Chapter Fourteen.

Chapter Fourteen.In the Face of Death.When Jim recovered consciousness, it was to find himself in a small dark cell, whether on board a ship or on land he could not tell, for there was no window in his prison, and there was not a particle of that motion which he knew there would have been had he been at sea; but he presently came to the conclusion that he must be in one of the “punishment cells” aboard some ship lying in the harbour, for he thought that, now and again, he could hear the faint plash and gurgle of water close at hand, a sound similar to that which he had often heard when down about the bilges of theBlanco Encalada, far below the water-line. He also very soon realised that, in addition to being in prison, he had chains upon his legs, and further, that those chains were fastened to a ring, or staple, set into the wall of the chamber. The poor lad was consumed by a raging thirst, too; while the wound in his shoulder, inflicted either by a bullet or a piece of flying shell, was occasioning him very great pain. If he only had a light, he reflected, things would not be quite so bad, and he rummaged among his pockets in the endeavour to find a box of matches which he knew had been in his pocket when he was thrown overboard off theJanequeo. They were in a tin box, so that it was just possible that the water would not have had time to get to them during the short period of his immersion; and, in any case, as his clothing was very nearly dry again, it was more than likely that the matches would be the same.After trying several pockets, and discovering that they had already been gone through, and that all articles of any value, including his watch and chain, had been taken from him, he found the box for which he was searching in the hip-pocket of his trousers; and, to his great delight, the wet had not reached its contents. He therefore struck a light, and the first thing his eyes rested upon was a large pitcher of water, and a plate containing a piece of black bread and several slices of pemmican or dried meat. These had been placed close beside him, and he was thankful that he had not accidentally capsized the water-jug in the darkness. He seized and drank at it eagerly, and when he had half-finished the contents he discovered that he was famished with hunger. He therefore struck another match and, by its light, possessed himself of the food, which he proceeded to devour ravenously, and finished off the entire supply before his hunger was satisfied. Having made a good meal, he felt very much better, and then by the light of a tiny fire, made of match-stalks, scraps of straw, and similar odds and ends, he managed, with some difficulty, to strip off his coat and shirt, and to attend, in some small degree, to the wound in his shoulder.It presented a somewhat inflamed appearance, so he improvised a pad and bandage by tearing strips off his shirt. These he soaked in the precious remainder of his drinking water and wrapped them round the injured part, binding the whole tightly in place with a strip of linen wound right round his body. This having been done, he felt so much more comfortable that he began to think a little natural sleep would do him no harm, and he accordingly composed himself to slumber upon the heap of straw which had been thrown down in one corner of the cell.How long, he wondered, had he been in this miserable hole? It must certainly have been a good many hours, or he would not have felt so intensely hungry and thirsty; and he also wondered in what ship, if any, he was, and how the Peruvians would treat the man who had blown up three of their finest ships, leaving them only the bare skeleton of a navy.He did not think very long, however; for he was fatigued to the point of exhaustion, and soon sank into a state of complete oblivion. How long he had slept he could not tell, but he was awakened by the noise of a door opening, and the shining of a bright light full upon his face. Before he could fully collect his faculties the bearer of the lamp, a burly Peruvian seaman with the nameUnionon the front of his cap, bade him in a rough tone of voice stand up, at the same time producing a key from among a number which hung at his belt and unlocking the young Englishman’s irons. As they fell away from his limbs Jim heaved a sigh of relief, which the seaman heard; and hearing, remarked: “You need not be so glad to get them off, you young whipper-snapper; you will be free for only a few minutes, while the captain sees you, and after he has done with you, you will probably be shot—or worse! So you need not look so pleased.”Needless to say, after the communication of this item of information Jim did not feel exactly jubilant; but the fellow, he considered, might only have been speaking thus to vent his ill-will; and in any case Jim was not going to let him see that what he had said affected him in the least. He therefore merely answered: “We shall see what we shall see; fate is fate, and nobody can alter that.”The fellow made no reply in words, but, uttering a raucous laugh, bade Jim precede him out of the cell, and mind that he played no tricks or he would get a bullet through him. Then the seaman locked the door, pocketed the key, and placing his rifle with its fixed bayonet at the “charge,” ordered the prisoner to walk on in front, which Jim did; keeping his eyes very wide open, meanwhile, so as to make a note of the position of the cell and its surroundings for possible use on some future occasion.They first passed along a passage flanked with other cells, similar to Jim’s, that in which he had been confined being the last of a row, and then they came to an iron-studded door, which the prisoner was commanded to open. It opened at his touch, and the Englishman and his guard passed through it, finding themselves immediately upon theUnion’slower deck. As the Peruvian marine guided Jim through the ship, with the point of his fixed bayonet, the young Englishman took the opportunity to satisfy his curiosity regarding this famous craft—a curiosity which was perfectly natural in view of the fact that he had himself fought an action with her, and chased her while he was in theAngamos. He smiled as his eyes fell upon one of the beams supporting the main deck, for in it were embedded several pieces of shell which the Peruvians had not seen fit to remove; and he knew that they were the fragments of a missile, fired by his own cruiser, which had entered one of theUnion’sopen gun-ports that day of the battle in the Second Narrows.But his examination of the interior of the corvette was necessarily only a very cursory one, for he was hurried forward by a prod from the sentry’s bayonet whenever he showed a disposition to loiter. They presently mounted a ladder leading from the lower to the main deck, walked along the latter toward the stern, and presently Jim found himself outside the door of a cabin in the extreme after-end of the ship, which he shrewdly surmised belonged to the skipper.The sentry then grounded his rifle, knocked upon the door, opened it slightly, and announced in gruff tones: “The prisoner, sir!”There was a short pause, broken only by the rustling of papers, and then a low, carefully modulated voice replied: “Bring the fellow in, then, sentry”; and Jim was ushered into the presence of Captain Villavicencio, the famous captain of the Peruvian corvette.Entering, Douglas found himself in a large and airy cabin, situated in the extreme after-end of the ship, opening on to a narrow gallery running round the stern of the ship, from quarter to quarter. Two tall and narrow doors which gave exit on to this gallery, and which now stood open, disclosed a view of Callao harbour, with the water shimmering in the rays of the newly risen sun, for it was early morning. In the centre of the cabin, which was most luxuriously furnished, stood a magnificent mahogany writing-table, at which sat the man whose name was still ringing through a whole continent. He was an extremely handsome individual, and his enormous proportions were well set off by the dark blue and gold of his naval uniform. He had jet-black curly hair, and a short, pointed beard; while the dark eyes which looked out from beneath thick, overhanging brows, seemed to pierce through and through the individual toward whom his glance was directed. Jim saw at once that this was a man among a thousand, one who would make a name for himself, and come to the front in spite of all opposition. But there was a certain subtle something about the Peruvian which inspired in the young man a feeling almost akin to terror. The eyes, for instance, had a distinctly tigerish look about them, and the man’s whole personality was strongly suggestive of a feline nature. Those deep-set dark eyes, Jim knew instinctively, could, at times, flash forth lightnings deadly in their intensity; while that low, purring voice could also take on a note of such deadly menace as would make the hearer’s blood curdle. The steel-pointed claw beneath the velvet glove was all too apparent to the young Englishman, and he looked forward to the coming interview with feelings that were anything but pleasant. He felt as though he were in the power of some gigantic cat which might play with him until it was tired of that amusement, and would then turn and rend him. No wonder, he thought to himself, that the Chilians feared this man, and spared no pains in their endeavours to destroy him and his ship.In response to a wave of Villavicencio’s hand, Jim took up a position on the side of the table opposite to that occupied by the skipper, while the sentry posted himself close alongside the prisoner. Then the Peruvian busied himself with some papers for a few minutes, apparently oblivious of Jim’s presence. At length, having found that for which he was searching, he glanced up, and his gaze flickered over Jim like summer lightning, inspiring in the young man so strong a feeling of repulsion that it almost amounted to nausea. There was something horribly magnetic in the look, and Jim felt that this man possessed some strange occult power which was lacking in most human beings.After looking at the young man for a few seconds, Villavicencio turned to the sentry and remarked, “I shall not need your presence, I think, Jacinto. You may leave the room, but post yourself outside my cabin door, and see that we are not interrupted.”The sentry gravely presented arms, and walked out of the cabin, closing the door softly behind him. When he had gone the skipper took up a blank sheet of paper and a pencil, wrote down a few lines on the paper, and then looking at his prisoner, said in a low, purring tone—“You are the young Chilian naval officer who was in charge of the torpedo-boat which destroyed three of our ships the night before last, are you not?”Jim replied that he was.“Well,” resumed Villavicencio, “you will be sorry, I am sure, to hear that all your comrades were drowned when theJanequeo—that was the name of the boat, I believe—went down. You are the sole survivor. By the way, how many men had you with you?”“There were eighteen of us altogether,” replied Douglas.The skipper made a brief note on the paper before him and then remarked softly, “H’m, it is a pity that they were all drowned. I should have much liked to have saved a few more of them.”Although there was absolutely no fault to be found with the sentiment expressed by the captain, Jim felt instinctively that the words possessed a double meaning, and he shivered in spite of the heat of the morning, which was already becoming excessive.“What is your name, young man?” was the next question, and upon Jim answering, his reply was noted down by his interrogator upon the paper before him. Just as he had finished writing a thought seemed to strike him suddenly and he looked up quickly from the sheet.“Were you ever on board the Chilian cruiserAngamos?” he inquired, still in the same low and even tones, but with a curious new thrill in his voice.“Yes,” replied Jim, looking him straight in the face, “I had the honour to command that ship upon the occasion when she encountered theUnionin the Straits of Magellan. If I remember rightly, theUniondid not stay to finish our little encounter.”“Ah–h–h,” breathed Villavicencio, through his teeth, “so youwerethe man in command of the cruiser. I thought you might be when I heard your name, but you struck me as being rather young for the post. By the way, how old are you?”Jim told him, not without a certain curious sinking sensation about his heart.“So young as that? Dear me, dear me! it certainlydoesseem a pity, but it cannot be helped,” said the captain. “Your name does not sound like a Chilian one, however. Of what nationality are you, if I may ask?”“I am an Englishman,” replied Jim, “and proud of the fact,” he immediately added.Villavicencio appeared to be sunk in thought for a few seconds, during which he ejaculated “Caramba!” and “Carrajo!” several times. The last item of information seemed to be both unexpected and unpleasant. Presently, however, he muttered to himself, “Well, I don’t suppose it matters very much. People are liable to accidents here as well as elsewhere, and if inquiries should be made I can easily plead ignorance. Only, I shall have to alter the method of it. My first ideamightpossibly attract too much attention. However—I shall see.” Aloud, he went on, “Have you any relations in this part of the world, Señor Douglas?”Inconsequent as the question appeared to be, Jim felt an uncanny, creepy sensation about the roots of his hair, but his voice did not shake as he replied, “No, I have no relations either in Chili or in any other part of the world. I am absolutely alone.”Villavicencio’s face at once brightened, and he rubbed his hands, remarking, “Ah! then so much the better, Señor Douglas, for in that case they will not miss you.” Then his whole appearance changed, and his voice dropped to a harsh, hissing note as he resumed, “It is a great pity, though, that you are an Englishman, and so well known in the Chilian navy, for that fact prevents me from dealing as I had intended with the miscreant who destroyed two of our ships and seriously damaged a third. But though I cannot punish you as I should have liked, I can andwillhave you shot, and that immediately, on the deck of my ship, theUnion, the vessel which, you so pleasantly remarked just now, ran away from your cruiser and her consort in the Straits.”“But,” exclaimed Douglas, in astonishment, “I am a prisoner of war, and I demand to be treated as such. I have done nothing but my duty, nothing to merit death at your hands; and even if I had, I have yet to learn that one man only, even though he be the captain of a corvette, can sit in judgment upon a prisoner and sentence him to death. I am at least entitled to a proper court-martial, if I am to be tried for my life.”Villavicencio laughed. “What you say, my dear young man, is no doubt technically correct; butheremight is right, and I will deal with you as I please, as you shall very soon see. Sentry!” he called, suddenly raising his voice and smiling evilly into Jim’s face.For a brief moment Douglas was on the point of leaping across the table and endeavouring to strangle the Peruvian where he sat, and neither the man’s sword at his side nor his huge proportions would have intimidated him, but there was that curious look in Villavicencio’s eyes which seemed to hypnotise and chain poor Jim to the spot on which he stood. The next second the sentry entered, and it was too late to think about resistance.“Sentry,” said the skipper, “take the prisoner back to his cell, and see that he does not attempt to escape on the way; he looks desperate. When you have locked him up in safety, send Lieutenant Rodriguez to me at once.”Like a man in a dream, Jim marched to the door, scarcely hearing the skipper’s sauve voice remarking: “Hasta la vista, Señor Douglas; I will not sayadios, for we shall meet again—once more.”The cabin door then closed, and Jim was conducted back to his cell, followed by the curious glances of the men who were assembled about the decks. Once back in his prison, he seemed able to think more connectedly, and he began to wonder whether or not there might be some means of escape from this semi-human creature’s clutches. He had done absolutely nothing to merit this threatened summary execution, and he felt convinced that his sentence was simply due to the skipper’s own desire for personal vengeance on the man who had made him turn and fly upon that memorable day at the Second Narrows. If it really was so, there was nothing to be hoped, Jim felt, from the man’s clemency; for he clearly knew no more of the meaning of the word “mercy” than does an untamed tiger.Thus thinking, Douglas fell into a deep and gloomy reverie, from which he was aroused by the sounds of footsteps clattering about above his head, accompanied by the occasional clank of arms, and several short, crisp words of command. It sounded as though a body of men had been formed up on the deck above him, and had then been marched off to some other place. In a moment the horrible truth struck him; it was the firing-party which had been told off for his own execution!That he was right was proved by the fact that he almost immediately afterwards heard footsteps approaching the door and echoing along the passage. There was a rattle of keys, and he was confronted, this time, by two armed seamen, who roughly bade him get on his feet and accompany them. The poor lad was too thunderstruck to move for a few moments, so one of the men prodded him roughly with his bayonet, and again bade him rise. Jim then got on his legs, with the blood streaming from the thrust which had been inflicted in his thigh, and between the two guards he again made his way to the main deck. This time, however, he was not taken so far aft as before, but was conducted up the main companion stairs on to the upper deck.Having arrived there, the intense light from the brilliant sun nearly blinded him after his imprisonment in the pitchy blackness of his cell; but as soon as he could see clearly he at once perceived, drawn up in single line across the quarter-deck, a body of men armed with rifles, and he knew that this was indeed the firing-party which Villavicencio had promised him. The skipper was nowhere in sight; but the lieutenant, Rodriguez, stood at the end of the firing-line with his drawn sword in his hand. Jim was piloted by his guards past the end of the firing-party and placed with his back against a number of stout planks reared on end, which were there for the purpose of stopping the bullets after they had passed through the young man’s body. It was only when the lieutenant came up to him and began to bandage his eyes that Jim recovered from the state of semi-coma into which he had been thrown by the news of his impending execution; but the touch of the Peruvian’s hands recalled him to his senses and, flinging the man’s fingers aside, he protested vigorously against the gross injustice and inhumanity of the proceeding.The only answer was a short word of command from Rodriguez, in reply to which the two guards seized Douglas by the arms and pinioned him so that further struggles were impossible. The bandage was then adjusted, and Jim was forced back against the planks. The guards then stood aside; but, Jim’s arms being now bound behind him, resistance was useless and escape impossible. Rather, therefore, than engage in a useless and undignified struggle, he determined to put a bold face on the matter, and meet his fate like a man. Accordingly, he stood still, waiting for the end.He heard the sharp command to load, then to present; and he was nerving himself to hear the fatal word “Fire!” when the voice of Villavicencio broke the intense stillness. What he said Jim did not know, but the command to fire did not come. Instead, the rifles were grounded with a clash, and Douglas heard somebody walking toward him.Then the Peruvian skipper’s voice broke the intense silence. “Take off that bandage,” he commanded; and the handkerchief being stripped from Jim’s eyes he found himself looking into those of Villavicencio.“You are reprieved, Señor Englishman,” he said; “I have just received a letter which has induced me to change my mind about you. Instead, therefore, of shooting you, I am sending you, together with a number of your comrades, the Chilian officers whom I captured in theRimac, to the silver mines on the shores of Lake Titicaca. That will, in some sort, compensate me for your insulting remark about the incident in the Second Narrows, for I can promise you that your life, and the lives of your comrades, will be made a very purgatory for you. Shooting is much too easy a death for you, my friend; you will die, all the same, in the silver mines; but the process of dying will be slow and very unpleasant. You will start on your journey to-morrow, señor; and you will have a splendid opportunity to view the beauties of the country, for you will walk the whole distance, which is several hundred miles. And now, señor, I bid you a finaladios. Guards, take the man away and lodge him again in his cell. Look after him well; for you will pay for it with your lives if you let him escape. Again, señor,adios!”

When Jim recovered consciousness, it was to find himself in a small dark cell, whether on board a ship or on land he could not tell, for there was no window in his prison, and there was not a particle of that motion which he knew there would have been had he been at sea; but he presently came to the conclusion that he must be in one of the “punishment cells” aboard some ship lying in the harbour, for he thought that, now and again, he could hear the faint plash and gurgle of water close at hand, a sound similar to that which he had often heard when down about the bilges of theBlanco Encalada, far below the water-line. He also very soon realised that, in addition to being in prison, he had chains upon his legs, and further, that those chains were fastened to a ring, or staple, set into the wall of the chamber. The poor lad was consumed by a raging thirst, too; while the wound in his shoulder, inflicted either by a bullet or a piece of flying shell, was occasioning him very great pain. If he only had a light, he reflected, things would not be quite so bad, and he rummaged among his pockets in the endeavour to find a box of matches which he knew had been in his pocket when he was thrown overboard off theJanequeo. They were in a tin box, so that it was just possible that the water would not have had time to get to them during the short period of his immersion; and, in any case, as his clothing was very nearly dry again, it was more than likely that the matches would be the same.

After trying several pockets, and discovering that they had already been gone through, and that all articles of any value, including his watch and chain, had been taken from him, he found the box for which he was searching in the hip-pocket of his trousers; and, to his great delight, the wet had not reached its contents. He therefore struck a light, and the first thing his eyes rested upon was a large pitcher of water, and a plate containing a piece of black bread and several slices of pemmican or dried meat. These had been placed close beside him, and he was thankful that he had not accidentally capsized the water-jug in the darkness. He seized and drank at it eagerly, and when he had half-finished the contents he discovered that he was famished with hunger. He therefore struck another match and, by its light, possessed himself of the food, which he proceeded to devour ravenously, and finished off the entire supply before his hunger was satisfied. Having made a good meal, he felt very much better, and then by the light of a tiny fire, made of match-stalks, scraps of straw, and similar odds and ends, he managed, with some difficulty, to strip off his coat and shirt, and to attend, in some small degree, to the wound in his shoulder.

It presented a somewhat inflamed appearance, so he improvised a pad and bandage by tearing strips off his shirt. These he soaked in the precious remainder of his drinking water and wrapped them round the injured part, binding the whole tightly in place with a strip of linen wound right round his body. This having been done, he felt so much more comfortable that he began to think a little natural sleep would do him no harm, and he accordingly composed himself to slumber upon the heap of straw which had been thrown down in one corner of the cell.

How long, he wondered, had he been in this miserable hole? It must certainly have been a good many hours, or he would not have felt so intensely hungry and thirsty; and he also wondered in what ship, if any, he was, and how the Peruvians would treat the man who had blown up three of their finest ships, leaving them only the bare skeleton of a navy.

He did not think very long, however; for he was fatigued to the point of exhaustion, and soon sank into a state of complete oblivion. How long he had slept he could not tell, but he was awakened by the noise of a door opening, and the shining of a bright light full upon his face. Before he could fully collect his faculties the bearer of the lamp, a burly Peruvian seaman with the nameUnionon the front of his cap, bade him in a rough tone of voice stand up, at the same time producing a key from among a number which hung at his belt and unlocking the young Englishman’s irons. As they fell away from his limbs Jim heaved a sigh of relief, which the seaman heard; and hearing, remarked: “You need not be so glad to get them off, you young whipper-snapper; you will be free for only a few minutes, while the captain sees you, and after he has done with you, you will probably be shot—or worse! So you need not look so pleased.”

Needless to say, after the communication of this item of information Jim did not feel exactly jubilant; but the fellow, he considered, might only have been speaking thus to vent his ill-will; and in any case Jim was not going to let him see that what he had said affected him in the least. He therefore merely answered: “We shall see what we shall see; fate is fate, and nobody can alter that.”

The fellow made no reply in words, but, uttering a raucous laugh, bade Jim precede him out of the cell, and mind that he played no tricks or he would get a bullet through him. Then the seaman locked the door, pocketed the key, and placing his rifle with its fixed bayonet at the “charge,” ordered the prisoner to walk on in front, which Jim did; keeping his eyes very wide open, meanwhile, so as to make a note of the position of the cell and its surroundings for possible use on some future occasion.

They first passed along a passage flanked with other cells, similar to Jim’s, that in which he had been confined being the last of a row, and then they came to an iron-studded door, which the prisoner was commanded to open. It opened at his touch, and the Englishman and his guard passed through it, finding themselves immediately upon theUnion’slower deck. As the Peruvian marine guided Jim through the ship, with the point of his fixed bayonet, the young Englishman took the opportunity to satisfy his curiosity regarding this famous craft—a curiosity which was perfectly natural in view of the fact that he had himself fought an action with her, and chased her while he was in theAngamos. He smiled as his eyes fell upon one of the beams supporting the main deck, for in it were embedded several pieces of shell which the Peruvians had not seen fit to remove; and he knew that they were the fragments of a missile, fired by his own cruiser, which had entered one of theUnion’sopen gun-ports that day of the battle in the Second Narrows.

But his examination of the interior of the corvette was necessarily only a very cursory one, for he was hurried forward by a prod from the sentry’s bayonet whenever he showed a disposition to loiter. They presently mounted a ladder leading from the lower to the main deck, walked along the latter toward the stern, and presently Jim found himself outside the door of a cabin in the extreme after-end of the ship, which he shrewdly surmised belonged to the skipper.

The sentry then grounded his rifle, knocked upon the door, opened it slightly, and announced in gruff tones: “The prisoner, sir!”

There was a short pause, broken only by the rustling of papers, and then a low, carefully modulated voice replied: “Bring the fellow in, then, sentry”; and Jim was ushered into the presence of Captain Villavicencio, the famous captain of the Peruvian corvette.

Entering, Douglas found himself in a large and airy cabin, situated in the extreme after-end of the ship, opening on to a narrow gallery running round the stern of the ship, from quarter to quarter. Two tall and narrow doors which gave exit on to this gallery, and which now stood open, disclosed a view of Callao harbour, with the water shimmering in the rays of the newly risen sun, for it was early morning. In the centre of the cabin, which was most luxuriously furnished, stood a magnificent mahogany writing-table, at which sat the man whose name was still ringing through a whole continent. He was an extremely handsome individual, and his enormous proportions were well set off by the dark blue and gold of his naval uniform. He had jet-black curly hair, and a short, pointed beard; while the dark eyes which looked out from beneath thick, overhanging brows, seemed to pierce through and through the individual toward whom his glance was directed. Jim saw at once that this was a man among a thousand, one who would make a name for himself, and come to the front in spite of all opposition. But there was a certain subtle something about the Peruvian which inspired in the young man a feeling almost akin to terror. The eyes, for instance, had a distinctly tigerish look about them, and the man’s whole personality was strongly suggestive of a feline nature. Those deep-set dark eyes, Jim knew instinctively, could, at times, flash forth lightnings deadly in their intensity; while that low, purring voice could also take on a note of such deadly menace as would make the hearer’s blood curdle. The steel-pointed claw beneath the velvet glove was all too apparent to the young Englishman, and he looked forward to the coming interview with feelings that were anything but pleasant. He felt as though he were in the power of some gigantic cat which might play with him until it was tired of that amusement, and would then turn and rend him. No wonder, he thought to himself, that the Chilians feared this man, and spared no pains in their endeavours to destroy him and his ship.

In response to a wave of Villavicencio’s hand, Jim took up a position on the side of the table opposite to that occupied by the skipper, while the sentry posted himself close alongside the prisoner. Then the Peruvian busied himself with some papers for a few minutes, apparently oblivious of Jim’s presence. At length, having found that for which he was searching, he glanced up, and his gaze flickered over Jim like summer lightning, inspiring in the young man so strong a feeling of repulsion that it almost amounted to nausea. There was something horribly magnetic in the look, and Jim felt that this man possessed some strange occult power which was lacking in most human beings.

After looking at the young man for a few seconds, Villavicencio turned to the sentry and remarked, “I shall not need your presence, I think, Jacinto. You may leave the room, but post yourself outside my cabin door, and see that we are not interrupted.”

The sentry gravely presented arms, and walked out of the cabin, closing the door softly behind him. When he had gone the skipper took up a blank sheet of paper and a pencil, wrote down a few lines on the paper, and then looking at his prisoner, said in a low, purring tone—

“You are the young Chilian naval officer who was in charge of the torpedo-boat which destroyed three of our ships the night before last, are you not?”

Jim replied that he was.

“Well,” resumed Villavicencio, “you will be sorry, I am sure, to hear that all your comrades were drowned when theJanequeo—that was the name of the boat, I believe—went down. You are the sole survivor. By the way, how many men had you with you?”

“There were eighteen of us altogether,” replied Douglas.

The skipper made a brief note on the paper before him and then remarked softly, “H’m, it is a pity that they were all drowned. I should have much liked to have saved a few more of them.”

Although there was absolutely no fault to be found with the sentiment expressed by the captain, Jim felt instinctively that the words possessed a double meaning, and he shivered in spite of the heat of the morning, which was already becoming excessive.

“What is your name, young man?” was the next question, and upon Jim answering, his reply was noted down by his interrogator upon the paper before him. Just as he had finished writing a thought seemed to strike him suddenly and he looked up quickly from the sheet.

“Were you ever on board the Chilian cruiserAngamos?” he inquired, still in the same low and even tones, but with a curious new thrill in his voice.

“Yes,” replied Jim, looking him straight in the face, “I had the honour to command that ship upon the occasion when she encountered theUnionin the Straits of Magellan. If I remember rightly, theUniondid not stay to finish our little encounter.”

“Ah–h–h,” breathed Villavicencio, through his teeth, “so youwerethe man in command of the cruiser. I thought you might be when I heard your name, but you struck me as being rather young for the post. By the way, how old are you?”

Jim told him, not without a certain curious sinking sensation about his heart.

“So young as that? Dear me, dear me! it certainlydoesseem a pity, but it cannot be helped,” said the captain. “Your name does not sound like a Chilian one, however. Of what nationality are you, if I may ask?”

“I am an Englishman,” replied Jim, “and proud of the fact,” he immediately added.

Villavicencio appeared to be sunk in thought for a few seconds, during which he ejaculated “Caramba!” and “Carrajo!” several times. The last item of information seemed to be both unexpected and unpleasant. Presently, however, he muttered to himself, “Well, I don’t suppose it matters very much. People are liable to accidents here as well as elsewhere, and if inquiries should be made I can easily plead ignorance. Only, I shall have to alter the method of it. My first ideamightpossibly attract too much attention. However—I shall see.” Aloud, he went on, “Have you any relations in this part of the world, Señor Douglas?”

Inconsequent as the question appeared to be, Jim felt an uncanny, creepy sensation about the roots of his hair, but his voice did not shake as he replied, “No, I have no relations either in Chili or in any other part of the world. I am absolutely alone.”

Villavicencio’s face at once brightened, and he rubbed his hands, remarking, “Ah! then so much the better, Señor Douglas, for in that case they will not miss you.” Then his whole appearance changed, and his voice dropped to a harsh, hissing note as he resumed, “It is a great pity, though, that you are an Englishman, and so well known in the Chilian navy, for that fact prevents me from dealing as I had intended with the miscreant who destroyed two of our ships and seriously damaged a third. But though I cannot punish you as I should have liked, I can andwillhave you shot, and that immediately, on the deck of my ship, theUnion, the vessel which, you so pleasantly remarked just now, ran away from your cruiser and her consort in the Straits.”

“But,” exclaimed Douglas, in astonishment, “I am a prisoner of war, and I demand to be treated as such. I have done nothing but my duty, nothing to merit death at your hands; and even if I had, I have yet to learn that one man only, even though he be the captain of a corvette, can sit in judgment upon a prisoner and sentence him to death. I am at least entitled to a proper court-martial, if I am to be tried for my life.”

Villavicencio laughed. “What you say, my dear young man, is no doubt technically correct; butheremight is right, and I will deal with you as I please, as you shall very soon see. Sentry!” he called, suddenly raising his voice and smiling evilly into Jim’s face.

For a brief moment Douglas was on the point of leaping across the table and endeavouring to strangle the Peruvian where he sat, and neither the man’s sword at his side nor his huge proportions would have intimidated him, but there was that curious look in Villavicencio’s eyes which seemed to hypnotise and chain poor Jim to the spot on which he stood. The next second the sentry entered, and it was too late to think about resistance.

“Sentry,” said the skipper, “take the prisoner back to his cell, and see that he does not attempt to escape on the way; he looks desperate. When you have locked him up in safety, send Lieutenant Rodriguez to me at once.”

Like a man in a dream, Jim marched to the door, scarcely hearing the skipper’s sauve voice remarking: “Hasta la vista, Señor Douglas; I will not sayadios, for we shall meet again—once more.”

The cabin door then closed, and Jim was conducted back to his cell, followed by the curious glances of the men who were assembled about the decks. Once back in his prison, he seemed able to think more connectedly, and he began to wonder whether or not there might be some means of escape from this semi-human creature’s clutches. He had done absolutely nothing to merit this threatened summary execution, and he felt convinced that his sentence was simply due to the skipper’s own desire for personal vengeance on the man who had made him turn and fly upon that memorable day at the Second Narrows. If it really was so, there was nothing to be hoped, Jim felt, from the man’s clemency; for he clearly knew no more of the meaning of the word “mercy” than does an untamed tiger.

Thus thinking, Douglas fell into a deep and gloomy reverie, from which he was aroused by the sounds of footsteps clattering about above his head, accompanied by the occasional clank of arms, and several short, crisp words of command. It sounded as though a body of men had been formed up on the deck above him, and had then been marched off to some other place. In a moment the horrible truth struck him; it was the firing-party which had been told off for his own execution!

That he was right was proved by the fact that he almost immediately afterwards heard footsteps approaching the door and echoing along the passage. There was a rattle of keys, and he was confronted, this time, by two armed seamen, who roughly bade him get on his feet and accompany them. The poor lad was too thunderstruck to move for a few moments, so one of the men prodded him roughly with his bayonet, and again bade him rise. Jim then got on his legs, with the blood streaming from the thrust which had been inflicted in his thigh, and between the two guards he again made his way to the main deck. This time, however, he was not taken so far aft as before, but was conducted up the main companion stairs on to the upper deck.

Having arrived there, the intense light from the brilliant sun nearly blinded him after his imprisonment in the pitchy blackness of his cell; but as soon as he could see clearly he at once perceived, drawn up in single line across the quarter-deck, a body of men armed with rifles, and he knew that this was indeed the firing-party which Villavicencio had promised him. The skipper was nowhere in sight; but the lieutenant, Rodriguez, stood at the end of the firing-line with his drawn sword in his hand. Jim was piloted by his guards past the end of the firing-party and placed with his back against a number of stout planks reared on end, which were there for the purpose of stopping the bullets after they had passed through the young man’s body. It was only when the lieutenant came up to him and began to bandage his eyes that Jim recovered from the state of semi-coma into which he had been thrown by the news of his impending execution; but the touch of the Peruvian’s hands recalled him to his senses and, flinging the man’s fingers aside, he protested vigorously against the gross injustice and inhumanity of the proceeding.

The only answer was a short word of command from Rodriguez, in reply to which the two guards seized Douglas by the arms and pinioned him so that further struggles were impossible. The bandage was then adjusted, and Jim was forced back against the planks. The guards then stood aside; but, Jim’s arms being now bound behind him, resistance was useless and escape impossible. Rather, therefore, than engage in a useless and undignified struggle, he determined to put a bold face on the matter, and meet his fate like a man. Accordingly, he stood still, waiting for the end.

He heard the sharp command to load, then to present; and he was nerving himself to hear the fatal word “Fire!” when the voice of Villavicencio broke the intense stillness. What he said Jim did not know, but the command to fire did not come. Instead, the rifles were grounded with a clash, and Douglas heard somebody walking toward him.

Then the Peruvian skipper’s voice broke the intense silence. “Take off that bandage,” he commanded; and the handkerchief being stripped from Jim’s eyes he found himself looking into those of Villavicencio.

“You are reprieved, Señor Englishman,” he said; “I have just received a letter which has induced me to change my mind about you. Instead, therefore, of shooting you, I am sending you, together with a number of your comrades, the Chilian officers whom I captured in theRimac, to the silver mines on the shores of Lake Titicaca. That will, in some sort, compensate me for your insulting remark about the incident in the Second Narrows, for I can promise you that your life, and the lives of your comrades, will be made a very purgatory for you. Shooting is much too easy a death for you, my friend; you will die, all the same, in the silver mines; but the process of dying will be slow and very unpleasant. You will start on your journey to-morrow, señor; and you will have a splendid opportunity to view the beauties of the country, for you will walk the whole distance, which is several hundred miles. And now, señor, I bid you a finaladios. Guards, take the man away and lodge him again in his cell. Look after him well; for you will pay for it with your lives if you let him escape. Again, señor,adios!”

Chapter Fifteen.On the Road to Sorata.It is small wonder that Douglas felt so unnerved by the ordeal through which he had just passed that his brain seemed numbed to such an extent that he scarcely realised what was going on around him. Villavicencio’s taunts passed him by almost unheeded, and Jim most certainly did not realise that he was only exchanging a sudden for a lingering death. He was conscious only of the fact that his life had been spared; and he walked to his cell, between the guards, like a man in a dream. It was not until the heavy prison door banged to after him that he really awoke once more to a sense of the reality of things; and, although he speedily realised all that was meant by his being condemned to the silver mines for life, hope sprang up again in his breast. While there was life there was hope; and he would be a poor sort of man, he reflected, if he could not somehow contrive to escape, and that soon, from the terrible captivity to which Villavicencio had consigned him. And further than that, he determined that, once free, he would make the brutal Peruvian skipper pay, and that heavily, for the mental torment to which he had put his prisoner.To occupy his mind, Jim then began to examine his prison, so far as his bonds would permit him to do so, with the view of ascertaining whether there was any possibility of escape for him; and he came to the conclusion that, though he might possibly manage to break out, if he were given time enough, he would need a very much longer time for the accomplishment of such a task than the few hours which were to elapse before he was to be taken out of the cell and placed among the chain-gang which was to march to the silver mines. No; escape, if escape was to be compassed, would have to be effected while on the march; and Douglas fell to wondering who his companions in misfortune would prove to be, and whether they would be likely to be prevailed upon to join him in a dash for liberty. At any rate, he decided, as he fell asleep, nothing could be done, no arrangements could be made, until he saw the men who were to be his fellow-prisoners. Then, and then only, would he be able to judge whether an escape while on the march would be practicable. Jim sincerely hoped that the captives would prove to be “game” men, for once they had arrived at their destination, the silver mines, there would be very little chance of escape. Their freedom would have to be won while on the march, or not at all.Thus musing, Jim, overcome by the many and varied emotions of the morning, at length fell asleep; and he continued to slumber peacefully and almost continuously until he was wakened, on the following morning, by the sounds of the clashing of arms and the tramp of heavy footsteps outside his cell door. The young man sat up quickly, feeling much refreshed after his long sleep; and a second later the cell door swung open, a file of Peruvian marines entered the prison, and he was ordered to rise to his feet. His manacles were then unlocked, and, between his two guards, he walked out of his cell for the last time and proceeded on deck. There was nobody there when he arrived, and he was ordered to sit down under the port bulwarks, which he did, with the marines mounting guard over him. But a few minutes later Lieutenant Rodriguez appeared on deck, followed by a miserable-looking squad of half a dozen Chilian officers, among whom Jim recognised one or two whom he knew. They were guarded by a score of Peruvian seamen armed with drawn cutlasses. Jim was then roughly hauled to his feet and pushed into the midst of the new arrivals, who, recognising his uniform, tattered and torn though it was, hailed him as a comrade, and received him with, figuratively, open arms. The seven men were then formed up in line, and their names called out by Rodriguez. When they had answered the roll the Peruvian lieutenant called the sergeant in charge of the guard aside and gave him certain instructions; after which the Chilians were once more formed up in the middle of their escort, and the whole body, prisoners and guards, marched down the sloping gangway which led from theUnion’sdeck to the wharf, and Jim found himself once more, after many weary months, onterra firma.Still surrounded by their guards, the Chilians marched away along the stone quay wall, and presently, having left the precincts of the harbour, they arrived in the town proper of Callao. There, as soon as they made their appearance, a crowd of roughs surrounded the prisoners and began to deride them and pelt them with such filth and garbage as came to hand. Their destination, Jim discovered, was thePlaza, or great square, of the city, where they were to join the main body of prisoners destined for the mines. For the whole of the way the unfortunate men were in peril of their lives from the ferocity of the mob; indeed, in one instance the crowd made such an ugly rush in its attempt to get at the Chilians, to tear them to pieces, that their guards were obliged to halt, form a hollow square, with their captives in the middle, and repel the attack with their fixed bayonets.At the moment when the danger was at its worst Jim seized the opportunity to observe the faces of his companions in misfortune, and on only two of them did he perceive any signs of terror; he therefore decided that when making his plans for escape he would take especial care that those two officers were not made acquainted with them, as they would be not unlikely to disclose the plot, hoping that by so doing they might procure their own freedom without the danger involved in fighting for it. The remaining four held their heads high, and looked as though, if only they possessed weapons, they would have been more than glad to take a share in the fight. These were the sort of fellows, Douglas decided, with whom to discuss plans for escape, and he made up his mind that as soon as he could do so without being observed by the guards, he would take them aside with a view to the arranging of a plan of escape to be put into effect before the prison-gang should arrive at the mines.At length the crowd, finding that the military guard round the prisoners was too strong for it, abandoned its attempt to wreak its vengeance on the Chilians, and finally dispersed. The procession then resumed its march, and a quarter of an hour later arrived at thegran Plaza de Callao, where another depressing sight met Jim’s eyes. Round thePlazanow ranged rank upon rank of armed Peruvian soldiers, who were mounting guard over a hundred or more disconsolate-looking Chilian prisoners, who were nearly all manacled, some singly and some in groups. There were present representatives of nearly every regiment of the Chilian army, and naval men of all ratings; and, since the poor fellows had had no change of clothing during their captivity, most of their uniforms were almost unrecognisable. But Jim distinguished among them officers who belonged to the Constitucion and Valparaiso regiments, the Guias, and Grenaderos, together with Carabineros, Lancers, and Rifleros. Most of the naval prisoners were, however, officers; and Jim was overjoyed to see that among these were several men whom he knew, and to whom he determined to make his presence known at the first possible opportunity. The Englishman was at first a little surprised at the preponderance of military over naval captives, until he recollected that some months before, theUnion, in command of the redoubtable Villavicencio, had captured the transportRimac, which was on her way to Arica with troops. These unfortunate men had been subjected to a rigorous captivity in Callao for some months, and had only been taken from prison that very morning in order to march to the still worse fate of captivity in the mines. Altogether there were, with the new arrivals, about a hundred and fifty Chilian prisoners present on thePlaza; and Jim speedily made up his mind that it would be very curious if they could not by some means or other manage to effect their escape while on the road.The appearance of the naval prisoners from theUnionwas the signal for cheers from their companions in misfortune, and Jim was speedily recognised by some of the officers near him. The Peruvian soldiers, however, did not seem to relish this manifestation on the part of their prisoners, and several of them ordered the Chilians to keep silent, enforcing the command with savage blows from the butt-ends of their muskets. But at this moment a gorgeously uniformed official rode up on horseback and spoke to the captain in charge of the guard. Jim could not hear what was said, but the official handed the captain a paper, appeared to give him certain instructions, and then galloped off. Captain Veragua—for that, Jim afterwards learned, was the soldier’s name—glanced through the paper, and then began to call the roll of the prisoners. Most of them were present; but a hiatus now and again occurred, which was filled in by a voice responding, “Dead, captain!”This ceremony having been finished, several armourers made their appearance, with hammers and cold chisels, and proceeded to knock off the prisoners’ leg-irons, so that they would be able to march. Then the unhappy men were manacled together in groups of a dozen by means of a long chain to which their right wrists were fastened. Jim, seeing that this process was in progress, unostentatiously moved from where he was standing and took up a position in the midst of a number of naval officers whom he knew, and who had already been making covert signs for him to do so. It thus fell out, as he had hoped, that he was manacled to a group of men whom he already knew, and he determined to lose no time in discussing with them plans for a possible escape.There was no opportunity for that just at present, however; for his group was practically the last to be attended to; and, directly their chains had been riveted on, the whole body was formed up in a solid square. They were then surrounded by the troops, the order to march was given, and the entire company wheeled to the right off thePlazainto theCalle de los Angeles, down which they proceeded at a rapid pace.The low hum of conversation immediately broke out among the Chilians, and it was not checked by their guards; therefore, although it was impossible at present to discuss anything of a private nature, Jim took the opportunity to ask his friends if they had any information as to the fate in store for them, beyond the fact that they were destined for the mines. He found, however, that the latter fact was practically all that was known. They were to be taken, in the first place, he learned, to the recently erected station at Callao, and then put in the train for Lima. There they were to be imprisoned in the castle for one or two nights, until a second detachment of Chilian prisoners should have arrived from the south, and then the whole body was, as far as could be ascertained, to be marched direct to Sorata by way of Yanyos, Huancavelica, Guantanga, Cuzco, and Santa Rosa. This constituted a journey of some six hundred miles, the whole of which was to be accomplished on foot! Truly a pleasant prospect! But Jim vowed to himself that it would not be his fault if he did even as much as a sixth of that distance before he escaped. He therefore caused the word to be passed round among his fellow-officers, to whom he was manacled, that he wished to have a private talk with them upon the first occasion that offered; and their nods of comprehension assured him that they pretty clearly understood for what purpose the conversation was to be held.But they had, by this time, arrived at the railway station, and the detachment was halted in the goods-yard just outside. Although regular passenger communication had not yet been established between Callao and the capital, there had been for some time a line of railway for the purpose of carrying merchandise from the coast to Lima; and when the war began this line was seized upon by the military authorities for the purpose of transporting stores and soldiers. A huge, gloomy barrack of a station had been built, together with a number of auxiliary goods-sheds for the purpose of holding the war material; and it was among these sheds that the Chilians found themselves halted. The tedious process of calling the roll was then again gone through, and by the time that that was finished a shrill whistle, accompanied by much blowing-off of steam, and the clank of coupling-chains, announced that the train was being drawn up.Presently it came in sight round a curve, bumping and jolting over the points, and Jim saw that it was made up of a number of goods-trucks, to which no covering whatever had been attached, so that the unhappy prisoners would be exposed, during the whole of their journey, to the fierce rays of an almost vertical sun, and, as some of the men had already been without water for twelve hours, and there seemed to be no prospect of getting any before their arrival at Lima, it looked as though their journey, short as it was to be, would prove a never-to-be-forgotten one.The Chilians were now formed up in two long lines, one on each side of the set of metals on which the train was approaching; and, as soon as it steamed into its place, they were ordered to get on board. Manacled as they were in groups of twelve, this was necessarily a very tedious process, and two hours elapsed before the prisoners were all stowed away. It was then found that too few wagons had been provided, and, as there were no more procurable, the consequent crushing was terrible. But it had one advantage, which was, that the Peruvians were obliged to send a much smaller guard of soldiers than they would otherwise have done, for the simple reason that there was no room for more; and, as all the Chilians had now stowed themselves away and it would have taken too long a time to rearrange them, all the guards had to go in the last truck, instead of being distributed all over the train. This gave the prisoners the opportunity that some of them were looking for to have a little private conversation; but there was no present chance of escape; for the Peruvians with their rifles could fire from one end of the train to the other, and thus speedily put an end to any attempts of the sort.The train was on the point of starting when one poor thirsty wretch began to cry out most piteously for a drink of water; and in a second all the others were also clamouring for some. But the Peruvians merely laughed at their entreaties, telling them that it would do them good to be without for a while, and that they would appreciate their drink all the more when they got to Lima. The signal was then given, the whistle blew, and the melancholy procession moved out of Callao station, to the accompaniment of ironical cheers and wishes for a safe and happy journey from the soldiery and such of the townspeople as had come to witness the departure.The pace of the train was positively snail-like, and, as the engine had no tender attached, and burned wood instead of coal, the stoppages in order to replenish with fuel were very numerous. At the same time, it being now high noon, the vertical sun streamed down upon the uncovered trucks until they resembled so many ovens. The intense heat, coupled with the inordinate length of time occupied by the journey, reduced some of the prisoners, especially those who had been without water for many hours, to the verge of frenzy. Their supplications for water would have moved the hearts of any but the brutal Peruvian guards, whose canteens were full of spirit and water, and who constantly refreshed themselves therefrom, tortured the thirsty prisoners by holding the water-bottles up to their gaze, and then pouring the contents down their own throats. Gradually a low moan of pain and misery made itself heard in one of the trucks, which soon spread to the others as the miserable men became unable to bear their tortures any longer in silence.“By Jove!” exclaimed Jim, “this is awful; what fiends these Peruvians are! We have never treated our prisoners of war as these fellows are doing; I wish I had some water to give them, but unfortunately I have none; moreover, I am nearly perishing with thirst myself. Dozens of these men are wounded, you know, Carlos,” he continued, to a brother officer who was sitting next to him, “and their sufferings must be awful; some of them will go mad before we get to Lima. Hallo! quick there, stop that man!” he yelled, as a haggard-looking Chilian soldier staggered to his feet, his eyes blazing with insanity.But Douglas’s warning came too late. The Englishman had understood instinctively what the maddened wretch was about to do, and shouted his warning, but the men were packed so closely that there was no opportunity to save him. Before a single individual could rise to his feet the Chilian, manacled by one wrist as he was, had flung himself over the end of the truck and, falling between the metals, was now being dragged along by the train, his shrieks of agony filling all who heard them with horror. The soldier happened to be the end man of his group, and his length of chain was rather longer than that connecting the other members of that particular party; but he had nearly dragged the man next to him to a similar fearful death, for the poor fellow, half crazed with terror, was hanging over the end of the truck with his arm nearly torn from its socket by the corpse trailing on the line. His companions, however, seized him by the body, while several strove to disconnect the chain which fettered him to the awful object trailing beneath the train.Jim and several others had staggered to their feet and were shouting to the driver to stop the train, but the man was too far away to comprehend what was said. The Peruvians in the last truck, feigning to believe there was a mutiny of the prisoners, and glad of any excuse for cruelty, began to fire into the huddled mass of Chilians, the bullets doing fearful execution at such short range. The officer next in line to Jim fell dead with a bullet through his heart, and pulled Douglas down with him, thereby saving the Englishman’s life, for a perfect hail of bullets whizzed into the truck the moment after he fell.At this moment there was a fearful shriek from the front end of the truck. The body of the man who had committed suicide had by this time been cut to pieces by the wheels, and the loose end of chain had consequently been relieved of the drag upon it and was now lashing about among the wheels. Before the soldier who had been nearly dragged over could realise this and haul up the chain, the swaying end had got entangled among the spokes of a wheel. It was quickly coiled up and broken, of course, but before this happened it had actually torn the unhappy Chilian’s hand completely off, and his shrieks would have convinced the Peruvian guards that something was wrong had they been willing to be convinced, and not been too busily occupied in firing into their helpless prisoners.The maimed soldier had, however, fainted, and he now fell senseless upon the floor of the car, while his companions, unable to assist him, followed his example by lying down, to be out of the line of fire. The Peruvians, however, fired a few more shots into the truck; but since they could no longer see anybody at whom to shoot, they presently tired of their pastime, and laid down their rifles, laughing heartily among themselves at the sport they had enjoyed. Douglas and his fellow-officers heard the raucous sounds of merriment, and each in his heart vowed that, if they lived, they would exact a fearful retribution for the inhuman treatment which they had that day received from their captors.At four o’clock that afternoon the train crawled and jolted into Lima; the trucks were at once surrounded by soldiery who were waiting for their arrival, and the unhappy prisoners were roughly hauled out and formed up in a square as before. The weary, hungry and thirsty prisoners were hurried off to the castle of Lima, where, in the courtyard, they were given the first food and water that many of them had received for nearly thirty-six hours.While the starving wretches were refreshing themselves, the gates opened to admit another body of about fifty Chilians surrounded by guards. These were herded in among those who had arrived by the train, and likewise were given food and water, upon which they fell like ravenous wild beasts. After having satisfied his hunger, Jim seized the opportunity to look round him a little. There were now about two hundred Chilians present, and it was evident, from the preparations that were being made, that they were all to be taken to the mines. Even as he looked about him the new force of guards began to form up. There were quite a hundred of them, Jim noticed, or about one to every two prisoners. But the Peruvians were all armed with rifle and bayonet, whereas the Chilians were not; moreover, the guards were free, while the Chilian prisoners were manacled together in groups of a dozen.Douglas had been led to expect that they would be kept a day or two at Lima, but he now saw that he had been mistaken in his surmise. Apparently the second body of prisoners had arrived sooner than they were expected, and consequently the authorities had decided that all the Chilians should commence their march without delay. The captives were now ordered to stand up, and were formed into one company of five men deep. After this was done a number of Peruvians brought in a couple of wagons, which they at once began to unload, taking therefrom a number of pickaxes and shovels, which were then served out among the prisoners, and each man was given one of each tool. The reason for this, Jim discovered, was that there were not sufficient implements at Sorata to supply the new labourers, so the prisoners were compelled to carry with them the tools wherewith they were to do their work when they reached their destination.“Carrajo!” exclaimed Douglas under his breath, as he watched his fellow-prisoners shoulder the pickaxes and shovels. “Do those fools of Peruvians know what they are doing? Why, they are absolutely delivering themselves into our hands! I was wondering by what means we should be able to overcome a hundred armed soldiers while on the march, but now that we have got these things it will be easy.”He was aroused from his reverie by receiving a heavy blow on the shoulder and hearing a rough voice exclaim: “Now then, wake up; don’t stand there dreaming all day. What are you thinking about? Here, catch hold of this spade and pickaxe; that’s your share. Ha, ha! it’s a good idea and an excellent joke to make you rascals carry the tools with which we are going to make you work when you reach the mines. That’s it; now get into your place, and look sharp; we shall be on the march in a few minutes. I hope your honour won’t find the weight too heavy, for you will come off rather badly if you do!”Jim clutched his tools with the grasp of a drowning man, and there was joy in his heart as he shouldered them, for he did not regard them as tools, but rather as the precious means by which to regain his liberty. Find them too heavy! Well, he rather thought not; he would not part with them, now that they were his, on any account, for a scheme of escape had come into his mind which he believed he could easily put into practice, if he could but secure the co-operation of his fellow-prisoners.But there was no more time at present for thought; the column was on the point of departure. A bugle rang out shrilly from somewhere in the courtyard; a stentorian voice barked out certain orders, and the Peruvian guards closed up round their captives. Then, just as dusk was falling, the gates were thrown open, and the column of three hundred men marched out of Lima castle into the broad streets, on the road to Sorata.Nothing could be done that night, Jim decided; and a week elapsed before he could even speak to his companions upon the subject which was uppermost in his mind. Then, one evening, shortly before midnight, when the vigilance of the guards had somewhat relaxed, Jim found his opportunity. He softly wakened the man next to him, and whispered earnestly to him for about ten minutes. The Chilian officer listened intently, and then awoke his companion in turn and passed the idea on to him. Thus the “word” percolated through the sleeping camp, and before morning every one of the Chilians who could be trusted had been informed of Jim’s plan, and had agreed to be on the watch for the signal which the young Englishman had promised to give them upon the very first opportunity which presented itself as being likely to promise success.

It is small wonder that Douglas felt so unnerved by the ordeal through which he had just passed that his brain seemed numbed to such an extent that he scarcely realised what was going on around him. Villavicencio’s taunts passed him by almost unheeded, and Jim most certainly did not realise that he was only exchanging a sudden for a lingering death. He was conscious only of the fact that his life had been spared; and he walked to his cell, between the guards, like a man in a dream. It was not until the heavy prison door banged to after him that he really awoke once more to a sense of the reality of things; and, although he speedily realised all that was meant by his being condemned to the silver mines for life, hope sprang up again in his breast. While there was life there was hope; and he would be a poor sort of man, he reflected, if he could not somehow contrive to escape, and that soon, from the terrible captivity to which Villavicencio had consigned him. And further than that, he determined that, once free, he would make the brutal Peruvian skipper pay, and that heavily, for the mental torment to which he had put his prisoner.

To occupy his mind, Jim then began to examine his prison, so far as his bonds would permit him to do so, with the view of ascertaining whether there was any possibility of escape for him; and he came to the conclusion that, though he might possibly manage to break out, if he were given time enough, he would need a very much longer time for the accomplishment of such a task than the few hours which were to elapse before he was to be taken out of the cell and placed among the chain-gang which was to march to the silver mines. No; escape, if escape was to be compassed, would have to be effected while on the march; and Douglas fell to wondering who his companions in misfortune would prove to be, and whether they would be likely to be prevailed upon to join him in a dash for liberty. At any rate, he decided, as he fell asleep, nothing could be done, no arrangements could be made, until he saw the men who were to be his fellow-prisoners. Then, and then only, would he be able to judge whether an escape while on the march would be practicable. Jim sincerely hoped that the captives would prove to be “game” men, for once they had arrived at their destination, the silver mines, there would be very little chance of escape. Their freedom would have to be won while on the march, or not at all.

Thus musing, Jim, overcome by the many and varied emotions of the morning, at length fell asleep; and he continued to slumber peacefully and almost continuously until he was wakened, on the following morning, by the sounds of the clashing of arms and the tramp of heavy footsteps outside his cell door. The young man sat up quickly, feeling much refreshed after his long sleep; and a second later the cell door swung open, a file of Peruvian marines entered the prison, and he was ordered to rise to his feet. His manacles were then unlocked, and, between his two guards, he walked out of his cell for the last time and proceeded on deck. There was nobody there when he arrived, and he was ordered to sit down under the port bulwarks, which he did, with the marines mounting guard over him. But a few minutes later Lieutenant Rodriguez appeared on deck, followed by a miserable-looking squad of half a dozen Chilian officers, among whom Jim recognised one or two whom he knew. They were guarded by a score of Peruvian seamen armed with drawn cutlasses. Jim was then roughly hauled to his feet and pushed into the midst of the new arrivals, who, recognising his uniform, tattered and torn though it was, hailed him as a comrade, and received him with, figuratively, open arms. The seven men were then formed up in line, and their names called out by Rodriguez. When they had answered the roll the Peruvian lieutenant called the sergeant in charge of the guard aside and gave him certain instructions; after which the Chilians were once more formed up in the middle of their escort, and the whole body, prisoners and guards, marched down the sloping gangway which led from theUnion’sdeck to the wharf, and Jim found himself once more, after many weary months, onterra firma.

Still surrounded by their guards, the Chilians marched away along the stone quay wall, and presently, having left the precincts of the harbour, they arrived in the town proper of Callao. There, as soon as they made their appearance, a crowd of roughs surrounded the prisoners and began to deride them and pelt them with such filth and garbage as came to hand. Their destination, Jim discovered, was thePlaza, or great square, of the city, where they were to join the main body of prisoners destined for the mines. For the whole of the way the unfortunate men were in peril of their lives from the ferocity of the mob; indeed, in one instance the crowd made such an ugly rush in its attempt to get at the Chilians, to tear them to pieces, that their guards were obliged to halt, form a hollow square, with their captives in the middle, and repel the attack with their fixed bayonets.

At the moment when the danger was at its worst Jim seized the opportunity to observe the faces of his companions in misfortune, and on only two of them did he perceive any signs of terror; he therefore decided that when making his plans for escape he would take especial care that those two officers were not made acquainted with them, as they would be not unlikely to disclose the plot, hoping that by so doing they might procure their own freedom without the danger involved in fighting for it. The remaining four held their heads high, and looked as though, if only they possessed weapons, they would have been more than glad to take a share in the fight. These were the sort of fellows, Douglas decided, with whom to discuss plans for escape, and he made up his mind that as soon as he could do so without being observed by the guards, he would take them aside with a view to the arranging of a plan of escape to be put into effect before the prison-gang should arrive at the mines.

At length the crowd, finding that the military guard round the prisoners was too strong for it, abandoned its attempt to wreak its vengeance on the Chilians, and finally dispersed. The procession then resumed its march, and a quarter of an hour later arrived at thegran Plaza de Callao, where another depressing sight met Jim’s eyes. Round thePlazanow ranged rank upon rank of armed Peruvian soldiers, who were mounting guard over a hundred or more disconsolate-looking Chilian prisoners, who were nearly all manacled, some singly and some in groups. There were present representatives of nearly every regiment of the Chilian army, and naval men of all ratings; and, since the poor fellows had had no change of clothing during their captivity, most of their uniforms were almost unrecognisable. But Jim distinguished among them officers who belonged to the Constitucion and Valparaiso regiments, the Guias, and Grenaderos, together with Carabineros, Lancers, and Rifleros. Most of the naval prisoners were, however, officers; and Jim was overjoyed to see that among these were several men whom he knew, and to whom he determined to make his presence known at the first possible opportunity. The Englishman was at first a little surprised at the preponderance of military over naval captives, until he recollected that some months before, theUnion, in command of the redoubtable Villavicencio, had captured the transportRimac, which was on her way to Arica with troops. These unfortunate men had been subjected to a rigorous captivity in Callao for some months, and had only been taken from prison that very morning in order to march to the still worse fate of captivity in the mines. Altogether there were, with the new arrivals, about a hundred and fifty Chilian prisoners present on thePlaza; and Jim speedily made up his mind that it would be very curious if they could not by some means or other manage to effect their escape while on the road.

The appearance of the naval prisoners from theUnionwas the signal for cheers from their companions in misfortune, and Jim was speedily recognised by some of the officers near him. The Peruvian soldiers, however, did not seem to relish this manifestation on the part of their prisoners, and several of them ordered the Chilians to keep silent, enforcing the command with savage blows from the butt-ends of their muskets. But at this moment a gorgeously uniformed official rode up on horseback and spoke to the captain in charge of the guard. Jim could not hear what was said, but the official handed the captain a paper, appeared to give him certain instructions, and then galloped off. Captain Veragua—for that, Jim afterwards learned, was the soldier’s name—glanced through the paper, and then began to call the roll of the prisoners. Most of them were present; but a hiatus now and again occurred, which was filled in by a voice responding, “Dead, captain!”

This ceremony having been finished, several armourers made their appearance, with hammers and cold chisels, and proceeded to knock off the prisoners’ leg-irons, so that they would be able to march. Then the unhappy men were manacled together in groups of a dozen by means of a long chain to which their right wrists were fastened. Jim, seeing that this process was in progress, unostentatiously moved from where he was standing and took up a position in the midst of a number of naval officers whom he knew, and who had already been making covert signs for him to do so. It thus fell out, as he had hoped, that he was manacled to a group of men whom he already knew, and he determined to lose no time in discussing with them plans for a possible escape.

There was no opportunity for that just at present, however; for his group was practically the last to be attended to; and, directly their chains had been riveted on, the whole body was formed up in a solid square. They were then surrounded by the troops, the order to march was given, and the entire company wheeled to the right off thePlazainto theCalle de los Angeles, down which they proceeded at a rapid pace.

The low hum of conversation immediately broke out among the Chilians, and it was not checked by their guards; therefore, although it was impossible at present to discuss anything of a private nature, Jim took the opportunity to ask his friends if they had any information as to the fate in store for them, beyond the fact that they were destined for the mines. He found, however, that the latter fact was practically all that was known. They were to be taken, in the first place, he learned, to the recently erected station at Callao, and then put in the train for Lima. There they were to be imprisoned in the castle for one or two nights, until a second detachment of Chilian prisoners should have arrived from the south, and then the whole body was, as far as could be ascertained, to be marched direct to Sorata by way of Yanyos, Huancavelica, Guantanga, Cuzco, and Santa Rosa. This constituted a journey of some six hundred miles, the whole of which was to be accomplished on foot! Truly a pleasant prospect! But Jim vowed to himself that it would not be his fault if he did even as much as a sixth of that distance before he escaped. He therefore caused the word to be passed round among his fellow-officers, to whom he was manacled, that he wished to have a private talk with them upon the first occasion that offered; and their nods of comprehension assured him that they pretty clearly understood for what purpose the conversation was to be held.

But they had, by this time, arrived at the railway station, and the detachment was halted in the goods-yard just outside. Although regular passenger communication had not yet been established between Callao and the capital, there had been for some time a line of railway for the purpose of carrying merchandise from the coast to Lima; and when the war began this line was seized upon by the military authorities for the purpose of transporting stores and soldiers. A huge, gloomy barrack of a station had been built, together with a number of auxiliary goods-sheds for the purpose of holding the war material; and it was among these sheds that the Chilians found themselves halted. The tedious process of calling the roll was then again gone through, and by the time that that was finished a shrill whistle, accompanied by much blowing-off of steam, and the clank of coupling-chains, announced that the train was being drawn up.

Presently it came in sight round a curve, bumping and jolting over the points, and Jim saw that it was made up of a number of goods-trucks, to which no covering whatever had been attached, so that the unhappy prisoners would be exposed, during the whole of their journey, to the fierce rays of an almost vertical sun, and, as some of the men had already been without water for twelve hours, and there seemed to be no prospect of getting any before their arrival at Lima, it looked as though their journey, short as it was to be, would prove a never-to-be-forgotten one.

The Chilians were now formed up in two long lines, one on each side of the set of metals on which the train was approaching; and, as soon as it steamed into its place, they were ordered to get on board. Manacled as they were in groups of twelve, this was necessarily a very tedious process, and two hours elapsed before the prisoners were all stowed away. It was then found that too few wagons had been provided, and, as there were no more procurable, the consequent crushing was terrible. But it had one advantage, which was, that the Peruvians were obliged to send a much smaller guard of soldiers than they would otherwise have done, for the simple reason that there was no room for more; and, as all the Chilians had now stowed themselves away and it would have taken too long a time to rearrange them, all the guards had to go in the last truck, instead of being distributed all over the train. This gave the prisoners the opportunity that some of them were looking for to have a little private conversation; but there was no present chance of escape; for the Peruvians with their rifles could fire from one end of the train to the other, and thus speedily put an end to any attempts of the sort.

The train was on the point of starting when one poor thirsty wretch began to cry out most piteously for a drink of water; and in a second all the others were also clamouring for some. But the Peruvians merely laughed at their entreaties, telling them that it would do them good to be without for a while, and that they would appreciate their drink all the more when they got to Lima. The signal was then given, the whistle blew, and the melancholy procession moved out of Callao station, to the accompaniment of ironical cheers and wishes for a safe and happy journey from the soldiery and such of the townspeople as had come to witness the departure.

The pace of the train was positively snail-like, and, as the engine had no tender attached, and burned wood instead of coal, the stoppages in order to replenish with fuel were very numerous. At the same time, it being now high noon, the vertical sun streamed down upon the uncovered trucks until they resembled so many ovens. The intense heat, coupled with the inordinate length of time occupied by the journey, reduced some of the prisoners, especially those who had been without water for many hours, to the verge of frenzy. Their supplications for water would have moved the hearts of any but the brutal Peruvian guards, whose canteens were full of spirit and water, and who constantly refreshed themselves therefrom, tortured the thirsty prisoners by holding the water-bottles up to their gaze, and then pouring the contents down their own throats. Gradually a low moan of pain and misery made itself heard in one of the trucks, which soon spread to the others as the miserable men became unable to bear their tortures any longer in silence.

“By Jove!” exclaimed Jim, “this is awful; what fiends these Peruvians are! We have never treated our prisoners of war as these fellows are doing; I wish I had some water to give them, but unfortunately I have none; moreover, I am nearly perishing with thirst myself. Dozens of these men are wounded, you know, Carlos,” he continued, to a brother officer who was sitting next to him, “and their sufferings must be awful; some of them will go mad before we get to Lima. Hallo! quick there, stop that man!” he yelled, as a haggard-looking Chilian soldier staggered to his feet, his eyes blazing with insanity.

But Douglas’s warning came too late. The Englishman had understood instinctively what the maddened wretch was about to do, and shouted his warning, but the men were packed so closely that there was no opportunity to save him. Before a single individual could rise to his feet the Chilian, manacled by one wrist as he was, had flung himself over the end of the truck and, falling between the metals, was now being dragged along by the train, his shrieks of agony filling all who heard them with horror. The soldier happened to be the end man of his group, and his length of chain was rather longer than that connecting the other members of that particular party; but he had nearly dragged the man next to him to a similar fearful death, for the poor fellow, half crazed with terror, was hanging over the end of the truck with his arm nearly torn from its socket by the corpse trailing on the line. His companions, however, seized him by the body, while several strove to disconnect the chain which fettered him to the awful object trailing beneath the train.

Jim and several others had staggered to their feet and were shouting to the driver to stop the train, but the man was too far away to comprehend what was said. The Peruvians in the last truck, feigning to believe there was a mutiny of the prisoners, and glad of any excuse for cruelty, began to fire into the huddled mass of Chilians, the bullets doing fearful execution at such short range. The officer next in line to Jim fell dead with a bullet through his heart, and pulled Douglas down with him, thereby saving the Englishman’s life, for a perfect hail of bullets whizzed into the truck the moment after he fell.

At this moment there was a fearful shriek from the front end of the truck. The body of the man who had committed suicide had by this time been cut to pieces by the wheels, and the loose end of chain had consequently been relieved of the drag upon it and was now lashing about among the wheels. Before the soldier who had been nearly dragged over could realise this and haul up the chain, the swaying end had got entangled among the spokes of a wheel. It was quickly coiled up and broken, of course, but before this happened it had actually torn the unhappy Chilian’s hand completely off, and his shrieks would have convinced the Peruvian guards that something was wrong had they been willing to be convinced, and not been too busily occupied in firing into their helpless prisoners.

The maimed soldier had, however, fainted, and he now fell senseless upon the floor of the car, while his companions, unable to assist him, followed his example by lying down, to be out of the line of fire. The Peruvians, however, fired a few more shots into the truck; but since they could no longer see anybody at whom to shoot, they presently tired of their pastime, and laid down their rifles, laughing heartily among themselves at the sport they had enjoyed. Douglas and his fellow-officers heard the raucous sounds of merriment, and each in his heart vowed that, if they lived, they would exact a fearful retribution for the inhuman treatment which they had that day received from their captors.

At four o’clock that afternoon the train crawled and jolted into Lima; the trucks were at once surrounded by soldiery who were waiting for their arrival, and the unhappy prisoners were roughly hauled out and formed up in a square as before. The weary, hungry and thirsty prisoners were hurried off to the castle of Lima, where, in the courtyard, they were given the first food and water that many of them had received for nearly thirty-six hours.

While the starving wretches were refreshing themselves, the gates opened to admit another body of about fifty Chilians surrounded by guards. These were herded in among those who had arrived by the train, and likewise were given food and water, upon which they fell like ravenous wild beasts. After having satisfied his hunger, Jim seized the opportunity to look round him a little. There were now about two hundred Chilians present, and it was evident, from the preparations that were being made, that they were all to be taken to the mines. Even as he looked about him the new force of guards began to form up. There were quite a hundred of them, Jim noticed, or about one to every two prisoners. But the Peruvians were all armed with rifle and bayonet, whereas the Chilians were not; moreover, the guards were free, while the Chilian prisoners were manacled together in groups of a dozen.

Douglas had been led to expect that they would be kept a day or two at Lima, but he now saw that he had been mistaken in his surmise. Apparently the second body of prisoners had arrived sooner than they were expected, and consequently the authorities had decided that all the Chilians should commence their march without delay. The captives were now ordered to stand up, and were formed into one company of five men deep. After this was done a number of Peruvians brought in a couple of wagons, which they at once began to unload, taking therefrom a number of pickaxes and shovels, which were then served out among the prisoners, and each man was given one of each tool. The reason for this, Jim discovered, was that there were not sufficient implements at Sorata to supply the new labourers, so the prisoners were compelled to carry with them the tools wherewith they were to do their work when they reached their destination.

“Carrajo!” exclaimed Douglas under his breath, as he watched his fellow-prisoners shoulder the pickaxes and shovels. “Do those fools of Peruvians know what they are doing? Why, they are absolutely delivering themselves into our hands! I was wondering by what means we should be able to overcome a hundred armed soldiers while on the march, but now that we have got these things it will be easy.”

He was aroused from his reverie by receiving a heavy blow on the shoulder and hearing a rough voice exclaim: “Now then, wake up; don’t stand there dreaming all day. What are you thinking about? Here, catch hold of this spade and pickaxe; that’s your share. Ha, ha! it’s a good idea and an excellent joke to make you rascals carry the tools with which we are going to make you work when you reach the mines. That’s it; now get into your place, and look sharp; we shall be on the march in a few minutes. I hope your honour won’t find the weight too heavy, for you will come off rather badly if you do!”

Jim clutched his tools with the grasp of a drowning man, and there was joy in his heart as he shouldered them, for he did not regard them as tools, but rather as the precious means by which to regain his liberty. Find them too heavy! Well, he rather thought not; he would not part with them, now that they were his, on any account, for a scheme of escape had come into his mind which he believed he could easily put into practice, if he could but secure the co-operation of his fellow-prisoners.

But there was no more time at present for thought; the column was on the point of departure. A bugle rang out shrilly from somewhere in the courtyard; a stentorian voice barked out certain orders, and the Peruvian guards closed up round their captives. Then, just as dusk was falling, the gates were thrown open, and the column of three hundred men marched out of Lima castle into the broad streets, on the road to Sorata.

Nothing could be done that night, Jim decided; and a week elapsed before he could even speak to his companions upon the subject which was uppermost in his mind. Then, one evening, shortly before midnight, when the vigilance of the guards had somewhat relaxed, Jim found his opportunity. He softly wakened the man next to him, and whispered earnestly to him for about ten minutes. The Chilian officer listened intently, and then awoke his companion in turn and passed the idea on to him. Thus the “word” percolated through the sleeping camp, and before morning every one of the Chilians who could be trusted had been informed of Jim’s plan, and had agreed to be on the watch for the signal which the young Englishman had promised to give them upon the very first opportunity which presented itself as being likely to promise success.

Chapter Sixteen.The Red Day of Cuzco.A fortnight had passed since that memorable night upon which Jim communicated his plan of escape to his fellow-prisoners, and still no opportunity had come for the Chilians to make a bid for freedom. For some days after Douglas had communicated with them the weary men had brightened up considerably. The spark of hope which glimmered in the midst of their darkness gave them strength to bear up under their many misfortunes. But as day after day came and went without the signal being given, a dull despair had taken the place of hope, and many a worn-out and soul-sick man fell down in the dusty road, never to rise again. Belonging, as the bulk of the prisoners did, to a southern race, they were very easily cheered up or cast down, and their despair was all the deeper for the short interval of hope which had been given them. The majority of them seemed to have almost resigned themselves to fate, and were looking forward to nothing better than a lifelong captivity in the mines of Sorata. To such an extent, indeed, was this the case that Jim realised that, unless an opportunity should very shortly occur whereby he could put his scheme into execution, his companions would be too profoundly dispirited to attempt to make use of the chance of escape when it should actually arrive. He had told them, however, at the outset that it would be folly to make the attempt while crossing the mountains; for, even should they contrive to get away, they would be in the heart of a hostile country, where they might easily be recaptured. The young Englishman’s plan had been to wait until they got farther south, when they would again be comparatively close to the coast, so that they might escape thither and trust to being able to get away in boats. But the long-protracted waiting, coupled with the intense cold which they experienced up among the mountains, was fast taking all the heart out of the prisoners, and Jim saw that unless the attempt were made almost at once everything would be lost.They were now nearing Cuzco, having travelled nearly half the distance to Sorata, and the weary men hoped to sleep that very night in the ancient capital of the Incas. Jim had managed to interchange a few hasty words about mid-day with the officers of his own group, all men of high courage and of advanced rank, and they and he had come to the conclusion that the escape should be attempted that very night, should they fail to reach Cuzco, or the night after leaving that city, should they happen to arrive there that day. These few were the only men who had retained their courage unimpaired, and Jim felt that he could rely upon them. It would not do, they all decided, to wait any longer; and although Cuzco itself lay among the mountains, it would be better to make the attempt there, and trust to being able to get away to the sea-coast, than be obliged to defer it indefinitely.The word to be on the watch and ready was therefore passed round immediately after the mid-day halt; and it was astonishing to see how the news brightened up the weary men and made new beings of them. Indeed, Jim almost felt sorry that he had not delayed the message until the evening, for he felt alarmed lest the guards should observe the change and guess at its cause. They seemed, however, to take no notice of it, and the forlorn procession moved forward slowly along the great, dusty road, which had not been repaired since the time of Pizarro’s conquest. Hour after hour went by and there was still no sign of the City of the Sun; so that, by the time that four o’clock arrived, Douglas decided that the escape would have to be attempted that very night. Just before dusk the clouds, which had been covering the heavens all day long, broke; the glorious setting sun shone out in all his majesty; and there before them in the distance, some fifteen miles away, his beams fell on the city of Cuzco, gilding and glorifying it until it actually did present the appearance of a city of gold. It was a magnificent sight, and drew an exclamation of admiration and delight from the Chilians, weary as they all were; but they hoped that the view which they had just obtained of the place was all that they would ever see of it—as it would be, if fortune would but favour them that night.It was now perfectly evident that they would not be able to reach Cuzco that evening, and as the darkness was fast coming on the Peruvians began to look about them for a suitable place in which to camp for the night. About half a mile farther on could be seen, through the gathering gloom, a small hillock, crowned with great rocks and boulders, apparently the remains of some ancient Inca fortification. This struck Douglas as a place that might have been made on purpose for their attempt, could the guards but be induced to pitch the camp there. He was casting about in his mind for some scheme by which they might be induced to select the spot as a halting-place, when the officer in command of the troop rose in his stirrups and, pointing to the hillock with his sword, exclaimed:“There, over yonder, is the place for us,mi hijos; we will encamp among those boulders. We shall be as comfortable there as in the city of Cuzco itself. Forward,guerreros; we shall soon be there; and we will have a good long rest to-night.”“Ay, that you will, you inhuman scoundrel,” muttered Jim; “but it will not be the sort of sleep of which you are thinking!” However, the prisoners and their guards pushed forward, and in about ten minutes’ time the group arrived at the foot of the little hill, which they at once began to climb.“Now I wonder,” thought Jim, “whether the next time we tread this road it will be as free men once more. God grant us success this night, for if we fail there will be no second chance for us!”The other officers seemed to be occupied with similar thoughts, for they examined the whole place and its surroundings very carefully as they ascended; evidently in order that, should the attempt be successful, they might be able to find their way down in the darkness. At last the summit was reached; but before the weary men could enjoy the rest of which they stood in such great need, they were obliged to unload the tents and provisions from the pack mules, the Peruvians being much to lazy to do anything for themselves. It was therefore about eight o’clock by the time that the tents were pitched and the evening meal prepared; and when the food was ready the prisoners ate as much as they could, for they did not in the least know where they would obtain their next meal. This having been done, the pots and pans had to be cleaned and put away; so that it was a tolerably weary company which at last sought its tents to lie down and rest.But not to slumber. There was not a single Chilian among those to whom the plan had been revealed who closed his eyes, lest he should fall asleep and thus not be ready when the momentous signal should be given. Long before this it had been ascertained that there were but four keys for the purpose of locking and unlocking the prisoners’ manacles; one being held by the captain, while the other three were distributed in turn among the soldiers, being given to three different men every day, for the better security of the prisoners, and to make sure that there could be no tampering with the guards. Jim had been keeping his eyes very wide open all through the day, and he had noticed which of the Peruvians were the men who had the keys in their possession that night, while he had also carefully marked the positions where they had thrown themselves down to sleep. Two of the soldiers had retired to a tent, but the third had fortunately elected to sleep in the open, as the night was very warm.The plan arranged was for Jim and his group of manacled fellow-officers to crawl forward, and either kill or stun one of the gaolers—it would be too risky to tackle more than one—secure his key, unlock their own fetters, and then to go silently the rounds, setting free their companions. When all were at liberty they were to seize their shovels and pickaxes and with them attack the slumbering soldiery, killing as many as possible before they were fully awake and could seize their rifles. Should they be discovered before the work was complete, those who were free were to keep off the Peruvians while the remainder were set at liberty.It sounded rather a barbarous scheme, but Jim could think of no other which would be at all likely to be successful; and he was by this time rendered altogether too hardened by privation and ill-treatment to feel very much pity for the callously brutal Peruvian guards. Besides, it was his life or theirs, and he had no difficulty in choosing.The young Englishman waited until midnight, in order to allow the soldiers to get well asleep, and then he silently nudged his companions to make sure that all were awake. They all were,—very wide awake, too,—and, after a few low-voiced instructions from Douglas, the little body of men began to crawl away through the darkness, taking the utmost care that there should be no clanking of chains to betray their movements. Forward on hands and knees they went, all moving together; and they soon passed through the ranks of their comrades, who did not make a single movement while the gallant little band crawled past.Soon they had left the Chilian part of the encampment behind; and a few minutes later, Jim, who was the leading man of the party, came abreast of the first Peruvian tent. The night was pitchy dark, although there was a young moon, for the sky was covered with dark, low-lying clouds. This was all the better, for it lessened the probability of their being seen by the sentries; but they had to exercise a great deal of caution to avoid colliding with and so disturbing any soldiers who had elected to sleep out in the open.“Now,” whispered Jim, as they came abreast of a certain tent, looming up dim and ghostly in the darkness; “Pedrillo is sleeping just outside this tent. Forward, men; but carefully, for your lives. One false step now, and all will be lost. Come along, and remember—we must be quick and silent at—at the work which we have to do. There must not be so much as a single struggle.”His companions now came up abreast of Douglas, instead of following in single file; and, still abreast, they crawled toward the slumbering custodian of the key. Nearer and nearer they drew, until only a few yards separated them from their prey, then only a few feet. They were almost within arm’s length of him now; silently they crept forward again, then they paused. The only sound was that caused by the heavy breathing of the victim and the soft, hissing breaths of his executioners. Now they crept forward again until they were close to the man; Jim plucked the sleeve of the Chilian nearest to him, and together they leaned over the gaoler.“Now!” hissed Jim, and four men flung themselves upon the fellow’s body at the same moment that Douglas’s hands clutched his throat. There was a short quick scuffle, and it was all over.In a second he had snatched the key from the dead man’s girdle and was feverishly unlocking his comrades’ fetters. Then they, in turn, unlocked his, and in less than five minutes the twelve men were all free. Back they sped to their own portion of the camp, and were soon unlocking their friends’ manacles, with the result that in less than twenty minutes at least half the Chilians were free, and stood, grasping their pickaxes and shovels, ready for the fight which was inevitable before they could get away.Then a horrible thing happened.Among the Chilians was a naval petty officer, a surly, cunning—faced creature whom nobody trusted, and from whom, therefore, all particulars of the plot had been kept secret. Jim had just inserted the key in his manacles, when this traitor shrieked at the top of his voice:“Help! help! the Chilians are escaping!”Why the fellow did it nobody ever knew, but it was surmised that, being too much of a craven himself to attempt to escape, he had hoped to purchase his own freedom by betraying his comrades. But he must have been mad to do such a thing, surrounded as he was by Chilians, for he might have felt certain that before assistance could reach him he would be dead.The mischief, however, was done, and the slumbering camp was effectually alarmed. The sentries squibbed off their rifles, and then, reloading, began to blaze away into the Chilian encampment. The captain’s harsh voice was heard giving orders, and in a few seconds the Peruvian soldiers had formed up in line, fixed their bayonets, and were prepared to charge.“Quick,” exclaimed Jim; “seize your shovels and pickaxes and repel their attack. I will help you. You, Manuel, take the key and free the others while we who are already free keep the Peruvians at bay. But be cool—keep calm, and all will be well; we will defend you.”Tossing the key to Manuel, Jim seized a shovel, and put himself at the head of his men. “Charge! charge!” he roared, and the fifty free Chilians charged straight at the place where the Peruvians were known to be.The next second a sanguinary and ferocious struggle had commenced in the darkness. The Peruvians, hearing the Chilians approach, had levelled their rifles, and poured a withering volley into the charging men, with murderous effect. But, their rifles once emptied, conditions were somewhat more equal, and for a quarter of an hour the combat raged furiously. But such an unequal contest could not last very long; the soldiers were able, during pauses in the struggle, to reload their rifles; and this being done, they mowed the Chilians down by dozens. Manuel did his work well, but the liberated men who straggled up, by twos and threes, did not prove a very valuable reinforcement for the prisoners.Then, to crown all their misfortunes, the moon came out and flooded the battle-ground with light; and light was all that the Peruvians needed to enable them to turn a one-sided combat into a massacre. The Chilians, mowed down by the score, at last threw down their primitive weapons and called for quarter; but the soldiers, rendered still more ferocious by the sight and smell of blood, continued to fire into the defenceless prisoners until they were sated with slaughter. Then the hapless band was surrounded once more, and the unhurt and least seriously wounded men were manacled afresh. The mortally wounded were simply bayoneted as they lay, their friends being unable to stay the murderers’ hands.At last it was all over; the casualties were counted up and the roll called. The Peruvians had lost but eleven men, all killed, whereas the Chilians were reduced to forty, all told, scarcely one of whom did not bear a more or less serious wound on his person. But the Peruvian captain was furious at what he called the “dastardly attack” of the Chilians on his men, and he swore to take a full and complete revenge when the next morning should arrive. The wretched men were then allowed to lie down once more and sleep—if they could; and thus the remaining hours of that ghastly night passed slowly away.The next morning, as soon as day dawned, Captain Garcia-y-Garcia, having appointed a sergeant and a corporal to assist him, constituted himself and his two assistants into what he called a “court-martial,” and then proceeded to try the prisoners.Jim he promptly pounced upon as the ringleader, and subjected the young Englishman to a short examination, which, however, was the merest farce, for the captain had already determined upon his fate. After a trial lasting, perhaps, five minutes, therefore, Jim was condemned to be shot before mid-day, as were nine more of his unfortunate companions. The remaining thirty Chilians were each sentenced to receive a flogging of a hundred lashes as soon as they arrived at the mines; and Captain Garcia-y-Garcia promised himself that he would be the man to supervise the punishment.The ten men who were condemned to death were then separated from the rest of the troop, and were told to seat themselves on the ground at some little distance away, where they were at once surrounded by guards. Garcia-y-Garcia then selected a squad of twenty Peruvian soldiers, and told them off for the firing-party. They were then formed up in a single line and ordered to load their rifles with ball cartridge.When everything was in readiness, the ten unfortunate prisoners were brought forward and made to stand, also in line, with their backs against a huge rock which was to serve as a background; and Jim found himself, for the second time in his life, facing a firing-party and condemned to death. But this time there seemed to be no hope or possibility of reprieve. He was surrounded by cruel men who had no feelings save those of a brutal nature, and it seemed as though no power on earth could save him.Jim was very thankful that no attempt was made to blindfold them, for he had had a bandage round his eyes on a previous occasion, and knew from experience that the suspense of waiting for the squad to fire, not knowing what they were doing meanwhile, was worse than death itself could possibly be.At last the fatal moment came, and the unlucky men shook hands with one another in sad farewell. The doomed men then stood to attention, and the soldiers examined the breeches of their rifles to make sure that they were properly loaded.Then came the word “Ready!” and the twenty rifles came up to the soldiers’ hips as though by machinery. At the second word of command the barrels glinted in the sun as the men planted the rifle-butts in the hollow of their shoulders. Jim involuntarily cast his eyes skyward as he waited for the final word, and his lips were seen to move slightly.A painful pause—and then Garcia-y-Garcia’s voice rang out, loud, clear, and triumphant: “Fire!”There was a simultaneous crash as the rifles were discharged, and Jim felt a sharp, stinging sensation in his left side and in his arm as he fell back upon the ground. A body fell a second after his own and lay right across his face, and Jim had actually put up his hand to push away the corpse before he realised that he was not at all severely hurt. He was recalled to his senses by hearing the captain’s voice commanding his men to reload and fire again into the heap of corpses, to “make assurance doubly sure,” as he put it, and Jim had presence of mind enough to abstain from making any further movement, though he suffered agonies of suspense while waiting for the second discharge.It came at last, and Douglas escaped yet a second time, although the body lying above his own was riddled with bullets. The Englishman could feel now that the bullet which struck him had passed between his left side and his left arm, grazing both, but inflicting no injury worth speaking of. But would he escape after all, or would he have his brains blown out as he lay? The question was soon answered, for even as he was thinking about it, the body was hauled off his face and a soldier shouted: “Why, captain, here is a man who is still alive.”Garcia-y-Garcia ran up and stood over Jim, looking down at him with eyes that glittered with savage menace. He half turned away to give the order for Jim’s death, when he checked himself. His expression gradually changed, and presently he spoke:“No; I don’t think I’ll shoot you to-day, Señor Chileño, although I don’t know that I may not change my mind later. However, I will spare you this once, for you deserve to escape death after having been shot at twice. Get up!”Hardly able to believe his ears, Jim rose to his feet, and was immediately secured to the chain once more. Then, still in a dream, he heard the command given to march, and the sadly depleted company moved down the side of the knoll, leaving nearly seventy unburied corpses lying on its summit. How very differently things had looked yesterday at this hour, thought Jim: how sadly everything had changed! Between now and yesterday lay this blood-red day of Cuzco—a day which Jim knew he would never forget so long as he lived.

A fortnight had passed since that memorable night upon which Jim communicated his plan of escape to his fellow-prisoners, and still no opportunity had come for the Chilians to make a bid for freedom. For some days after Douglas had communicated with them the weary men had brightened up considerably. The spark of hope which glimmered in the midst of their darkness gave them strength to bear up under their many misfortunes. But as day after day came and went without the signal being given, a dull despair had taken the place of hope, and many a worn-out and soul-sick man fell down in the dusty road, never to rise again. Belonging, as the bulk of the prisoners did, to a southern race, they were very easily cheered up or cast down, and their despair was all the deeper for the short interval of hope which had been given them. The majority of them seemed to have almost resigned themselves to fate, and were looking forward to nothing better than a lifelong captivity in the mines of Sorata. To such an extent, indeed, was this the case that Jim realised that, unless an opportunity should very shortly occur whereby he could put his scheme into execution, his companions would be too profoundly dispirited to attempt to make use of the chance of escape when it should actually arrive. He had told them, however, at the outset that it would be folly to make the attempt while crossing the mountains; for, even should they contrive to get away, they would be in the heart of a hostile country, where they might easily be recaptured. The young Englishman’s plan had been to wait until they got farther south, when they would again be comparatively close to the coast, so that they might escape thither and trust to being able to get away in boats. But the long-protracted waiting, coupled with the intense cold which they experienced up among the mountains, was fast taking all the heart out of the prisoners, and Jim saw that unless the attempt were made almost at once everything would be lost.

They were now nearing Cuzco, having travelled nearly half the distance to Sorata, and the weary men hoped to sleep that very night in the ancient capital of the Incas. Jim had managed to interchange a few hasty words about mid-day with the officers of his own group, all men of high courage and of advanced rank, and they and he had come to the conclusion that the escape should be attempted that very night, should they fail to reach Cuzco, or the night after leaving that city, should they happen to arrive there that day. These few were the only men who had retained their courage unimpaired, and Jim felt that he could rely upon them. It would not do, they all decided, to wait any longer; and although Cuzco itself lay among the mountains, it would be better to make the attempt there, and trust to being able to get away to the sea-coast, than be obliged to defer it indefinitely.

The word to be on the watch and ready was therefore passed round immediately after the mid-day halt; and it was astonishing to see how the news brightened up the weary men and made new beings of them. Indeed, Jim almost felt sorry that he had not delayed the message until the evening, for he felt alarmed lest the guards should observe the change and guess at its cause. They seemed, however, to take no notice of it, and the forlorn procession moved forward slowly along the great, dusty road, which had not been repaired since the time of Pizarro’s conquest. Hour after hour went by and there was still no sign of the City of the Sun; so that, by the time that four o’clock arrived, Douglas decided that the escape would have to be attempted that very night. Just before dusk the clouds, which had been covering the heavens all day long, broke; the glorious setting sun shone out in all his majesty; and there before them in the distance, some fifteen miles away, his beams fell on the city of Cuzco, gilding and glorifying it until it actually did present the appearance of a city of gold. It was a magnificent sight, and drew an exclamation of admiration and delight from the Chilians, weary as they all were; but they hoped that the view which they had just obtained of the place was all that they would ever see of it—as it would be, if fortune would but favour them that night.

It was now perfectly evident that they would not be able to reach Cuzco that evening, and as the darkness was fast coming on the Peruvians began to look about them for a suitable place in which to camp for the night. About half a mile farther on could be seen, through the gathering gloom, a small hillock, crowned with great rocks and boulders, apparently the remains of some ancient Inca fortification. This struck Douglas as a place that might have been made on purpose for their attempt, could the guards but be induced to pitch the camp there. He was casting about in his mind for some scheme by which they might be induced to select the spot as a halting-place, when the officer in command of the troop rose in his stirrups and, pointing to the hillock with his sword, exclaimed:

“There, over yonder, is the place for us,mi hijos; we will encamp among those boulders. We shall be as comfortable there as in the city of Cuzco itself. Forward,guerreros; we shall soon be there; and we will have a good long rest to-night.”

“Ay, that you will, you inhuman scoundrel,” muttered Jim; “but it will not be the sort of sleep of which you are thinking!” However, the prisoners and their guards pushed forward, and in about ten minutes’ time the group arrived at the foot of the little hill, which they at once began to climb.

“Now I wonder,” thought Jim, “whether the next time we tread this road it will be as free men once more. God grant us success this night, for if we fail there will be no second chance for us!”

The other officers seemed to be occupied with similar thoughts, for they examined the whole place and its surroundings very carefully as they ascended; evidently in order that, should the attempt be successful, they might be able to find their way down in the darkness. At last the summit was reached; but before the weary men could enjoy the rest of which they stood in such great need, they were obliged to unload the tents and provisions from the pack mules, the Peruvians being much to lazy to do anything for themselves. It was therefore about eight o’clock by the time that the tents were pitched and the evening meal prepared; and when the food was ready the prisoners ate as much as they could, for they did not in the least know where they would obtain their next meal. This having been done, the pots and pans had to be cleaned and put away; so that it was a tolerably weary company which at last sought its tents to lie down and rest.

But not to slumber. There was not a single Chilian among those to whom the plan had been revealed who closed his eyes, lest he should fall asleep and thus not be ready when the momentous signal should be given. Long before this it had been ascertained that there were but four keys for the purpose of locking and unlocking the prisoners’ manacles; one being held by the captain, while the other three were distributed in turn among the soldiers, being given to three different men every day, for the better security of the prisoners, and to make sure that there could be no tampering with the guards. Jim had been keeping his eyes very wide open all through the day, and he had noticed which of the Peruvians were the men who had the keys in their possession that night, while he had also carefully marked the positions where they had thrown themselves down to sleep. Two of the soldiers had retired to a tent, but the third had fortunately elected to sleep in the open, as the night was very warm.

The plan arranged was for Jim and his group of manacled fellow-officers to crawl forward, and either kill or stun one of the gaolers—it would be too risky to tackle more than one—secure his key, unlock their own fetters, and then to go silently the rounds, setting free their companions. When all were at liberty they were to seize their shovels and pickaxes and with them attack the slumbering soldiery, killing as many as possible before they were fully awake and could seize their rifles. Should they be discovered before the work was complete, those who were free were to keep off the Peruvians while the remainder were set at liberty.

It sounded rather a barbarous scheme, but Jim could think of no other which would be at all likely to be successful; and he was by this time rendered altogether too hardened by privation and ill-treatment to feel very much pity for the callously brutal Peruvian guards. Besides, it was his life or theirs, and he had no difficulty in choosing.

The young Englishman waited until midnight, in order to allow the soldiers to get well asleep, and then he silently nudged his companions to make sure that all were awake. They all were,—very wide awake, too,—and, after a few low-voiced instructions from Douglas, the little body of men began to crawl away through the darkness, taking the utmost care that there should be no clanking of chains to betray their movements. Forward on hands and knees they went, all moving together; and they soon passed through the ranks of their comrades, who did not make a single movement while the gallant little band crawled past.

Soon they had left the Chilian part of the encampment behind; and a few minutes later, Jim, who was the leading man of the party, came abreast of the first Peruvian tent. The night was pitchy dark, although there was a young moon, for the sky was covered with dark, low-lying clouds. This was all the better, for it lessened the probability of their being seen by the sentries; but they had to exercise a great deal of caution to avoid colliding with and so disturbing any soldiers who had elected to sleep out in the open.

“Now,” whispered Jim, as they came abreast of a certain tent, looming up dim and ghostly in the darkness; “Pedrillo is sleeping just outside this tent. Forward, men; but carefully, for your lives. One false step now, and all will be lost. Come along, and remember—we must be quick and silent at—at the work which we have to do. There must not be so much as a single struggle.”

His companions now came up abreast of Douglas, instead of following in single file; and, still abreast, they crawled toward the slumbering custodian of the key. Nearer and nearer they drew, until only a few yards separated them from their prey, then only a few feet. They were almost within arm’s length of him now; silently they crept forward again, then they paused. The only sound was that caused by the heavy breathing of the victim and the soft, hissing breaths of his executioners. Now they crept forward again until they were close to the man; Jim plucked the sleeve of the Chilian nearest to him, and together they leaned over the gaoler.

“Now!” hissed Jim, and four men flung themselves upon the fellow’s body at the same moment that Douglas’s hands clutched his throat. There was a short quick scuffle, and it was all over.

In a second he had snatched the key from the dead man’s girdle and was feverishly unlocking his comrades’ fetters. Then they, in turn, unlocked his, and in less than five minutes the twelve men were all free. Back they sped to their own portion of the camp, and were soon unlocking their friends’ manacles, with the result that in less than twenty minutes at least half the Chilians were free, and stood, grasping their pickaxes and shovels, ready for the fight which was inevitable before they could get away.

Then a horrible thing happened.

Among the Chilians was a naval petty officer, a surly, cunning—faced creature whom nobody trusted, and from whom, therefore, all particulars of the plot had been kept secret. Jim had just inserted the key in his manacles, when this traitor shrieked at the top of his voice:

“Help! help! the Chilians are escaping!”

Why the fellow did it nobody ever knew, but it was surmised that, being too much of a craven himself to attempt to escape, he had hoped to purchase his own freedom by betraying his comrades. But he must have been mad to do such a thing, surrounded as he was by Chilians, for he might have felt certain that before assistance could reach him he would be dead.

The mischief, however, was done, and the slumbering camp was effectually alarmed. The sentries squibbed off their rifles, and then, reloading, began to blaze away into the Chilian encampment. The captain’s harsh voice was heard giving orders, and in a few seconds the Peruvian soldiers had formed up in line, fixed their bayonets, and were prepared to charge.

“Quick,” exclaimed Jim; “seize your shovels and pickaxes and repel their attack. I will help you. You, Manuel, take the key and free the others while we who are already free keep the Peruvians at bay. But be cool—keep calm, and all will be well; we will defend you.”

Tossing the key to Manuel, Jim seized a shovel, and put himself at the head of his men. “Charge! charge!” he roared, and the fifty free Chilians charged straight at the place where the Peruvians were known to be.

The next second a sanguinary and ferocious struggle had commenced in the darkness. The Peruvians, hearing the Chilians approach, had levelled their rifles, and poured a withering volley into the charging men, with murderous effect. But, their rifles once emptied, conditions were somewhat more equal, and for a quarter of an hour the combat raged furiously. But such an unequal contest could not last very long; the soldiers were able, during pauses in the struggle, to reload their rifles; and this being done, they mowed the Chilians down by dozens. Manuel did his work well, but the liberated men who straggled up, by twos and threes, did not prove a very valuable reinforcement for the prisoners.

Then, to crown all their misfortunes, the moon came out and flooded the battle-ground with light; and light was all that the Peruvians needed to enable them to turn a one-sided combat into a massacre. The Chilians, mowed down by the score, at last threw down their primitive weapons and called for quarter; but the soldiers, rendered still more ferocious by the sight and smell of blood, continued to fire into the defenceless prisoners until they were sated with slaughter. Then the hapless band was surrounded once more, and the unhurt and least seriously wounded men were manacled afresh. The mortally wounded were simply bayoneted as they lay, their friends being unable to stay the murderers’ hands.

At last it was all over; the casualties were counted up and the roll called. The Peruvians had lost but eleven men, all killed, whereas the Chilians were reduced to forty, all told, scarcely one of whom did not bear a more or less serious wound on his person. But the Peruvian captain was furious at what he called the “dastardly attack” of the Chilians on his men, and he swore to take a full and complete revenge when the next morning should arrive. The wretched men were then allowed to lie down once more and sleep—if they could; and thus the remaining hours of that ghastly night passed slowly away.

The next morning, as soon as day dawned, Captain Garcia-y-Garcia, having appointed a sergeant and a corporal to assist him, constituted himself and his two assistants into what he called a “court-martial,” and then proceeded to try the prisoners.

Jim he promptly pounced upon as the ringleader, and subjected the young Englishman to a short examination, which, however, was the merest farce, for the captain had already determined upon his fate. After a trial lasting, perhaps, five minutes, therefore, Jim was condemned to be shot before mid-day, as were nine more of his unfortunate companions. The remaining thirty Chilians were each sentenced to receive a flogging of a hundred lashes as soon as they arrived at the mines; and Captain Garcia-y-Garcia promised himself that he would be the man to supervise the punishment.

The ten men who were condemned to death were then separated from the rest of the troop, and were told to seat themselves on the ground at some little distance away, where they were at once surrounded by guards. Garcia-y-Garcia then selected a squad of twenty Peruvian soldiers, and told them off for the firing-party. They were then formed up in a single line and ordered to load their rifles with ball cartridge.

When everything was in readiness, the ten unfortunate prisoners were brought forward and made to stand, also in line, with their backs against a huge rock which was to serve as a background; and Jim found himself, for the second time in his life, facing a firing-party and condemned to death. But this time there seemed to be no hope or possibility of reprieve. He was surrounded by cruel men who had no feelings save those of a brutal nature, and it seemed as though no power on earth could save him.

Jim was very thankful that no attempt was made to blindfold them, for he had had a bandage round his eyes on a previous occasion, and knew from experience that the suspense of waiting for the squad to fire, not knowing what they were doing meanwhile, was worse than death itself could possibly be.

At last the fatal moment came, and the unlucky men shook hands with one another in sad farewell. The doomed men then stood to attention, and the soldiers examined the breeches of their rifles to make sure that they were properly loaded.

Then came the word “Ready!” and the twenty rifles came up to the soldiers’ hips as though by machinery. At the second word of command the barrels glinted in the sun as the men planted the rifle-butts in the hollow of their shoulders. Jim involuntarily cast his eyes skyward as he waited for the final word, and his lips were seen to move slightly.

A painful pause—and then Garcia-y-Garcia’s voice rang out, loud, clear, and triumphant: “Fire!”

There was a simultaneous crash as the rifles were discharged, and Jim felt a sharp, stinging sensation in his left side and in his arm as he fell back upon the ground. A body fell a second after his own and lay right across his face, and Jim had actually put up his hand to push away the corpse before he realised that he was not at all severely hurt. He was recalled to his senses by hearing the captain’s voice commanding his men to reload and fire again into the heap of corpses, to “make assurance doubly sure,” as he put it, and Jim had presence of mind enough to abstain from making any further movement, though he suffered agonies of suspense while waiting for the second discharge.

It came at last, and Douglas escaped yet a second time, although the body lying above his own was riddled with bullets. The Englishman could feel now that the bullet which struck him had passed between his left side and his left arm, grazing both, but inflicting no injury worth speaking of. But would he escape after all, or would he have his brains blown out as he lay? The question was soon answered, for even as he was thinking about it, the body was hauled off his face and a soldier shouted: “Why, captain, here is a man who is still alive.”

Garcia-y-Garcia ran up and stood over Jim, looking down at him with eyes that glittered with savage menace. He half turned away to give the order for Jim’s death, when he checked himself. His expression gradually changed, and presently he spoke:

“No; I don’t think I’ll shoot you to-day, Señor Chileño, although I don’t know that I may not change my mind later. However, I will spare you this once, for you deserve to escape death after having been shot at twice. Get up!”

Hardly able to believe his ears, Jim rose to his feet, and was immediately secured to the chain once more. Then, still in a dream, he heard the command given to march, and the sadly depleted company moved down the side of the knoll, leaving nearly seventy unburied corpses lying on its summit. How very differently things had looked yesterday at this hour, thought Jim: how sadly everything had changed! Between now and yesterday lay this blood-red day of Cuzco—a day which Jim knew he would never forget so long as he lived.

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