonderfully gentle and I thought——”
She rose and stopped him with a gesture. “There is no more to be said, Mr. Brandon. I cannot marry you, and if you are generous, you will go.”
Dick, who had been gripping the chair hard, let his hand fall slackly and turned away. Clare watched him cross the patio, and stood tensely still, fighting against an impulse to call him back as he neared the door. Then as he vanished into the shadow of the arch she sat down with sudden limpness and buried her hot face in her hands.
CHAPTER XXIITHE OFFICIAL MIND
On the evening after Clare’s refusal, Dick entered the principal café at Santa Brigida. The large, open-fronted room was crowded, for, owing to the duty, newspapers were not generally bought by the citizens, who preferred to read them at the cafés, and theDiariohad just come in. The eagerness to secure a copy indicated that something important had happened, and after listening to the readers’ remarks, Dick gathered that the French liner had sunk and a number of her passengers were drowned. This, however, did not seem to account for the angry excitement some of the men showed, and Dick waited until a polite half-breed handed him the newspaper.
A ship’s lifeboat, filled with exhausted passengers, had reached a bay some distance along the coast, and it appeared from their stories that the liner was steaming across a smooth sea in the dark when a large vessel, which carried no lights, emerged from a belt of haze and came towards her. The French captain steered for the land, hoping to reach territorial waters, where he would be safe, but the stranger was faster and opened fire with a heavy gun. The liner held on, although she was twice hit, but after a time there was an explosion below and her colored firemen ran up on deck. Then the ship stopped, boats were hoisted out,and it was believed that several got safely away, though only one had so far reached the coast. This boat was forced to pass the attacking vessel rather close, and an officer declared that she looked like one of the Spanish liners and her funnel was black.
Dick gave the newspaper to the next man and sat still with knitted brows, for his suspicions were suddenly confirmed. The raider had a black funnel, and was no doubt the ship he had seen steering for Adexe. An enemy commerce-destroyer was lurking about the coast, and she could not be allowed to continue her deadly work, which her resemblance to the Spanish vessels would make easier. For all that, Dick saw that anything he might do would cost him much, since Clare had said that she and Kenwardine must stand together. This was true, in a sense, because if Kenwardine got into trouble, she would share his disgrace and perhaps his punishment. Moreover, she might think he had been unjustly treated and blame Dick for helping to persecute him. Things were getting badly entangled, and Dick, leaning back in his chair, vacantly looked about.
The men had gathered in groups round the tables, their dark faces showing keen excitement as they argued with dramatic gestures about international law. For the most part, they looked indignant, but Dick understood that they did not expect much from their Government. One said the English would send a cruiser and something might be done by the Americans; another explained the Monroe Doctrine in a high-pitched voice. Dick, however, tried not to listen, because difficulties he had for some time seen approaching must now be faced.
He had been forced to leave England in disgrace, and his offense would be remembered if he returned. Indeed, he had come to regard America as his home, but patriotic feelings he had thought dead had awakened and would not be denied. He might still be able to serve his country and meant to do so, though it was plain that this would demand a sacrifice. Love and duty clashed, but he must do his best and leave the rest to luck. Getting up with sudden resolution, he left the café and went to the British consulate.
When he stopped outside the building, to which the royal arms were fixed, he remarked that two peons were lounging near, but, without troubling about them, knocked at the door. There was only a Vice-Consul at Santa Brigida, and the post, as sometimes happens, was held by a merchant, who had, so a clerk stated, already gone home. Dick, however, knew where he lived and determined to seek him at his house. He looked round once or twice on his way there, without seeing anybody who seemed to be following him, but when he reached the iron gate he thought a dark figure stopped in the gloom across the street. Still, it might only be a citizen going into his house, and Dick rang the bell.
He was shown on to a balcony where the Vice-Consul sat with his Spanish wife and daughter at a table laid with wine and fruit. He did not look pleased at being disturbed, but told Dick to sit down when the ladies withdrew.
“Now,” he said, “you can state your business, but I have an appointment in a quarter of an hour.”
Dick related his suspicions about the coaling company, and described what he had seen at Adexe andthe visit of the black-funnel boat, but before he had gone far, realized that he was wasting his time. The Vice-Consul’s attitude was politely indulgent.
“This is a rather extraordinary tale,” he remarked when Dick stopped.
“I have told you what I saw and what I think it implies,” Dick answered with some heat.
“Just so. I do not doubt your honesty, but it is difficult to follow your arguments.”
“It oughtn’t to be difficult. You have heard that the French liner was sunk by a black-funnel boat.”
“Black funnels are common. Why do you imagine the vessel you saw was an auxiliary cruiser?”
“Because her crew looked like navy men. They were unusually numerous and were busy at drill.”
“Boat or fire drill probably. They often exercise them at it on board passenger ships. Besides, I think you stated that it was dark.”
Dick pondered for a few moments. He had heard that Government officials were hard to move, and knew that, in hot countries, Englishmen who marry native wives sometimes grow apathetic and succumb to the climatic lethargy. But this was not all: he had to contend against the official dislike of anything informal and unusual. Had he been in the navy, his warning would have received attention, but as he was a humble civilian he had, so to speak, no business to know anything about such matters.
“Well,” he said, “you can make inquiries and see if my conclusions are right.”
The Vice-Consul smiled. “That is not so. You can pry into the coaling company’s affairs and, if you are caught, it would be looked upon as an individualimpertinence. If I did anything of the kind, it would reflect upon the Foreign Office and compromise our relations with a friendly state. The Adexe wharf is registered according to the laws of this country as being owned by a native company.”
“Then go to the authorities and tell them what you know.”
“The difficulty is that I know nothing except that you have told me a somewhat improbable tale.”
“But you surely don’t mean to let the raider do what she likes? Her next victim may be a British vessel.”
“I imagine the British admiralty will attend to that, and I have already sent a cablegram announcing the loss of the French boat.”
Dick saw that he was doubted and feared that argument would be useless, but he would not give in.
“A raider must have coal and it’s not easy to get upon this coast,” he resumed. “You could render her harmless by cutting off supplies.”
“Do you know much about international law and how far it prohibits a neutral country from selling coal to a belligerent?”
“I don’t know anything about it; but if our Foreign Office is any good, they ought to be able to stop the thing,” Dick answered doggedly.
“Then let me try to show you how matters stand. We will suppose that your suspicions were correct and I thought fit to make representations to the Government of this country. What do you think would happen?”
“They’d be forced to investigate your statements.”
“Exactly. The head of a department would beasked to report. You probably know that every official whose business brings him into touch with it is in the coaling company’s pay; I imagine there is not a foreign trader here who does not get small favors in return for bribes. Bearing this in mind, it is easy to understand what the report would be. I should have shown that we suspected the good faith of a friendly country, and there would be nothing gained.”
“Still, you can’t let the matter drop,” Dick insisted.
“Although you have given me no proof of your statements, which seem to be founded on conjectures, I have not said that I intend to let it drop. In the meantime I am entitled to ask for some information about yourself. You look like an Englishman and have not been here long. Did you leave home after the war broke out?”
“Yes,” said Dick, who saw where he was leading, “very shortly afterwards.”
“Why? Men like you are needed for the army.”
Dick colored, but looked his questioner steadily in the face.
“I was in the army. They turned me out.”
The Vice-Consul made a gesture. “I have nothing to do with the reason for this; but you can see my difficulty. You urge me to meddle with things that require very delicate handling and with which my interference would have to be justified. No doubt, you can imagine the feelings of my superiors when I admitted that I acted upon hints given me by a stranger in the employ of Americans, who owned to having been dismissed from the British army.”
Dick got up, with his face firmly set.
“Very well. There’s no more to be said. I won’t trouble you again.”
Leaving the house, he walked moodily back to the end of the line. The Vice-Consul was a merchant and thought first of his business, which might suffer if he gained the ill-will of corrupt officials. He would, no doubt, move if he were forced, but he would demand incontestable proof, which Dick feared he could not find. Well, he had done his best and been rebuffed, and now the temptation to let the matter drop was strong. To go on would bring him into conflict with Kenwardine, and perhaps end in his losing Clare, but he must go on. For all that, he would leave the Vice-Consul alone and trust to getting some help from his employer’s countrymen. If it could be shown that the enemy was establishing a secret base for naval operations at Adexe, he thought the Americans would protest. The Vice-Consul, however, had been of some service by teaching him the weakness of his position. He must strengthen it by carefully watching what went on, and not interfere until he could do so with effect. Finding the locomotive waiting, he returned to his shack and with an effort fixed his mind upon the plans of some work that he must superintend in the morning.
For the next few days he was busily occupied. A drum of the traveling crane broke and as it could not be replaced for a time, Dick put up an iron derrick of Bethune’s design to lower the concrete blocks into place. They were forced to use such material as they could find, and the gang of peons who handled the chain-tackle made a poor substitute for a steam engine. In consequence, the work progressed slowly andStuyvesant ordered it to be carried on into the night. Jake and Bethune grumbled, but Dick found the longer hours and extra strain something of a relief. He had now no leisure to indulge in painful thoughts; besides, while he was busy at the dam he could not watch Kenwardine, and his duty to his employer justified his putting off an unpleasant task.
One hot night he stood, soaked with perspiration and dressed in soiled duck clothes, some distance beneath the top of the dam, which broke down to a lower level at the spot. There was no moon, but a row of blast-lamps that grew dimmer as they receded picked out the tall embankment with jets of pulsating flame. Glimmering silvery gray in the light, it cut against the gloom in long sweeping lines, with a molded rib that added a touch of grace where the slope got steeper towards its top. This was Dick’s innovation. He had fought hard for it and when Jake supported him Stuyvesant had written to Fuller, who sanctioned the extra cost. The rib marked the fine contour of the structure and fixed its bold curve upon the eye.
Where the upper surface broke off, two gangs of men stood beside the tackles that trailed away from the foot of the derrick. The flame that leaped with a roar from a lamp on a tripod picked out some of the figures with harsh distinctness, but left the rest dim and blurred. Dick stood eight or nine feet below, with the end of the line, along which the blocks were brought, directly above his head. A piece of rail had been clamped across the metals to prevent the truck running over the edge. Jake stood close by on the downward slope of the dam. Everything wasready for the lowering of the next block, but they had a few minutes to wait.
“That rib’s a great idea,” Jake remarked. “Tones up the whole work; it’s curious what you can do with a flowing line, but it must be run just right. Make it the least too flat and you get harshness, too full and the effect’s vulgarly pretty or voluptuous. Beauty’s severely chaste and I allow, as far as form goes, this dam’s a looker.” He paused and indicated the indigo sky, flaring lights, and sweep of pearly stone. “Then if you want color, you can revel in silver, orange, and blue.”
Dick, who nodded, shared Jake’s admiration. He had helped to build the dam and, in a sense, had come to love it. Any defacement or injury to it would hurt him. Just then a bright, blinking spot emerged from the dark at the other end of the line and increased in radiance as it came forward, flickering along the slope of stone. It was the head-lamp of the locomotive that pushed the massive concrete block they waited for. The block cut off the light immediately in front of and below it, and when the engine, snorting harshly, approached the edge of the gap somebody shouted and steam was cut off. The truck stopped just short of the rail fastened across the line, and Dick looked up.
The blast-lamp flung its glare upon the engine and the rays of the powerful head-light drove horizontally into the dark, but the space beyond the broken end of the dam was kept in shadow by the block, and the glitter above dazzled his eyes.
“Swing the derrick-boom and tell the engineer to come on a yard or two,” he said.
There was a patter of feet, a rattle of chains, and somebody called: “Adelante locomotura!”
The engine snorted, the wheels ground through the fragments of concrete scattered about the line, and the big dark mass rolled slowly forward. It seemed to Dick to be going farther than it ought, but he had ascertained that the guard-rail was securely fastened. As he watched the front of the truck, Jake, who stood a few feet to one side, leaned out and seized his shoulder.
“Jump!” he cried, pulling him forward.
Dick made an awkward leap, and alighting on the steep front of the dam, fell heavily on his side. As he clutched the stones to save himself from sliding down, a black mass plunged from the line above and there was a deafening crash as it struck the spot he had left. Then a shower of fragments fell upon him and he choked amidst a cloud of dust. Hoarse shouts broke out above, and he heard men running about the dam as he got up, half dazed.
“Are you all right, Jake?” he asked.
“Not a scratch,” was the answer; and Dick, scrambling up the bank, called for a lamp.
It was brought by a big mulatto, and Dick held up the light. The last-fitted block of the ribbed course was split in two, and the one that had fallen was scattered about in massive broken lumps. Amidst these lay the guard-rail, and the front wheels of the truck hung across the gap above. There was other damage, and Dick frowned as he looked about.
“We’ll be lucky if we get the broken molding out in a day, and I expect we’ll have to replace two of the lower blocks,” he said. “It’s going to be an awkwardand expensive job now that the cement has set.”
“Is that all?” Jake asked with a forced grin.
“It’s enough,” said Dick. “However, we’ll be better able to judge in the daylight.”
Then he turned to the engineer, who was standing beside the truck, surrounded by excited peons. “How did it happen?”
“I had my hand on the throttle when I got the order to go ahead, and let her make a stroke or two, reckoning the guard-rail would snub up the car. I heard the wheels clip and slammed the link-gear over, because it looked as if she wasn’t going to stop. When she reversed, the couplings held the car and the block slipped off.”
“Are you sure you didn’t give her too much steam?”
“No, sir. I’ve been doing this job quite a while, and know just how smart a push she wants. It was the guard-rail slipping that made the trouble.”
“I can’t understand why it did slip. The fastening clamps were firm when I looked at them.”
“Well,” remarked the engineer, “the guard’s certainly in the pit, and I felt her give as soon as the car-wheels bit.”
Dick looked hard at him and thought he spoke the truth. He was a steady fellow and a good driver.
“Put your engine in the house and take down the feed-pump you were complaining about. We won’t want her to-morrow,” he said, and dismissing the men, returned to his shack, where he sat down rather limply on the veranda.
“I don’t understand the thing,” he said to Jake. “The guard-rail’s heavy and I watched the smith makethe clamps we fixed it with. One claw went over the rail, the other under the flange of the metal that formed the track, and sudden pressure would jamb the guard down. Then, not long before the accident, I hardened up the clamp.”
“You hit it on the back?”
“Of course. I’d have loosened the thing by hitting the front.”
“That’s so,” Jake agreed, somewhat dryly. “We’ll look for the clamps in the morning. But you didn’t seem very anxious to get out of the way.”
“I expect I forgot to thank you for warning me. Anyhow, you know——”
“Yes, I know,” said Jake. “You didn’t think about it; your mind was on your job. Still, I suppose you see that if you’d been a moment later you’d have been smashed pretty flat?”
Dick gave him a quick glance. There was something curious about Jake’s tone, but Dick knew he did not mean to emphasize the value of his warning. It was plain that he had had a very narrow escape, but since one must be prepared for accidents in heavy engineering work, he did not see why this should jar his nerves. Yet they were jarred. The danger he had scarcely heeded had now a disturbing effect. He could imagine what would have happened had he delayed his leap. However, he was tired, and perhaps rather highly strung, and he got up.
“It’s late, and we had better go to bed,” he said.
CHAPTER XXIIITHE CLAMP
When work began next morning, Jake asked Dick if he should order the peons to search for the clamps that had held the guard-rail.
“I think not,” said Dick. “It would be better if you looked for the things yourself.”
“Very well. Perhaps you’re right.”
Dick wondered how much Jake suspected, particularly as he did not appear to be searching for anything when he moved up and down among the broken concrete. Half an hour later, when none of the peons were immediately about, he came up with his hand in his pocket and indicated a corner beside a block where there was a little shade and they were not likely to be overlooked.
“I’ve got one,” he remarked.
When they sat down Jake took out a piece of thick iron about six inches long, forged into something like the shape of a U, though the curve was different and one arm was shorter than the other. Much depended on the curve, for the thing was made on the model of an old-fashioned but efficient clamp that carpenters sometimes use for fastening work to a bench. A blow or pressure on one part wedged it fast, but a sharp tap on the other enabled it to be lifted off. This was convenient, because as the work progressed, thetrack along the dam had to be lengthened and the guard fixed across a fresh pair of rails.
Taking the object from Jake, Dick examined it carefully. He thought he recognized the dint where he had struck the iron, and then, turning it over, noted another mark. This had been made recently, because the surface of the iron was bright where the hammer had fallen, and a blow there would loosen the clamp. He glanced at Jake, who nodded.
“It looks very suspicious, but that’s all. You can’t tell how long the mark would take to get dull. Besides, we have moved the guard two or three times in the last few days.”
“That’s true,” said Dick. “Still, I wedged the thing up shortly before the accident. It has stood a number of shocks; in fact, it can’t be loosened by pressure on the back. When do youthinkthe last blow was struck?”
“After yours,” Jake answered meaningly.
“Then the probability is that somebody wanted the truck to fall into the hole and smash the block.”
“Yes,” said Jake, who paused and looked hard at Dick. “But I’m not sure that was all he wanted. You were standing right under the block, and if I hadn’t been a little to one side, where the lights didn’t dazzle me, the smashing of a lot of concrete wouldn’t have been the worst damage.”
Dick said nothing, but his face set hard as he braced himself against the unnerving feeling that had troubled him on the previous night. The great block had not fallen by accident; it looked as if somebody had meant to take his life. The cunning of the attempt daunted him. The blow had been struck in amanner that left him a very slight chance of escape; and his subtle antagonist might strike again.
“What are you going to do about it?” Jake resumed.
“Nothing,” said Dick.
Jake looked at him in surprise. “Don’t you see what you’re up against?”
“It’s pretty obvious; but if I ask questions, I’ll find out nothing and show that I’m suspicious. If we let the thing go as an accident, we may catch the fellow off his guard.”
“My notion is that you know more than you mean to tell. Now you began by taking care of me, but it looks as if the matter would end in my taking care of you. Seems to me you need it and I don’t like to see you playing a lone hand.”
Dick gave him a grateful smile. “If I see how you can help, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, you’ll say nothing to imply that I’m on the watch.”
“Well,” said Jake, grinning, “if you can bluff Stuyvesant, you’ll be smarter than I thought. You’re a rather obvious person and he’s not a fool.”
He went away, but Dick lighted a cigarette and sat still in the shade. He was frankly daunted, but did not mean to stop, for he saw that he was following the right clue. His reason for visiting the Adexe wharf had been guessed. He had been watched when he went to the Vice-Consul, and it was plain that his enemies thought he knew enough to be dangerous. The difficulty was that he did not know who they were. He hated to think that Kenwardine was a party to the plot, but this, while possible, was by no means certain. At Santa Brigida, a man’s life wasnot thought of much account, and it would, no doubt, have been enough if Kenwardine had intimated that Dick might cause trouble; but then Kenwardine must have known what was likely to follow his hint.
After all, however, this was not very important. He must be careful, but do nothing to suggest that he understood the risk he ran. If his antagonists thought him stupid, so much the better. He saw the difficulty of playing what Jake called a lone hand against men skilled in the intricate game; but he could not ask for help until he was sure of his ground. Besides, he must find a way of stopping Kenwardine without involving Clare. In the meantime he had a duty to Fuller, and throwing away his cigarette, resumed his work.
Two or three days later he met Kenwardine in a café where he was waiting for a man who supplied some stores to the camp. When Kenwardine saw Dick he crossed the floor and sat down at his table. His Spanish dress became him, he looked polished and well-bred, and it was hard to think him a confederate of half-breed ruffians who would not hesitate about murder. But Dick wondered whether Clare had told him about his proposal.
“I suppose I may congratulate you on your recent promotion? You certainly deserve it,” Kenwardine remarked with an ironical smile. “I imagine your conscientiousness and energy are unusual, but perhaps at times rather inconvenient.”
“Thanks!” said Dick. “How did you hear about the matter?”
“In Santa Brigida, one hears everything that goeson. We have nothing much to do but talk about our neighbors’ affairs.”
Dick wondered whether Kenwardine meant to hint that as his time was largely unoccupied he had only a small part in managing the coaling business, but he said: “We are hardly your neighbors at the camp.”
“I suppose that’s true. We certainly don’t see you often.”
This seemed to indicate that Kenwardine did not know about Dick’s recent visit. He could have no reason for hiding his knowledge, and it looked as if Clare did not tell her father everything.
“You have succeeded in keeping your young friend out of our way,” Kenwardine resumed. “Still, as he hasn’t your love of work and sober character, there’s some risk of a reaction if you hold him in too hard. Jake’s at an age when it’s difficult to be satisfied with cement.”
Dick laughed. “I really did try to keep him, but was helped by luck. We have been unusually busy at the dam and although I don’t know that his love for cement is strong he doesn’t often leave a half-finished job.”
“If you work upon his feelings in that way, I expect you’ll beat me; but after all, I’m not scheming to entangle the lad. He’s a bright and amusing youngster, but there wouldn’t be much profit in exploiting him. However, you have had some accidents at the dam, haven’t you?”
Dick was immediately on his guard, but he answered carelessly: “We broke a crane-drum, which delayed us.”
“And didn’t a truck fall down the embankment and do some damage?”
“It did,” said Dick. “We had a big molded block, which cost a good deal to make, smashed to pieces, and some others split. I had something of an escape, too, because I was standing under the block.”
He was watching Kenwardine and thought his expression changed and his easy pose stiffened. His self-control was good, but Dick imagined he was keenly interested and surprised.
“Then you ran a risk of being killed?”
“Yes. Jake, however, saw the danger and warned me just before the block fell.”
“That was lucky. But you have a curious temperament. When we began to talk of the accidents, you remembered the damage to Fuller’s property before the risk to your life.”
“Well,” said Dick, “you see I wasn’t hurt, but the damage still keeps us back.”
“How did the truck run off the line? I should have thought you’d have taken precautions against anything of the kind.”
Dick pondered. He believed Kenwardine really was surprised to hear he had nearly been crushed by the block; but the fellow was clever and had begun to talk about the accidents. He must do nothing to rouse his suspicions, and began a painstaking account of the matter, explaining that the guard-rail had got loose, but saying nothing about the clamps being tampered with. Indeed, the trouble he took about the explanation was in harmony with his character and his interest in his work, and presently Kenwardine looked bored.
“I quite understand the thing,” he said, and got up as the man Dick was waiting for came towards the table.
The merchant did not keep Dick long, and he left the café feeling satisfied. Kenwardine had probably had him watched and had had something to do with the theft of the sheet from his blotting pad, but knew nothing about the attempt upon his life. After hearing about it, he understood why the accident happened, but had no cause to think that Dick knew, and some of his fellow conspirators were responsible for this part of the plot. Dick wondered whether he would try to check them now he did know, because if they tried again, they would do so with Kenwardine’s tacit consent.
A few days later, he was sitting with Bethune and Jake one evening when Stuyvesant came in and threw a card, printed with the flag of a British steamship company, on the table.
“I’m not going, but you might like to do so,” he said.
Dick, who was nearest, picked up the card. It was an invitation to a dinner given to celebrate the first call of a large new steamship at Santa Brigida, and he imagined it had been sent to the leading citizens and merchants who imported goods by the company’s vessels. After glancing at it, he passed it on.
“I’ll go,” Bethune remarked. “After the Spartan simplicity we practise at the camp, it will be a refreshing change to eat a well-served dinner in a mailboat’s saloon, though I’ve no great admiration for British cookery.”
“It can’t be worse than the dago kind we’re usedto,” Jake broke in. “What’s the matter with it, anyhow?”
“It’s like the British character, heavy and unchanging,” Bethune replied. “A London hotel menu, with English beer and whisky, in the tropics! Only people without imagination would offer it to their guests; and then they’ve printed a list of the ports she’s going to at the bottom. Would any other folk except perhaps the Germans, couple an invitation with a hint that they were ready to trade? If a Spaniard comes to see you on business, he talks for half an hour about politics or your health, and apologizes for mentioning such a thing as commerce when he comes to the point.”
“The British plan has advantages,” said Stuyvesant. “You know what you’re doing when you deal with them.”
“That’s so. We know, for example, when this boat will arrive at any particular place and when she’ll sail; while you can reckon on a French liner’s being three or four days late and on the probability of a Spaniard’s not turning up at all. But whether you have revolutions, wars, or tidal waves, the Britisher sails on schedule.”
“There’s some risk in that just now,” Stuyvesant observed.
Bethune turned to Jake. “You had better come. The card states there’ll be music, and the agent will hire Vallejo’s band, which is pretty good. Guitars, mandolins, and fiddles on the poop, and señoritas in gauzy dresses flitting through graceful dances in the after well! The entertainment ought to appeal to your artistic taste.”
“I’m going,” Jake replied.
“So am I,” said Dick.
Jake grinned. “That’s rather sudden, isn’t it? However, you may be needed to look after Bethune.”
An evening or two later, they boarded the launch at the town mole. The sea was smooth and glimmered with phosphorescence in the shadow of the land, for the moon had not risen far above the mountains. Outside the harbor mouth, the liner’s long, black hull cut against the dusky blue, the flowing curve of her sheer picked out by a row of lights. Over this rose three white tiers of passenger decks, pierced by innumerable bright points, with larger lights in constellations outside, while masts and funnels ran up, faintly indicated, into the gloom above. She scarcely moved to the lift of the languid swell, but as the undulations passed there was a pale-green shimmer about her waterline that magnified the height to her topmost deck. She looked unsubstantial, rather like a floating fairy palace than a ship, and as the noisy launch drew nearer Jake gave his imagination rein.
“She was made, just right, by magic; a ship of dreams,” he said. “Look how she glimmers, splashed with cadmium radiance, on velvety blue; and her formlessness outside the lights wraps her in mystery. Yet you get a hint of swiftness.”
“You know she has power and speed,” Bethune interrupted.
“No,” said Jake firmly, “it’s not a matter of knowledge; she appeals to your imagination. You feel that airy fabric must travel like the wind.” Then he turned to Dick, who was steering. “There’s a boat ahead with a freight of señoritas in white andorange gossamer; they know something about grace of line in this country. Are you going to rush past them, like a dull barbarian, in this kicking, snorting launch?”
“I’ll make for the other side of the ship, if you like.”
“You needn’t go so far,” Jake answered with a chuckle. “But you might muzzle your rackety engine.”
Dick, who had seen the boat, gave her room enough, but let the engine run. He imagined that Jake’s motive for slowing down might be misunderstood by the señoritas’ guardian, since a touch of Moorish influence still colors the Spaniard’s care of his women. As the launch swung to starboard her red light shone into the boat, and Dick recognized Don Sebastian sitting next a stout lady in a black dress. There were three or four girls beside them, and then Dick’s grasp on the tiller stiffened, for the ruby beam picked out Clare’s face. He thought it wore a tired look, but she turned her head, as if dazzled, and the light passed on, and Dick’s heart beat as the boat dropped back into the gloom. Since Kenwardine had sent Clare with Don Sebastian, he could not be going, and Dick might find an opportunity for speaking to her alone. He meant to do so, although the interview would not be free from embarrassment. Then he avoided another boat, and stopping the engine, steered for the steamer’s ladder.