Chapter Six.The Inca’s Prophecy.On reaching Antofagasta theCovadongawent into the roads and lay inside the reef which stretches across their entrance; and there, her captain, Carlos Condell, telegraphed to Valparaiso, giving details of the previous day’s fight, and asking for further orders, while he set about repairing the very extensive damage which had been sustained by his ship in her fight with theIndependencia. On the following day Condell received news from Valparaiso to the effect that the Chilian fleet had gone north to Callao; and was instructed that he himself was to rejoin as soon as he received word from Iquique that Admiral Williams had returned to that port. He was further instructed to proceed, meanwhile, as rapidly as possible, with the repairs to his own ship.The gunboat was accordingly hauled alongside the wharf at Antofagasta, her heavy guns were lifted out of her, and the vessel was careened in order that the shot-holes below her water-line might be plugged.As the work on theCovadongawould, it was expected, occupy at least a fortnight, Jim Douglas applied to Commander Condell for leave to go ashore occasionally, that he might explore the quaint old town, which dated back to a period long anterior to the conquest of Peru by Pizarro and his band of adventurers.During his short sojourn on board theCovadongaJim had formed a rather intimate acquaintanceship with her first lieutenant, a man named Jorge Montt; and one evening, after he had returned from one of his periodical surveys of the town, Jim entered the tiny mess-room to find Montt discoursing at length to an eager circle of listeners upon the legends and traditions of old Peru.“Yes,” Montt was saying, as Douglas entered, “it is an undisputed fact that there are thousands—nay, tens of thousands—of the descendants of the ancient Inca race now living in Peru, Bolivia, and upper Chili, who implicitly believe that a time will come when the Incas will regain their old supremacy, drive all the Latin races out of this part of South America, and re-establish the old Inca monarchy once more, in all its pristine glory. You know, of course, that there are many stories extant in this country as to the existence of vast hoards of buried treasure? Well, it is prophesied, I believe, that one day a man shall arise in Peru who shall head a vast Indian insurrection and drive the ‘oppressors’ into the sea; and his power will, it is said, be derived from these enormous hoards of buried treasure, the locality of which is well known among the Incas, and which will be revealed to the ‘Libertador’—when he makes his appearance. The study of these Indian traditions is very interesting, I assure you, gentlemen,” he concluded.“But then,” remarked Jim, who had sat down and was listening intently, “nearly all semi-civilised races have traditions of the same sort. Take the North American Indians, for instance; or the Zulus. Why, even the Chinese believe that one day a chief will arise among them who shall lead them to the conquest of the whole world! I do not think there is very much in these old legends. Every nation has them, in some form or other.”“Yes, that is so,” agreed Montt; “but I have studied the history of the Inca races very closely, and, so far as my experience goes, there is no nation on earth whose prophecies are so likely to come to pass as are theirs. I am personally aware of many occasions on which prophecies made by members of this strange race have come true in the most marvellous way. For myself, I feel convinced that the Incas really have some means, unknown to us, of foretelling future events; for I once visited in my youth an old woman in this very town of Antofagasta, who prophesied many things about my future, many of which have, so far, come true, and the rest of which will doubtless happen in due time.”Montt finished his remarks to the accompaniment of a chorus of derisive laughter, and a number of voices were raised in protest against his attempted imposition upon their credulity. Whereupon the lieutenant became somewhat angry, and replied shortly:“Well, gentlemen, you may believe me or not, as you please; but it is the truth that I am telling you; and I can take you to that identical personage, if you wish, for I believe she still lives here, and you can therefore experiment for yourselves, should you feel so inclined. For my own part I believe implicitly everything that she told me. Now, are any of you willing to accompany me to this Inca woman’s house and put her powers to the test?”There was a lengthy pause, for all the officers were either Chilians or of Chilian descent, and the South American races are notoriously superstitious. But Jim, being an Englishman, had no qualms; and he felt, for some reason or other, a great curiosity to see this strange personage. He therefore replied:“Well, Montt, if none of these other gentlemen feel disposed to go with you, perhaps you will have no objection to take me? I am very much interested in all matters of this kind, and I have been impressed by what you have just told us. I should very much like to go with you, if you don’t mind.”Montt bowed gravely and answered: “By all means, Señor Douglas; I shall be only too pleased; for I am sure that the woman would interest you, whether you believe in second sight or not. I shall be off duty to-morrow evening, after six o’clock. We shall dine at half-past, as usual, I suppose: how would half-past seven suit you as the time for going ashore? We could be back before midnight, easily, if we went at that time.”“Yes,” Douglas agreed, “that time will suit me very well, Señor Montt; and I shall look forward to our expedition with great interest.”The conversation then turned upon other matters, and the subject was dropped; but the next evening, after dinner, Douglas reminded Montt of their arrangement; and the two men, dressing themselves in mufti, stepped off theCovadongaon to the wharf, and made their way up into the town.They walked along the sea-front, where the horse-trams were wont to ply before the electric cars were introduced, right away up to the north end of the promenade, until they came to the Hôtel de Sucré, where they turned off to the right, up a very narrow and badly-lighted side-street, which conducted them into a part of the city very much resembling the place in Iquique into which Jim had been inveigled. Indeed Jim began to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their little adventure when he saw the evil glances and scowls of hatred which everywhere met them on their progress; for it was not so very long that the Chilians had occupied the place.However, Montt betrayed not the slightest uneasiness, and assured his friend that the Bolivians always looked askance at strangers in the city, and as they were both dressed in mufti, so that their connection with the Chilians was not apparent, the young Englishman decided not to worry himself about the matter, but to trust entirely to his companion’s discretion.They traversed a number of narrow side-streets and gloomy alleys, and presently came out in the broadPlaza de la Libertad, where some patriotic orator was volubly holding forth about the rights of man and the iniquity of the Chilian invasion. Montt hurriedly seized Jim’s arm as the Englishman was on the point of crossing the road to hear what the orator had to say, and guided him away to the left, so that they skirted theplazainstead of crossing it.“The people seem in rather an excitable mood to-night,” said the lieutenant; “we had therefore better make ourselves as inconspicuous as possible. I wonder what has occurred? Possibly there may have been some battle, in which the Bolivians have been defeated. I would not have come ashore had I thought that the city was likely to be in this state of unrest. However, as we are here we may as well go forward; so come along, and let us get away from this frothing volcano as soon as we can. We will turn down this side-street; it is not very much out of our way, and we shall be out of sight of the crowd all the sooner.”Jim readily acquiesced, as a good many of the people whom they met seemed to regard them with anything but friendly glances, and the two men hurried away down the Calle San Antonio, where they soon got out of range of the angry growling of the mob.“Can’t imagine what’s wrong here to-night,” muttered Montt, in a low voice, “but it must be either, as I said, that we have defeated their countrymen somewhere on land, or else that one of our ships has sunk or captured theHuascar; nothing less would, I imagine, have roused them to such a pitch of excitement. We Chilians are maintaining a ridiculously small army of occupation here; far too small for the purpose, in my opinion; and if the Bolivians were to turn restive, as they seem very much inclined to do, we should have rather a bad time of it, I am afraid. However, we are not far away from the house where this old Inca witch-woman, or whatever she calls herself, lives. It used to be in one of the small hovels on the right side of the street we are just coming to.”They turned into the street—or, rather, alley—indicated by Montt, and at once found themselves in a cobble-paved and exceedingly ill-lighted thoroughfare, flanked on either side by a curious assortment of huge, old-time houses, which were doubtless, at one period, the dwellings of high Government officials, and tiny, tumbledown hovels, which seemed to have sprung up, like fungi or some other evil growth, on the small spaces of ground which had formerly been left vacant between the larger houses.Half-way down this evil-looking, evil-smelling, and squalid alley Montt called a halt and, looking round carefully, remarked:“Now, Señor Douglas, so far as I can remember—for it is a good many years since I was here before—this is the house; but as I see no sign of any light in the place, the old woman may have gone away, or died. However, having come thus far, we will try our luck.” And the lieutenant knocked softly upon the door.The sound echoed dully through the little building, but otherwise the silence remained unbroken; it seemed as though the place was indeed deserted.“Caramba!” exclaimed Montt, “I don’t believe there is anybody here, after all; what a pity! I do not care to knock too loudly, either, for fear of attracting the attention of the neighbours. They are a queer lot down in this quarter, I can tell you. Hallo! did you hear anything moving inside there, just then, Douglas?”Jim listened intently for a few seconds, then replied: “Yes, I think Idohear something prowling about in there, but—upon my word, Montt, it sounds more like a—a—well, an animal than a human being; and—what a very curious smell there is; quite like—let me see—” here the young officer sniffed several times—“yes,” he continued after a pause, “it is quite like the odour of a wild beast!”“Per Dios! you are right,” exclaimed the lieutenant, sniffing in turn. “And I remember that last time I visited this place the old woman certainly seemed to carry with her an uncanny, musty, animal odour. Therefore it is probably she. I will knock again.”Montt thereupon drew from his jacket pocket a revolver, which he had taken the precaution to bring with him, and tapped softly on the door with its butt.This time there followed a plainly perceptible “shuffle-shuffle” like the soft padding of a heavy animal’s paws, and both men started violently when, directly afterward, and from the other side of the door, a whining voice inquired—“Who knocks at my door? Go away, whoever you are. I am a poor, lone old woman, and if you dis—”“Are you the Inca woman, Mama Huello?” broke in Montt; “for, if so, we wish to consult you. We are two naval officers who have heard of your wonderful powers of foretelling the future, and we should like to have a demonstration of them.”There was a pause, and then the whining voice replied: “Yes, I am the Mama Huello; wait ye there for a short time, while I prepare for your reception.”Again that curious shuffling sound was heard, and Jim somehow felt a shiver of fear run down his spine. It was only a disordered fancy, of course; but to him it certainly seemed as though the voice proceeded from an animal, rather than from a human being. Then Montt remarked:“She must surely have a big dog, or some other pet animal with her, I should think, for I distinctly heard the ‘pad-pad’ of paws when the Mama turned away. I hope the creature will not attempt to worry us, under the impression that we mean harm to the old woman.”Jim did not reply. He felt instinctively that they would find no animal there when they entered the house; but he had no further time for reflection, for, at that moment, the door opened with startling suddenness, and a voice invited them to enter.Montt stepped inside, and Jim followed close upon his heels. The door shut after them, of its own accord, apparently; and they found themselves in a narrow stone-flagged passage, which was dimly lighted by an oil-lamp with a large red shade over it. The whitewashed walls were covered with all manner of hieroglyphs and drawings, the meaning of which Jim could not fathom. Nor had he much time to examine them, for the voice of the Mama, still proceeding from some unseen quarter, invited them to go forward, and they presently found themselves in a large apartment, built of stone, upon the walls of which hung rich silks and cloths made of vicuna-wool, together with a number of other articles, evidently of ancient native manufacture, the like of which the young Englishman had never seen before. To say that he was astonished at the barbaric splendour of the apartment is to put it very mildly; and he could not understand how it was that such an apparently diminutive house could contain a room of such large size as the one in which he now stood.But he soon forgot his astonishment in watching the extraordinary owner of the place. She was a wizened little woman, of an age far beyond the allotted threescore years and ten, if appearances went for anything; but it was her face and hands that riveted Jim’s attention and excited his disgust. Her features bore a strongly marked resemblance to those of an animal of the cat species, and her teeth were all pointed instead of being square; while her hands resembled claws, the fingers were hooked and skinny, and the nails were discoloured and extraordinarily long. Taken altogether, it was a personality to excite repulsion and fear in any one brought in contact with it, and Douglas felt another strong shiver run down his back as he looked at her. She stood in the middle of the room, leaning upon a thick ebony stick, and peering out from beneath her overhanging eyebrows at the two young officers, with an expression which they could not quite fathom, and which seemed to be reading their very souls. Then Montt pulled himself together and remarked:“We have heard of your powers, Mama, and we have come to ask you to foretell the future to us. As I said before, we are both naval officers in the service of—well—I won’t say what country; and we are anxious to learn what may be in store for us. Will you read our lives?”“Sit ye both down there,” replied the old crone, pointing to a richly cushioned couch which was placed against one of the walls. “If ye really wish to know the future I can tell it ye. Oh yes, the Mama can tell ye. You, Don Jorge Montt, have visited me before—seven years ago; and I told you many things about your future. Have they yet come to pass?”Montt started. He had not expected that she would again recognise him, for he was very much changed in appearance; and her remembrance of his name, and the date when he last visited her, seemed rather to savour of the uncanny.“Yes, Mama,” he replied, “I did visit you at the time you mention; and all that you told me has, so far, proved true. But men’s actions govern their lives, and I thought that, perhaps, mine might have altered my future. You did not forecast a very prosperous career for me then, you know.”“You speak truth, Don Jorge,” replied the woman. “Your brave deeds in the past have indeed influenced your future; and methinks I shall see great things in store for you. I will read your future first, my officer,” she went on. “Come over here, and sit in this chair. Yes, that is it. Now do not speak until I give you permission; nor you either, Señor Englishman. Ha! You wonder how I know your nationality, do you not? I will show you stranger things than that, however, before you leave.”Montt having taken his seat in the chair, as directed, the Mama brought from a corner of the room a large copper brazier, on the top of which was a bowl of the same metal. Having filled the brazier with hot coals, which she took from a fire burning in the open hearth, she waited patiently for the metal bowl to become hot.After the lapse of perhaps ten minutes the copper basin began to glow dully red, and the witch-woman thereupon poured into it some powder, which she took from a little gold casket.Immediately a great cloud of smoke rushed up from the bowl, and, to Jim’s unbounded amazement, hung suspended over it, without mingling with the air of the room, as he had expected it would. At the same time a delightful odour greeted his nostrils, and he began to experience a delicious sensation of drowsiness stealing over him, while to his ears there seemed to come a faint sound as of music being played at a distance. The outlines of the room began to vanish and fade away, little by little, until the only thing that remained before his eyes was the column, or rather ball, of smoke which now appeared gradually to assume larger dimensions, until at length he seemed to be looking into a dense mist, wherein he could at that moment discern nothing. And all the time his sensation of drowsiness was becoming stronger and still stronger, until he seemed to be in a state of semi-coma, very much like that induced by the use of opium.Then, quite suddenly, his lassitude left him, his senses became preternaturally acute, and a sense of well-being and complete satisfaction pervaded his whole being. The mist into which he was gazing became faintly luminous, and strange shapes began to flit across it; shapes the like of which he had never seen in his life before. Then something approached him and rested its head upon his knee. He looked down and saw that the “something” was a huge jaguar or South American tiger; and it bore a striking resemblance to the woman, Mama Huello. But, strange to say, Jim felt no sensation of fear; instead, his whole being seemed to be quivering with eagerness to see what was to be displayed upon the curtain of mist, still stretched before him.The light became stronger and stronger, and the cloud more luminous, until it seemed to be a mass of living flame; and presently, out of the mist, pictures began to shape themselves one after another, in rapid succession.Jim saw his friend, Montt, as the central figure in many battles, conducting himself with unexampled bravery, and covering himself with glory. Scenes occurred which Douglas knew, instinctively, related to the war at present in progress. He saw the lieutenant in command of a small gunboat fighting an action against a whole Peruvian fleet, and coming off victorious, though sorely wounded. Then many years seemed to elapse, during which Montt had apparently attained to a high position in the Chilian navy. The country was now divided against itself, was in the throes of revolution, and Montt was the leading spirit among the insurgents. He carried all before him by the magic of his consummate genius, and out of anarchy created concord. Then the scene changed again, and Jim beheld the representation of a broadplazain some city which he had never visited but which some sixth sense told him was Santiago de Chili. Montt, now supreme head of the Chilian navy, was just issuing from a building fronting on the square. It was night-time, and the man was clothed in a heavy black cloak which he had flung round his shoulders. Montt descended the steps leading from the house, and started to walk across the square, when suddenly, from behind the large fountain which played in the middle of theplaza, there sprang four men, all masked and armed with knives. There was a brief struggle, a shrill scream, and Montt fell pierced by the daggers of his enemies.Then the scene vanished from before Jim’s eyes, and he knew that his own future was about to be presented to him. He saw himself once more back on board theBlancoEncalada, and knew that that ship, together with another Chilian vessel, was engaged in a fierce fight with a Peruvian ironclad, the name of which was hidden from him. The Chilians were victorious, although the carnage on both sides had been enormous, and Jim perceived that he himself had been wounded. Several other actions passed across the screen of mist, in all of which Douglas took a leading part, distinguishing himself brilliantly, and receiving rapid promotion. The scene then changed from sea to land, and Jim knew that he was detailed for shore service in some obscure town among the Bolivian mountains. He could distinctly see the whole picture laid out before him, and he knew instinctively that some great good fortune was awaiting him when the time should come for him to visit that place.As he stood, or rather seemed to stand, gazing out over the scene, it vanished from before his eyes; and a voice, like that of the Mama Huello, spoke, saying:“You, Señor Englishman, shall come to great honours through your own exertions and bravery; but I also see great riches before you, of which you shall obtain possession with but little trouble on your part. They are still under the earth, but in due time, and in a manner little suspected by you, their whereabouts shall be revealed to you, and you shall become a great man and a powerful chief in the land of your adoption.”The voice ceased, and a rumbling sound seemed to make itself heard in Jim’s ears. Then the cloud of mist slowly dissolved, and the outlines of the room wherein he was seated gradually came back to his senses. Yes, there was the copper brazier, but the glow had vanished from the coals, which were now black and cold. Montt was still seated in his chair, looking like a statue carved out of marble, and Jim found himself still on the couch whereon he had first placed himself. The curious feeling of drowsiness gradually left him, and the figure of Mama Huello appeared, still standing close to Montt and the copper brazier, apparently in the same position as she had taken up when the mist began to appear before his eyes, and she was laughing, a grim, noiseless chuckle that disclosed all her white, pointed teeth.Suddenly the spell broke, and Montt and Jim rose to their feet simultaneously, the former wiping the cold perspiration from his brow, and smiling in a curiously strained manner.“Well, Mama,” he said, “you have shown us some very strange things, I must say. I only hope that the last part of your prophecy concerning myself will not come true. Here you are, Mama,” he went on, feeling in his pockets for a coin, “here is a five-pésopiece for you. I hope you will consider the payment sufficient.”The old Inca woman grabbed the coin and hid it away in the recesses of her girdle. “Quite sufficient, gallant cavalier,” she replied. “Your generosity has not withered with the years. You are a brave man; and I would that I might have shown you a more pleasant ending to your life; but fate is fate, and there is no changing it.Adios, señores, adios; I do not think we shall ever meet again. You, Señor Englishman, go forward to honour and fame; while you, Don Jorge Montt, go forward to honour and—death! But you will meet it with the brave heart; and it will not be very bitter when it comes.”By this time the two men had reached the door, which the Mama now opened, and a moment later Montt and Douglas were in the street, which was now illuminated by the rays of the full moon. As the door closed behind them Montt shivered, although the night was oppressively hot, and Jim could have sworn that he heard the sound of an animal’s pads retreating down the passage behind them.The two men swiftly pulled themselves together, however, and started off for theCovadonga, which they reached just as the first faint flush of dawn made its appearance in the eastern sky.
On reaching Antofagasta theCovadongawent into the roads and lay inside the reef which stretches across their entrance; and there, her captain, Carlos Condell, telegraphed to Valparaiso, giving details of the previous day’s fight, and asking for further orders, while he set about repairing the very extensive damage which had been sustained by his ship in her fight with theIndependencia. On the following day Condell received news from Valparaiso to the effect that the Chilian fleet had gone north to Callao; and was instructed that he himself was to rejoin as soon as he received word from Iquique that Admiral Williams had returned to that port. He was further instructed to proceed, meanwhile, as rapidly as possible, with the repairs to his own ship.
The gunboat was accordingly hauled alongside the wharf at Antofagasta, her heavy guns were lifted out of her, and the vessel was careened in order that the shot-holes below her water-line might be plugged.
As the work on theCovadongawould, it was expected, occupy at least a fortnight, Jim Douglas applied to Commander Condell for leave to go ashore occasionally, that he might explore the quaint old town, which dated back to a period long anterior to the conquest of Peru by Pizarro and his band of adventurers.
During his short sojourn on board theCovadongaJim had formed a rather intimate acquaintanceship with her first lieutenant, a man named Jorge Montt; and one evening, after he had returned from one of his periodical surveys of the town, Jim entered the tiny mess-room to find Montt discoursing at length to an eager circle of listeners upon the legends and traditions of old Peru.
“Yes,” Montt was saying, as Douglas entered, “it is an undisputed fact that there are thousands—nay, tens of thousands—of the descendants of the ancient Inca race now living in Peru, Bolivia, and upper Chili, who implicitly believe that a time will come when the Incas will regain their old supremacy, drive all the Latin races out of this part of South America, and re-establish the old Inca monarchy once more, in all its pristine glory. You know, of course, that there are many stories extant in this country as to the existence of vast hoards of buried treasure? Well, it is prophesied, I believe, that one day a man shall arise in Peru who shall head a vast Indian insurrection and drive the ‘oppressors’ into the sea; and his power will, it is said, be derived from these enormous hoards of buried treasure, the locality of which is well known among the Incas, and which will be revealed to the ‘Libertador’—when he makes his appearance. The study of these Indian traditions is very interesting, I assure you, gentlemen,” he concluded.
“But then,” remarked Jim, who had sat down and was listening intently, “nearly all semi-civilised races have traditions of the same sort. Take the North American Indians, for instance; or the Zulus. Why, even the Chinese believe that one day a chief will arise among them who shall lead them to the conquest of the whole world! I do not think there is very much in these old legends. Every nation has them, in some form or other.”
“Yes, that is so,” agreed Montt; “but I have studied the history of the Inca races very closely, and, so far as my experience goes, there is no nation on earth whose prophecies are so likely to come to pass as are theirs. I am personally aware of many occasions on which prophecies made by members of this strange race have come true in the most marvellous way. For myself, I feel convinced that the Incas really have some means, unknown to us, of foretelling future events; for I once visited in my youth an old woman in this very town of Antofagasta, who prophesied many things about my future, many of which have, so far, come true, and the rest of which will doubtless happen in due time.”
Montt finished his remarks to the accompaniment of a chorus of derisive laughter, and a number of voices were raised in protest against his attempted imposition upon their credulity. Whereupon the lieutenant became somewhat angry, and replied shortly:
“Well, gentlemen, you may believe me or not, as you please; but it is the truth that I am telling you; and I can take you to that identical personage, if you wish, for I believe she still lives here, and you can therefore experiment for yourselves, should you feel so inclined. For my own part I believe implicitly everything that she told me. Now, are any of you willing to accompany me to this Inca woman’s house and put her powers to the test?”
There was a lengthy pause, for all the officers were either Chilians or of Chilian descent, and the South American races are notoriously superstitious. But Jim, being an Englishman, had no qualms; and he felt, for some reason or other, a great curiosity to see this strange personage. He therefore replied:
“Well, Montt, if none of these other gentlemen feel disposed to go with you, perhaps you will have no objection to take me? I am very much interested in all matters of this kind, and I have been impressed by what you have just told us. I should very much like to go with you, if you don’t mind.”
Montt bowed gravely and answered: “By all means, Señor Douglas; I shall be only too pleased; for I am sure that the woman would interest you, whether you believe in second sight or not. I shall be off duty to-morrow evening, after six o’clock. We shall dine at half-past, as usual, I suppose: how would half-past seven suit you as the time for going ashore? We could be back before midnight, easily, if we went at that time.”
“Yes,” Douglas agreed, “that time will suit me very well, Señor Montt; and I shall look forward to our expedition with great interest.”
The conversation then turned upon other matters, and the subject was dropped; but the next evening, after dinner, Douglas reminded Montt of their arrangement; and the two men, dressing themselves in mufti, stepped off theCovadongaon to the wharf, and made their way up into the town.
They walked along the sea-front, where the horse-trams were wont to ply before the electric cars were introduced, right away up to the north end of the promenade, until they came to the Hôtel de Sucré, where they turned off to the right, up a very narrow and badly-lighted side-street, which conducted them into a part of the city very much resembling the place in Iquique into which Jim had been inveigled. Indeed Jim began to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their little adventure when he saw the evil glances and scowls of hatred which everywhere met them on their progress; for it was not so very long that the Chilians had occupied the place.
However, Montt betrayed not the slightest uneasiness, and assured his friend that the Bolivians always looked askance at strangers in the city, and as they were both dressed in mufti, so that their connection with the Chilians was not apparent, the young Englishman decided not to worry himself about the matter, but to trust entirely to his companion’s discretion.
They traversed a number of narrow side-streets and gloomy alleys, and presently came out in the broadPlaza de la Libertad, where some patriotic orator was volubly holding forth about the rights of man and the iniquity of the Chilian invasion. Montt hurriedly seized Jim’s arm as the Englishman was on the point of crossing the road to hear what the orator had to say, and guided him away to the left, so that they skirted theplazainstead of crossing it.
“The people seem in rather an excitable mood to-night,” said the lieutenant; “we had therefore better make ourselves as inconspicuous as possible. I wonder what has occurred? Possibly there may have been some battle, in which the Bolivians have been defeated. I would not have come ashore had I thought that the city was likely to be in this state of unrest. However, as we are here we may as well go forward; so come along, and let us get away from this frothing volcano as soon as we can. We will turn down this side-street; it is not very much out of our way, and we shall be out of sight of the crowd all the sooner.”
Jim readily acquiesced, as a good many of the people whom they met seemed to regard them with anything but friendly glances, and the two men hurried away down the Calle San Antonio, where they soon got out of range of the angry growling of the mob.
“Can’t imagine what’s wrong here to-night,” muttered Montt, in a low voice, “but it must be either, as I said, that we have defeated their countrymen somewhere on land, or else that one of our ships has sunk or captured theHuascar; nothing less would, I imagine, have roused them to such a pitch of excitement. We Chilians are maintaining a ridiculously small army of occupation here; far too small for the purpose, in my opinion; and if the Bolivians were to turn restive, as they seem very much inclined to do, we should have rather a bad time of it, I am afraid. However, we are not far away from the house where this old Inca witch-woman, or whatever she calls herself, lives. It used to be in one of the small hovels on the right side of the street we are just coming to.”
They turned into the street—or, rather, alley—indicated by Montt, and at once found themselves in a cobble-paved and exceedingly ill-lighted thoroughfare, flanked on either side by a curious assortment of huge, old-time houses, which were doubtless, at one period, the dwellings of high Government officials, and tiny, tumbledown hovels, which seemed to have sprung up, like fungi or some other evil growth, on the small spaces of ground which had formerly been left vacant between the larger houses.
Half-way down this evil-looking, evil-smelling, and squalid alley Montt called a halt and, looking round carefully, remarked:
“Now, Señor Douglas, so far as I can remember—for it is a good many years since I was here before—this is the house; but as I see no sign of any light in the place, the old woman may have gone away, or died. However, having come thus far, we will try our luck.” And the lieutenant knocked softly upon the door.
The sound echoed dully through the little building, but otherwise the silence remained unbroken; it seemed as though the place was indeed deserted.
“Caramba!” exclaimed Montt, “I don’t believe there is anybody here, after all; what a pity! I do not care to knock too loudly, either, for fear of attracting the attention of the neighbours. They are a queer lot down in this quarter, I can tell you. Hallo! did you hear anything moving inside there, just then, Douglas?”
Jim listened intently for a few seconds, then replied: “Yes, I think Idohear something prowling about in there, but—upon my word, Montt, it sounds more like a—a—well, an animal than a human being; and—what a very curious smell there is; quite like—let me see—” here the young officer sniffed several times—“yes,” he continued after a pause, “it is quite like the odour of a wild beast!”
“Per Dios! you are right,” exclaimed the lieutenant, sniffing in turn. “And I remember that last time I visited this place the old woman certainly seemed to carry with her an uncanny, musty, animal odour. Therefore it is probably she. I will knock again.”
Montt thereupon drew from his jacket pocket a revolver, which he had taken the precaution to bring with him, and tapped softly on the door with its butt.
This time there followed a plainly perceptible “shuffle-shuffle” like the soft padding of a heavy animal’s paws, and both men started violently when, directly afterward, and from the other side of the door, a whining voice inquired—
“Who knocks at my door? Go away, whoever you are. I am a poor, lone old woman, and if you dis—”
“Are you the Inca woman, Mama Huello?” broke in Montt; “for, if so, we wish to consult you. We are two naval officers who have heard of your wonderful powers of foretelling the future, and we should like to have a demonstration of them.”
There was a pause, and then the whining voice replied: “Yes, I am the Mama Huello; wait ye there for a short time, while I prepare for your reception.”
Again that curious shuffling sound was heard, and Jim somehow felt a shiver of fear run down his spine. It was only a disordered fancy, of course; but to him it certainly seemed as though the voice proceeded from an animal, rather than from a human being. Then Montt remarked:
“She must surely have a big dog, or some other pet animal with her, I should think, for I distinctly heard the ‘pad-pad’ of paws when the Mama turned away. I hope the creature will not attempt to worry us, under the impression that we mean harm to the old woman.”
Jim did not reply. He felt instinctively that they would find no animal there when they entered the house; but he had no further time for reflection, for, at that moment, the door opened with startling suddenness, and a voice invited them to enter.
Montt stepped inside, and Jim followed close upon his heels. The door shut after them, of its own accord, apparently; and they found themselves in a narrow stone-flagged passage, which was dimly lighted by an oil-lamp with a large red shade over it. The whitewashed walls were covered with all manner of hieroglyphs and drawings, the meaning of which Jim could not fathom. Nor had he much time to examine them, for the voice of the Mama, still proceeding from some unseen quarter, invited them to go forward, and they presently found themselves in a large apartment, built of stone, upon the walls of which hung rich silks and cloths made of vicuna-wool, together with a number of other articles, evidently of ancient native manufacture, the like of which the young Englishman had never seen before. To say that he was astonished at the barbaric splendour of the apartment is to put it very mildly; and he could not understand how it was that such an apparently diminutive house could contain a room of such large size as the one in which he now stood.
But he soon forgot his astonishment in watching the extraordinary owner of the place. She was a wizened little woman, of an age far beyond the allotted threescore years and ten, if appearances went for anything; but it was her face and hands that riveted Jim’s attention and excited his disgust. Her features bore a strongly marked resemblance to those of an animal of the cat species, and her teeth were all pointed instead of being square; while her hands resembled claws, the fingers were hooked and skinny, and the nails were discoloured and extraordinarily long. Taken altogether, it was a personality to excite repulsion and fear in any one brought in contact with it, and Douglas felt another strong shiver run down his back as he looked at her. She stood in the middle of the room, leaning upon a thick ebony stick, and peering out from beneath her overhanging eyebrows at the two young officers, with an expression which they could not quite fathom, and which seemed to be reading their very souls. Then Montt pulled himself together and remarked:
“We have heard of your powers, Mama, and we have come to ask you to foretell the future to us. As I said before, we are both naval officers in the service of—well—I won’t say what country; and we are anxious to learn what may be in store for us. Will you read our lives?”
“Sit ye both down there,” replied the old crone, pointing to a richly cushioned couch which was placed against one of the walls. “If ye really wish to know the future I can tell it ye. Oh yes, the Mama can tell ye. You, Don Jorge Montt, have visited me before—seven years ago; and I told you many things about your future. Have they yet come to pass?”
Montt started. He had not expected that she would again recognise him, for he was very much changed in appearance; and her remembrance of his name, and the date when he last visited her, seemed rather to savour of the uncanny.
“Yes, Mama,” he replied, “I did visit you at the time you mention; and all that you told me has, so far, proved true. But men’s actions govern their lives, and I thought that, perhaps, mine might have altered my future. You did not forecast a very prosperous career for me then, you know.”
“You speak truth, Don Jorge,” replied the woman. “Your brave deeds in the past have indeed influenced your future; and methinks I shall see great things in store for you. I will read your future first, my officer,” she went on. “Come over here, and sit in this chair. Yes, that is it. Now do not speak until I give you permission; nor you either, Señor Englishman. Ha! You wonder how I know your nationality, do you not? I will show you stranger things than that, however, before you leave.”
Montt having taken his seat in the chair, as directed, the Mama brought from a corner of the room a large copper brazier, on the top of which was a bowl of the same metal. Having filled the brazier with hot coals, which she took from a fire burning in the open hearth, she waited patiently for the metal bowl to become hot.
After the lapse of perhaps ten minutes the copper basin began to glow dully red, and the witch-woman thereupon poured into it some powder, which she took from a little gold casket.
Immediately a great cloud of smoke rushed up from the bowl, and, to Jim’s unbounded amazement, hung suspended over it, without mingling with the air of the room, as he had expected it would. At the same time a delightful odour greeted his nostrils, and he began to experience a delicious sensation of drowsiness stealing over him, while to his ears there seemed to come a faint sound as of music being played at a distance. The outlines of the room began to vanish and fade away, little by little, until the only thing that remained before his eyes was the column, or rather ball, of smoke which now appeared gradually to assume larger dimensions, until at length he seemed to be looking into a dense mist, wherein he could at that moment discern nothing. And all the time his sensation of drowsiness was becoming stronger and still stronger, until he seemed to be in a state of semi-coma, very much like that induced by the use of opium.
Then, quite suddenly, his lassitude left him, his senses became preternaturally acute, and a sense of well-being and complete satisfaction pervaded his whole being. The mist into which he was gazing became faintly luminous, and strange shapes began to flit across it; shapes the like of which he had never seen in his life before. Then something approached him and rested its head upon his knee. He looked down and saw that the “something” was a huge jaguar or South American tiger; and it bore a striking resemblance to the woman, Mama Huello. But, strange to say, Jim felt no sensation of fear; instead, his whole being seemed to be quivering with eagerness to see what was to be displayed upon the curtain of mist, still stretched before him.
The light became stronger and stronger, and the cloud more luminous, until it seemed to be a mass of living flame; and presently, out of the mist, pictures began to shape themselves one after another, in rapid succession.
Jim saw his friend, Montt, as the central figure in many battles, conducting himself with unexampled bravery, and covering himself with glory. Scenes occurred which Douglas knew, instinctively, related to the war at present in progress. He saw the lieutenant in command of a small gunboat fighting an action against a whole Peruvian fleet, and coming off victorious, though sorely wounded. Then many years seemed to elapse, during which Montt had apparently attained to a high position in the Chilian navy. The country was now divided against itself, was in the throes of revolution, and Montt was the leading spirit among the insurgents. He carried all before him by the magic of his consummate genius, and out of anarchy created concord. Then the scene changed again, and Jim beheld the representation of a broadplazain some city which he had never visited but which some sixth sense told him was Santiago de Chili. Montt, now supreme head of the Chilian navy, was just issuing from a building fronting on the square. It was night-time, and the man was clothed in a heavy black cloak which he had flung round his shoulders. Montt descended the steps leading from the house, and started to walk across the square, when suddenly, from behind the large fountain which played in the middle of theplaza, there sprang four men, all masked and armed with knives. There was a brief struggle, a shrill scream, and Montt fell pierced by the daggers of his enemies.
Then the scene vanished from before Jim’s eyes, and he knew that his own future was about to be presented to him. He saw himself once more back on board theBlancoEncalada, and knew that that ship, together with another Chilian vessel, was engaged in a fierce fight with a Peruvian ironclad, the name of which was hidden from him. The Chilians were victorious, although the carnage on both sides had been enormous, and Jim perceived that he himself had been wounded. Several other actions passed across the screen of mist, in all of which Douglas took a leading part, distinguishing himself brilliantly, and receiving rapid promotion. The scene then changed from sea to land, and Jim knew that he was detailed for shore service in some obscure town among the Bolivian mountains. He could distinctly see the whole picture laid out before him, and he knew instinctively that some great good fortune was awaiting him when the time should come for him to visit that place.
As he stood, or rather seemed to stand, gazing out over the scene, it vanished from before his eyes; and a voice, like that of the Mama Huello, spoke, saying:
“You, Señor Englishman, shall come to great honours through your own exertions and bravery; but I also see great riches before you, of which you shall obtain possession with but little trouble on your part. They are still under the earth, but in due time, and in a manner little suspected by you, their whereabouts shall be revealed to you, and you shall become a great man and a powerful chief in the land of your adoption.”
The voice ceased, and a rumbling sound seemed to make itself heard in Jim’s ears. Then the cloud of mist slowly dissolved, and the outlines of the room wherein he was seated gradually came back to his senses. Yes, there was the copper brazier, but the glow had vanished from the coals, which were now black and cold. Montt was still seated in his chair, looking like a statue carved out of marble, and Jim found himself still on the couch whereon he had first placed himself. The curious feeling of drowsiness gradually left him, and the figure of Mama Huello appeared, still standing close to Montt and the copper brazier, apparently in the same position as she had taken up when the mist began to appear before his eyes, and she was laughing, a grim, noiseless chuckle that disclosed all her white, pointed teeth.
Suddenly the spell broke, and Montt and Jim rose to their feet simultaneously, the former wiping the cold perspiration from his brow, and smiling in a curiously strained manner.
“Well, Mama,” he said, “you have shown us some very strange things, I must say. I only hope that the last part of your prophecy concerning myself will not come true. Here you are, Mama,” he went on, feeling in his pockets for a coin, “here is a five-pésopiece for you. I hope you will consider the payment sufficient.”
The old Inca woman grabbed the coin and hid it away in the recesses of her girdle. “Quite sufficient, gallant cavalier,” she replied. “Your generosity has not withered with the years. You are a brave man; and I would that I might have shown you a more pleasant ending to your life; but fate is fate, and there is no changing it.Adios, señores, adios; I do not think we shall ever meet again. You, Señor Englishman, go forward to honour and fame; while you, Don Jorge Montt, go forward to honour and—death! But you will meet it with the brave heart; and it will not be very bitter when it comes.”
By this time the two men had reached the door, which the Mama now opened, and a moment later Montt and Douglas were in the street, which was now illuminated by the rays of the full moon. As the door closed behind them Montt shivered, although the night was oppressively hot, and Jim could have sworn that he heard the sound of an animal’s pads retreating down the passage behind them.
The two men swiftly pulled themselves together, however, and started off for theCovadonga, which they reached just as the first faint flush of dawn made its appearance in the eastern sky.
Chapter Seven.A Night-Attack.The day following the joint adventure of Douglas and Montt in Antofagasta a telegram arrived for the skipper of theCovadonga, ordering him to leave the place immediately, and rejoin the flag at Valparaiso without delay. All shore leave was accordingly stopped, and that same evening the gunboat raised her anchor and steamed out of Chimba Bay, on her way to the headquarters port. The telegram had also contained a warning that the Peruvian warshipsHuascarandUnionwere prowling up and down the coast, and, as each one separately was a good deal more than a match for the littleCovadonga, it behoved her captain to keep a very sharp look-out for any sign of the enemy, especially as the gunboat was not fast enough to enable her to rely upon her speed for safety.Men were, consequently, posted at the mastheads, with orders to report directly any sign of a strange ship was seen, and the ship slid slowly along under the stars, keeping as close in to the land as possible. As soon as his watch was at an end that night, Douglas, feeling rather tired after his experience of the previous evening, went down below and turned into his bunk; and it was not very long before he was in the land of dreams.It seemed to him that he had only just fallen asleep when he was rudely awakened by a commotion up on deck. He lay half awake in his bunk for a minute or two, and heard men running about overhead, the sound of excited voices shouting, and then, loud and clear above the uproar, rang out Carlos Condell’s voice giving orders for the men to be called to quarters and the guns to be cast loose. Evidently, thought Jim, there was more fighting in the wind. He quickly tumbled into his clothes, slung his uniform ulster over his shoulders, for the night was cold, and stumbled up on deck, every pulse in him throbbing with excitement at the anticipation of another encounter with the enemy.As he dashed up through the hatchway he cannoned into, and almost knocked down, his friend Montt, who was rushing forward with orders from the skipper.“Hallo, Montt!” Jim ejaculated, “what’s the matter this time?”“Two steamers have just been sighted coming out of Chañeral Bay, and heading this way,” returned the Chilian, breathlessly. “They are believed to be theHuascarand the corvetteUnion, and it looks as though they had been up to some mischief in there, for there is a big glare away to the south-east—there, you can see it for yourself!—which seems to point to their having set something on fire. But you mustn’t keep me now, my friend, for it is ‘all hands to quarters and prepare for action’; and, if it should prove to be as we believe, we shall have a tough fight to get clear of these two fellows.” And the gallant first lieutenant bustled away to carry out his orders.Looking in the direction indicated by Montt, Jim could plainly see the dull, lurid glare of a large fire away to the south-east; and, outlined sharply against the glow, he could also make out, even from the level of the deck, a brig-rigged steamer, which could be none other than the Peruvian monitor; and she was accompanied by a large, three-masted, ship-rigged steamer which was undoubtedly the corvetteUnion. Whether the enemy had yet sighted theCovadongawas still doubtful, for the gunboat was close in under the high cliffs which formed the coastline at that point, and they would hardly be on the look-out for a vessel so near in to the land. But when they got nearer to her they could hardly help sighting her; and her only hope of ultimate escape was to avoid detection, if possible, until she was nearly abreast of the Peruvians, and then to make a running fight of it, trusting more to her heels than to her fighting powers to enable her to get away.But theCovadongacould scarcely hope to avoid a fight of some sort; and her gallant skipper, Condell, was not at all the sort of man to wish to do so. He would at any time much rather stay and fight than run, even though hopelessly outmatched; but orders were orders, and he was wanted at Valparaiso, so for once he was forced to acknowledge discretion as the better part of valour.At this moment, the “word” having been quietly passed, the men came tumbling up on deck, and Jim was obliged to abandon his survey of the Peruvians and attend to his duty of getting his own particular battery of guns ready for the coming encounter. In about ten minutes everything was prepared, and Montt, the first lieutenant, marched into the tiny conning-tower and reported to Condell, “Ship cleared for action, sir.” Jim was then free, for a short time at any rate, to turn his attention once more to the swiftly approaching steamers, which were travelling so fast as to give the impression that they feared pursuit.“If,” mused Jim, “theAlmirante Cochraneor some other of our ships are really after these fellows it will probably mean the saving of us, for theHuascarand theUnionwill in that case hardly dare to remain and fight against us.“Ah!—” he continued, as he saw a rocket stream up into the air from theHuascar, “they have sighted us, that is clear, and we shall have to fight after all. Yes; here they come! They are both altering their course now, and heading directly for us. I was afraid we should not escape detection.”The Peruvians, which had been heading off the land, had now turned slightly, and were pointing about north-north-west, directly for the spot where theCovadongawas creeping along under the land, and Jim could see the dull red glare above their funnels which showed that the stokers were coaling up vigorously.Condell now shouted down the voice-tube to the engine-room, ordering the staff to let him have as much steam as the boilers would carry, and rang for full speed at the same time. The little gunboat began to quiver from stem to stern, from truck to keel, under the increased pulsations of the throbbing screw, while the curl of white water at her bows gradually crept higher and still higher up her stem as her speed increased, until she swept along at her best pace of about nine knots in the hour.As she ran down the coast theHuascarand theUnionboth pointed their bows more and more shoreward, as if to cut off the gunboat; and it began to look very much as though there was no hope for theCovadonga, when suddenly another rocket, blue this time, soared up from the monitor, and she described a wide circle seaward once more, her consort following her example. Jim immediately guessed that Admiral Grau had, like a prudent man, had a leadsman at work on board his ship, and that the Peruvian skipper had suddenly found himself in danger of running aground through standing so close inshore.The two hostile warships then eased down to half-speed, and kept on a course parallel with the shore, and at a distance of about a mile away from it. As theCovadongaherself was obliged, by reason of shoals and sunken reefs, to keep at a distance of quite half a mile from the beach, this left her an avenue of escape just about half a mile in width. But although theHuascarand theUnioncould not approach closer than eight or nine hundred yards from the gunboat, she would still have to run the gauntlet of their fire, and they could easily destroy her, by gun-fire alone, at six times that distance. There did not appear to be very much hope for theCovadonga, thought Jim, unless she could somehow manage to disable her antagonists—a very unlikely contingency, owing to the smallness of her guns, or unless a Chilian ship should happen to be in the neighbourhood and be attracted to the spot by the sound of the firing which was bound to open in a few minutes.When theCovadongahad approached to within about a mile of the Peruvian ironclads, Jim saw theHuascargo about and heave-to, with her bows pointing to the south, while theUnioncame foaming along on her original course, which was parallel to that of the gunboat, and about half a mile distant from it to seaward.“Aha!” thought he to himself, “so that is the manoeuvre, is it? Grau is going to get us between two fires if he can. As soon as the corvette is past us she too will swing round and attack us with her bow-guns while theHuascarrakes us with her stern weapons. It looks as though theCovadongawere in for a hot time!”The young Englishman’s surmise soon proved correct; for directly theUnionhad passed out of the line of fire theHuascaropened with one of her turret 300-pounder guns. The first shell passed close ahead of the gunboat, but it was aimed much too high, and struck the cliffs on theCovadonga’sport beam, exploding with a brilliant flash of light and a roaring concussion that sent ton after ton of rock hurtling down into the sea. The corvette was now abreast of the Chilian ship, and as she drew level she let fly her whole broadside, consisting of one 100-pounder, one 70-pounder, and six 40-pounders, at the devoted gunboat.The effect was as though a hurricane of fire and steel had broken loose aboard theCovadonga. Three of her smaller machine-guns, together with their crews, were blown to atoms, while her bulwarks were levelled with the decks in several places. The execution on board was terrible; and Jim had an exceedingly narrow escape, for at the moment when theUnionfired he was just entering the little conning-tower with a communication for Captain Condell, and a 100-pounder shell struck full upon one of theCovadonga’s70-pounder gun-shields, tearing a portion of it away. It then burst into a thousand fragments, one of which whizzed past Jim’s head and struck the conning-tower beside him with such force that the piece of metal weighing several pounds was firmly embedded in the soft steel of which the tower was constructed, while Jim was dazed with the shock and half blinded by the flying iron dust and grains of powder.He managed to stagger inside the citadel just as theHuascarlet fly with one of her 40-pounder guns, the shell from which struck full upon the very spot on the deck where he had been standing ten seconds previously, ripping a huge hole in the iron sheathing with which it was covered, and then exploding right over the engine-room hatch, which luckily was protected by a bomb-proof grating.When Jim had at length cleared his eyes of dust and powder he delivered his message to the captain and was about to leave, but Condell requested him to remain, saying that he might want to make use of him. Montt was in the conning-tower, carrying out Condell’s orders as to the working of the engines, while the skipper himself watched carefully through the narrow observation-slit in the citadel, waiting for the moment when he might begin to open an effectual fire upon the enemy.At length the moment arrived. TheCovadongahad come up level with the Peruvian monitor, and theUnion, being obliged to circle to seaward as she found herself in shoal water, was about three-quarters of a mile astern, although still firing incessantly. Condell gave one last look round and then shouted “Fire!” through the voice-tube which led to the gunboat’s little turret. Immediately there came a deafening roar and a tremendous concussion, as the two 70-pounders hurled forth their shells at theHuascar, and a dense cloud of white smoke drifted down upon the conning-tower, filling it with acrid fumes and momentarily blotting out the view.When it cleared away it was seen that it had been a most lucky discharge, for one shell had struck full upon the monitor’s military mast, causing it to fall lengthwise along the ship, partly wrecking the funnel and a number of ventilators, while the other had apparently penetrated an open gun-port and thus reached some part of the ship’s boiler-room, for columns of steam were seen issuing from every available opening on the monitor’s midship section.“Load again, men; load again!” cried Douglas, quite forgetting himself in the excitement of the moment.“Another discharge like that, and we shall have the fellow completely crippled. Hurrah for the gallant littleCovadonga!”He was recalled to his senses by a short, sharp laugh from Condell, who remarked, with a grim smile: “Surely, Señor Douglas, you are not going to take away the command of my ship from me, are you?”Jim, of course, promptly apologised, explaining that it was owing to the excitement that he had forgotten himself, but Condell told him to think no more of it, as it was the sort of spirit that he liked to see a young man display. There was little time for conversation, however, for theHuascar, as though in revenge for the damage inflicted by her puny enemy, again discharged her whole broadside—or at least so much of it as was still capable of being fired; and the marksmanship was so excellent that every missile again struck theCovadonga, while at the same moment theUnionagain started firing with her bow-guns, and a 100-pounder shell struck the gunboat full upon the stern, blowing a huge hole in it, killing four men, and shooting away the ensign-staff and flag.When the smoke cleared away Douglas saw that their flag was gone, and at the same time heard the sound of cheering coming across the water from theHuascar—the Peruvians were under the impression that the gunboat had struck! But they were soon to be undeceived, for Jim rushed out of the conning-tower and down below, presently reappearing with another ensign under his arm. He then ran aft and proceeded to fix the spare staff, under a perfect hail of rifle-bullets from the monitor and corvette, and, having done so, ran up the flag amid cheers from theCovadonga. Then he went forward once more to his place in the conning-tower, which he reached just as Condell gave orders for the battery of 70-pounders to be fired again.“Bravely done, gallantly done, my young friend,” said the skipper, as Jim made his appearance; “I won’t forget that action of yours if we come through all right.”Both of theCovadonga’sshells at this moment burst on board the monitor, one of them blowing her short squat funnel clean over the side, while the other, by one of the strange happenings of war, entered her hull through the same gun-port as the previous shell, working still further havoc in theHuascar’sengine-room.The gunboat had by this time drawn considerably ahead of the monitor, and Condell soon saw that the latter was too seriously crippled in her engines to pursue. Yet she still continued firing with deadly effect, and theUnionwas slowly but surely creeping up astern. The skipper therefore ordered his men to turn their whole attention to the corvette and try to disable her also, since they would soon be beyond the range of theHuascar’sguns. Every weapon was thereupon trained astern, and the accuracy of the little gunboat’s fire was soon apparent, for on board the corvette one of the forward 100-pounders was dismounted and silenced, several Nordenfeldts were damaged and put out of action, and a luckily placed solid shot struck theUnion’sforemast full upon the cap, wrecking it and bringing the upper spars down, with disastrous effect to the men on deck below.Indeed it began to look as though the plucky little ship would escape after all, for she was now beyond range of all but theHuascar’sheaviest guns, while theUnionhad been obliged to slacken speed considerably in order to enable her to get her wreckage cleared away. But Condell surmised that the Peruvians must have shrewdly guessed at his destination, and he knew that they would not give up the chase so long as there was a chance of getting him again under their guns. Moreover, he had still nearly three hundred and fifty miles to go before he could reach safety,—more than a day and a half’s steaming!TheCovadongavery soon ran theHuascarhull-down, and had left the corvette about five miles astern before the latter got the wreckage of her foremast cleared away and resumed her pursuit at full speed; but Condell had improved the shining hour by putting his own little ship to rights, and getting up more powder and shell in readiness for the renewed attack which he knew must come.Day had just begun to dawn when theUnionagain opened fire, and her first shell unluckily cut the tiller-chains on board the gunboat, so that theCovadongavery nearly ran up on the beach before the chain could be repaired and the ship again got under control; indeed, Jim distinctly felt her keel scrape as she ran over a shoal which stretched out about half a mile into the sea. By the greatest good fortune, however, she got clear, and again resumed her attempt at escape. But the Peruvian ship had by this time lessened her distance to about two miles, and was firing so accurately that nearly every shot came aboard Condell’s little ship, which, however, still continued to reply pluckily, and with such precision that she did a considerable amount of damage to theUnion.Then suddenly it seemed as though the end had come, for a particularly well-aimed shell came hurtling into theCovadonga, close to her rudder-post, almost entirely destroying the rudder, and smashing one of the blades clean off the propeller. As a consequence, her speed immediately dropped to about five knots, and Condell ground his teeth with rage. If they could but have held out a little longer all might have been well, and he might have escaped into one of the shallow bays abounding on the coast where there was too little water for his heavily armed enemy to follow. He felt that it was cruelly hard. But the brave skipper was not yet beaten; far from it. He was determined to fight to the bitter end and, if need be, go down with his colours flying and guns firing, as did his friend and brother officer, Arturo Prat, on board theHuascarat the battle of Iquique Bay, in which he, Condell, also took part. Surrender? No; perish the thought!“Two columns of smoke approaching from the southwest, sir,” suddenly reported Douglas, who had been attentively gazing southward through the slit in the conning-tower, “and we are raising them so fast that they must be steaming hard, whoever they may be. Is it possible, I wonder, that they are two of our ships brought up by the firing?”“Where, Señor Douglas? Allow me to look!” ejaculated Condell excitedly. “By all that’s wonderful, if you are right it means that we are saved! Be so good as to bring me my glass, young man, as quickly as possible. Every moment is now very precious.”Douglas was back in less than a minute, carrying the telescope, by the aid of which it was presently seen that the approaching steamers were undoubtedly warships; one of them having very much the appearance of theMagellanes, while the other, a corvette, might be either theO’Higginsor theChacabuco.Condell looked long at the approaching ships, and then turned to look at theUnion. The Peruvian was fast coming up astern, and could not now be more than a mile away. She was still firing remorselessly into the gunboat, and apparently had not noticed the smoke columns.“Now,” shouted Condell to his men, “there is theUnion, and yonder are two of our ships coming up. We will stand and fight where we are, for we can no longer run; and we must endeavour to disable the Peruvian so effectually that she will fall an easy prey to the Chilian ships. When once we get to close grips we must keep her so busy that she will not have time to look round her until our friends are close aboard, when we will hand her over to their tender mercies! To quarters again, my brave hearts, and may God defend the right!”A rousing cheer answered his words, and the men returned to their guns full of hope and with renewed energy. They opened such a furious fire upon the Peruvian that she fairly reeled under the impact of that storm of missiles. But she nevertheless came on, unchecked, and a few minutes later ranged up, broadside on to theCovadonga, at a distance of about seven hundred yards, when the action at once became close and fierce.In less than a minute the Chilian gunboat had her mizzen-mast shot away close to the deck, her funnel riddled by machine-gun bullets, and every man not under cover killed. But the survivors sheltered themselves behind the gun-shields, and manfully replied with every weapon still capable of firing. TheUnionlost her captain and first lieutenant during the first few minutes of the renewed encounter, her mainmast came down by the board, having been struck, fair and square, by one of theCovadonga’s70-pounder shells, and all her small boats were in a few minutes utterly destroyed by the storm of shot from the gunboat’s gatling-guns.Then, suddenly, theCovadongaobserved a wild commotion on board theUnion, and her screw begin to revolve once more, while columns of black smoke pouring out of her shot-torn funnel showed that there was a considerable amount of activity in her engine-room. Then she began to forge ahead and, turning slowly to starboard, headed away to the north. She had caught sight of the approaching Chilian craft, and meant to effect her escape while the way still lay open to her.Jim saw a man run aft and dip the Peruvian ensign three times in a mock farewell salute, while the white water began to boil out from under theUnion’sstern. She was in full retreat, firing with her stern guns as she went. But Condell had no intention of permitting her to escape so easily. His ship would still steer, after a fashion, if she was not driven too hard, and he immediately took up a slow pursuit, hoping against hope that he might still be able to plump a lucky shell into her which should destroy either rudder or propeller, and so leave her at the mercy of the new arrivals, which were rapidly coming up, and which could now be plainly made out as being theMagellanes, gunboat, and theChacabuco, corvette.The Peruvian was going away fast enough, however, to take her soon out of range of theCovadonga. But theMagellanesandChacabuco, as they rushed past the gunboat cheering, now began to fire at the flying ship, and several of their shells burst aboard her. As theChacabucopassed she made the signal “Proceed forthwith to Valparaiso, and report that I am chasing to the northward. Good luck and congratulations.” The two ships swept rapidly away in chase of the Peruvian, and theCovadonga, obeying orders and resuming her voyage, made the best of her way to Valparaiso, which she reached the following evening, dropping her anchor in the middle of the assembled Chilian fleet, to the accompaniment of rousing cheers for her gallant conduct at Iquique Bay and Punto Gruesos.Jim then bade good-bye to Captain Condell and returned to his own ship, theBlanco Encalada, where he was most enthusiastically received by all his friends, an especially warm welcome being extended to him by his chum Terry O’Meara.
The day following the joint adventure of Douglas and Montt in Antofagasta a telegram arrived for the skipper of theCovadonga, ordering him to leave the place immediately, and rejoin the flag at Valparaiso without delay. All shore leave was accordingly stopped, and that same evening the gunboat raised her anchor and steamed out of Chimba Bay, on her way to the headquarters port. The telegram had also contained a warning that the Peruvian warshipsHuascarandUnionwere prowling up and down the coast, and, as each one separately was a good deal more than a match for the littleCovadonga, it behoved her captain to keep a very sharp look-out for any sign of the enemy, especially as the gunboat was not fast enough to enable her to rely upon her speed for safety.
Men were, consequently, posted at the mastheads, with orders to report directly any sign of a strange ship was seen, and the ship slid slowly along under the stars, keeping as close in to the land as possible. As soon as his watch was at an end that night, Douglas, feeling rather tired after his experience of the previous evening, went down below and turned into his bunk; and it was not very long before he was in the land of dreams.
It seemed to him that he had only just fallen asleep when he was rudely awakened by a commotion up on deck. He lay half awake in his bunk for a minute or two, and heard men running about overhead, the sound of excited voices shouting, and then, loud and clear above the uproar, rang out Carlos Condell’s voice giving orders for the men to be called to quarters and the guns to be cast loose. Evidently, thought Jim, there was more fighting in the wind. He quickly tumbled into his clothes, slung his uniform ulster over his shoulders, for the night was cold, and stumbled up on deck, every pulse in him throbbing with excitement at the anticipation of another encounter with the enemy.
As he dashed up through the hatchway he cannoned into, and almost knocked down, his friend Montt, who was rushing forward with orders from the skipper.
“Hallo, Montt!” Jim ejaculated, “what’s the matter this time?”
“Two steamers have just been sighted coming out of Chañeral Bay, and heading this way,” returned the Chilian, breathlessly. “They are believed to be theHuascarand the corvetteUnion, and it looks as though they had been up to some mischief in there, for there is a big glare away to the south-east—there, you can see it for yourself!—which seems to point to their having set something on fire. But you mustn’t keep me now, my friend, for it is ‘all hands to quarters and prepare for action’; and, if it should prove to be as we believe, we shall have a tough fight to get clear of these two fellows.” And the gallant first lieutenant bustled away to carry out his orders.
Looking in the direction indicated by Montt, Jim could plainly see the dull, lurid glare of a large fire away to the south-east; and, outlined sharply against the glow, he could also make out, even from the level of the deck, a brig-rigged steamer, which could be none other than the Peruvian monitor; and she was accompanied by a large, three-masted, ship-rigged steamer which was undoubtedly the corvetteUnion. Whether the enemy had yet sighted theCovadongawas still doubtful, for the gunboat was close in under the high cliffs which formed the coastline at that point, and they would hardly be on the look-out for a vessel so near in to the land. But when they got nearer to her they could hardly help sighting her; and her only hope of ultimate escape was to avoid detection, if possible, until she was nearly abreast of the Peruvians, and then to make a running fight of it, trusting more to her heels than to her fighting powers to enable her to get away.
But theCovadongacould scarcely hope to avoid a fight of some sort; and her gallant skipper, Condell, was not at all the sort of man to wish to do so. He would at any time much rather stay and fight than run, even though hopelessly outmatched; but orders were orders, and he was wanted at Valparaiso, so for once he was forced to acknowledge discretion as the better part of valour.
At this moment, the “word” having been quietly passed, the men came tumbling up on deck, and Jim was obliged to abandon his survey of the Peruvians and attend to his duty of getting his own particular battery of guns ready for the coming encounter. In about ten minutes everything was prepared, and Montt, the first lieutenant, marched into the tiny conning-tower and reported to Condell, “Ship cleared for action, sir.” Jim was then free, for a short time at any rate, to turn his attention once more to the swiftly approaching steamers, which were travelling so fast as to give the impression that they feared pursuit.
“If,” mused Jim, “theAlmirante Cochraneor some other of our ships are really after these fellows it will probably mean the saving of us, for theHuascarand theUnionwill in that case hardly dare to remain and fight against us.
“Ah!—” he continued, as he saw a rocket stream up into the air from theHuascar, “they have sighted us, that is clear, and we shall have to fight after all. Yes; here they come! They are both altering their course now, and heading directly for us. I was afraid we should not escape detection.”
The Peruvians, which had been heading off the land, had now turned slightly, and were pointing about north-north-west, directly for the spot where theCovadongawas creeping along under the land, and Jim could see the dull red glare above their funnels which showed that the stokers were coaling up vigorously.
Condell now shouted down the voice-tube to the engine-room, ordering the staff to let him have as much steam as the boilers would carry, and rang for full speed at the same time. The little gunboat began to quiver from stem to stern, from truck to keel, under the increased pulsations of the throbbing screw, while the curl of white water at her bows gradually crept higher and still higher up her stem as her speed increased, until she swept along at her best pace of about nine knots in the hour.
As she ran down the coast theHuascarand theUnionboth pointed their bows more and more shoreward, as if to cut off the gunboat; and it began to look very much as though there was no hope for theCovadonga, when suddenly another rocket, blue this time, soared up from the monitor, and she described a wide circle seaward once more, her consort following her example. Jim immediately guessed that Admiral Grau had, like a prudent man, had a leadsman at work on board his ship, and that the Peruvian skipper had suddenly found himself in danger of running aground through standing so close inshore.
The two hostile warships then eased down to half-speed, and kept on a course parallel with the shore, and at a distance of about a mile away from it. As theCovadongaherself was obliged, by reason of shoals and sunken reefs, to keep at a distance of quite half a mile from the beach, this left her an avenue of escape just about half a mile in width. But although theHuascarand theUnioncould not approach closer than eight or nine hundred yards from the gunboat, she would still have to run the gauntlet of their fire, and they could easily destroy her, by gun-fire alone, at six times that distance. There did not appear to be very much hope for theCovadonga, thought Jim, unless she could somehow manage to disable her antagonists—a very unlikely contingency, owing to the smallness of her guns, or unless a Chilian ship should happen to be in the neighbourhood and be attracted to the spot by the sound of the firing which was bound to open in a few minutes.
When theCovadongahad approached to within about a mile of the Peruvian ironclads, Jim saw theHuascargo about and heave-to, with her bows pointing to the south, while theUnioncame foaming along on her original course, which was parallel to that of the gunboat, and about half a mile distant from it to seaward.
“Aha!” thought he to himself, “so that is the manoeuvre, is it? Grau is going to get us between two fires if he can. As soon as the corvette is past us she too will swing round and attack us with her bow-guns while theHuascarrakes us with her stern weapons. It looks as though theCovadongawere in for a hot time!”
The young Englishman’s surmise soon proved correct; for directly theUnionhad passed out of the line of fire theHuascaropened with one of her turret 300-pounder guns. The first shell passed close ahead of the gunboat, but it was aimed much too high, and struck the cliffs on theCovadonga’sport beam, exploding with a brilliant flash of light and a roaring concussion that sent ton after ton of rock hurtling down into the sea. The corvette was now abreast of the Chilian ship, and as she drew level she let fly her whole broadside, consisting of one 100-pounder, one 70-pounder, and six 40-pounders, at the devoted gunboat.
The effect was as though a hurricane of fire and steel had broken loose aboard theCovadonga. Three of her smaller machine-guns, together with their crews, were blown to atoms, while her bulwarks were levelled with the decks in several places. The execution on board was terrible; and Jim had an exceedingly narrow escape, for at the moment when theUnionfired he was just entering the little conning-tower with a communication for Captain Condell, and a 100-pounder shell struck full upon one of theCovadonga’s70-pounder gun-shields, tearing a portion of it away. It then burst into a thousand fragments, one of which whizzed past Jim’s head and struck the conning-tower beside him with such force that the piece of metal weighing several pounds was firmly embedded in the soft steel of which the tower was constructed, while Jim was dazed with the shock and half blinded by the flying iron dust and grains of powder.
He managed to stagger inside the citadel just as theHuascarlet fly with one of her 40-pounder guns, the shell from which struck full upon the very spot on the deck where he had been standing ten seconds previously, ripping a huge hole in the iron sheathing with which it was covered, and then exploding right over the engine-room hatch, which luckily was protected by a bomb-proof grating.
When Jim had at length cleared his eyes of dust and powder he delivered his message to the captain and was about to leave, but Condell requested him to remain, saying that he might want to make use of him. Montt was in the conning-tower, carrying out Condell’s orders as to the working of the engines, while the skipper himself watched carefully through the narrow observation-slit in the citadel, waiting for the moment when he might begin to open an effectual fire upon the enemy.
At length the moment arrived. TheCovadongahad come up level with the Peruvian monitor, and theUnion, being obliged to circle to seaward as she found herself in shoal water, was about three-quarters of a mile astern, although still firing incessantly. Condell gave one last look round and then shouted “Fire!” through the voice-tube which led to the gunboat’s little turret. Immediately there came a deafening roar and a tremendous concussion, as the two 70-pounders hurled forth their shells at theHuascar, and a dense cloud of white smoke drifted down upon the conning-tower, filling it with acrid fumes and momentarily blotting out the view.
When it cleared away it was seen that it had been a most lucky discharge, for one shell had struck full upon the monitor’s military mast, causing it to fall lengthwise along the ship, partly wrecking the funnel and a number of ventilators, while the other had apparently penetrated an open gun-port and thus reached some part of the ship’s boiler-room, for columns of steam were seen issuing from every available opening on the monitor’s midship section.
“Load again, men; load again!” cried Douglas, quite forgetting himself in the excitement of the moment.
“Another discharge like that, and we shall have the fellow completely crippled. Hurrah for the gallant littleCovadonga!”
He was recalled to his senses by a short, sharp laugh from Condell, who remarked, with a grim smile: “Surely, Señor Douglas, you are not going to take away the command of my ship from me, are you?”
Jim, of course, promptly apologised, explaining that it was owing to the excitement that he had forgotten himself, but Condell told him to think no more of it, as it was the sort of spirit that he liked to see a young man display. There was little time for conversation, however, for theHuascar, as though in revenge for the damage inflicted by her puny enemy, again discharged her whole broadside—or at least so much of it as was still capable of being fired; and the marksmanship was so excellent that every missile again struck theCovadonga, while at the same moment theUnionagain started firing with her bow-guns, and a 100-pounder shell struck the gunboat full upon the stern, blowing a huge hole in it, killing four men, and shooting away the ensign-staff and flag.
When the smoke cleared away Douglas saw that their flag was gone, and at the same time heard the sound of cheering coming across the water from theHuascar—the Peruvians were under the impression that the gunboat had struck! But they were soon to be undeceived, for Jim rushed out of the conning-tower and down below, presently reappearing with another ensign under his arm. He then ran aft and proceeded to fix the spare staff, under a perfect hail of rifle-bullets from the monitor and corvette, and, having done so, ran up the flag amid cheers from theCovadonga. Then he went forward once more to his place in the conning-tower, which he reached just as Condell gave orders for the battery of 70-pounders to be fired again.
“Bravely done, gallantly done, my young friend,” said the skipper, as Jim made his appearance; “I won’t forget that action of yours if we come through all right.”
Both of theCovadonga’sshells at this moment burst on board the monitor, one of them blowing her short squat funnel clean over the side, while the other, by one of the strange happenings of war, entered her hull through the same gun-port as the previous shell, working still further havoc in theHuascar’sengine-room.
The gunboat had by this time drawn considerably ahead of the monitor, and Condell soon saw that the latter was too seriously crippled in her engines to pursue. Yet she still continued firing with deadly effect, and theUnionwas slowly but surely creeping up astern. The skipper therefore ordered his men to turn their whole attention to the corvette and try to disable her also, since they would soon be beyond the range of theHuascar’sguns. Every weapon was thereupon trained astern, and the accuracy of the little gunboat’s fire was soon apparent, for on board the corvette one of the forward 100-pounders was dismounted and silenced, several Nordenfeldts were damaged and put out of action, and a luckily placed solid shot struck theUnion’sforemast full upon the cap, wrecking it and bringing the upper spars down, with disastrous effect to the men on deck below.
Indeed it began to look as though the plucky little ship would escape after all, for she was now beyond range of all but theHuascar’sheaviest guns, while theUnionhad been obliged to slacken speed considerably in order to enable her to get her wreckage cleared away. But Condell surmised that the Peruvians must have shrewdly guessed at his destination, and he knew that they would not give up the chase so long as there was a chance of getting him again under their guns. Moreover, he had still nearly three hundred and fifty miles to go before he could reach safety,—more than a day and a half’s steaming!
TheCovadongavery soon ran theHuascarhull-down, and had left the corvette about five miles astern before the latter got the wreckage of her foremast cleared away and resumed her pursuit at full speed; but Condell had improved the shining hour by putting his own little ship to rights, and getting up more powder and shell in readiness for the renewed attack which he knew must come.
Day had just begun to dawn when theUnionagain opened fire, and her first shell unluckily cut the tiller-chains on board the gunboat, so that theCovadongavery nearly ran up on the beach before the chain could be repaired and the ship again got under control; indeed, Jim distinctly felt her keel scrape as she ran over a shoal which stretched out about half a mile into the sea. By the greatest good fortune, however, she got clear, and again resumed her attempt at escape. But the Peruvian ship had by this time lessened her distance to about two miles, and was firing so accurately that nearly every shot came aboard Condell’s little ship, which, however, still continued to reply pluckily, and with such precision that she did a considerable amount of damage to theUnion.
Then suddenly it seemed as though the end had come, for a particularly well-aimed shell came hurtling into theCovadonga, close to her rudder-post, almost entirely destroying the rudder, and smashing one of the blades clean off the propeller. As a consequence, her speed immediately dropped to about five knots, and Condell ground his teeth with rage. If they could but have held out a little longer all might have been well, and he might have escaped into one of the shallow bays abounding on the coast where there was too little water for his heavily armed enemy to follow. He felt that it was cruelly hard. But the brave skipper was not yet beaten; far from it. He was determined to fight to the bitter end and, if need be, go down with his colours flying and guns firing, as did his friend and brother officer, Arturo Prat, on board theHuascarat the battle of Iquique Bay, in which he, Condell, also took part. Surrender? No; perish the thought!
“Two columns of smoke approaching from the southwest, sir,” suddenly reported Douglas, who had been attentively gazing southward through the slit in the conning-tower, “and we are raising them so fast that they must be steaming hard, whoever they may be. Is it possible, I wonder, that they are two of our ships brought up by the firing?”
“Where, Señor Douglas? Allow me to look!” ejaculated Condell excitedly. “By all that’s wonderful, if you are right it means that we are saved! Be so good as to bring me my glass, young man, as quickly as possible. Every moment is now very precious.”
Douglas was back in less than a minute, carrying the telescope, by the aid of which it was presently seen that the approaching steamers were undoubtedly warships; one of them having very much the appearance of theMagellanes, while the other, a corvette, might be either theO’Higginsor theChacabuco.
Condell looked long at the approaching ships, and then turned to look at theUnion. The Peruvian was fast coming up astern, and could not now be more than a mile away. She was still firing remorselessly into the gunboat, and apparently had not noticed the smoke columns.
“Now,” shouted Condell to his men, “there is theUnion, and yonder are two of our ships coming up. We will stand and fight where we are, for we can no longer run; and we must endeavour to disable the Peruvian so effectually that she will fall an easy prey to the Chilian ships. When once we get to close grips we must keep her so busy that she will not have time to look round her until our friends are close aboard, when we will hand her over to their tender mercies! To quarters again, my brave hearts, and may God defend the right!”
A rousing cheer answered his words, and the men returned to their guns full of hope and with renewed energy. They opened such a furious fire upon the Peruvian that she fairly reeled under the impact of that storm of missiles. But she nevertheless came on, unchecked, and a few minutes later ranged up, broadside on to theCovadonga, at a distance of about seven hundred yards, when the action at once became close and fierce.
In less than a minute the Chilian gunboat had her mizzen-mast shot away close to the deck, her funnel riddled by machine-gun bullets, and every man not under cover killed. But the survivors sheltered themselves behind the gun-shields, and manfully replied with every weapon still capable of firing. TheUnionlost her captain and first lieutenant during the first few minutes of the renewed encounter, her mainmast came down by the board, having been struck, fair and square, by one of theCovadonga’s70-pounder shells, and all her small boats were in a few minutes utterly destroyed by the storm of shot from the gunboat’s gatling-guns.
Then, suddenly, theCovadongaobserved a wild commotion on board theUnion, and her screw begin to revolve once more, while columns of black smoke pouring out of her shot-torn funnel showed that there was a considerable amount of activity in her engine-room. Then she began to forge ahead and, turning slowly to starboard, headed away to the north. She had caught sight of the approaching Chilian craft, and meant to effect her escape while the way still lay open to her.
Jim saw a man run aft and dip the Peruvian ensign three times in a mock farewell salute, while the white water began to boil out from under theUnion’sstern. She was in full retreat, firing with her stern guns as she went. But Condell had no intention of permitting her to escape so easily. His ship would still steer, after a fashion, if she was not driven too hard, and he immediately took up a slow pursuit, hoping against hope that he might still be able to plump a lucky shell into her which should destroy either rudder or propeller, and so leave her at the mercy of the new arrivals, which were rapidly coming up, and which could now be plainly made out as being theMagellanes, gunboat, and theChacabuco, corvette.
The Peruvian was going away fast enough, however, to take her soon out of range of theCovadonga. But theMagellanesandChacabuco, as they rushed past the gunboat cheering, now began to fire at the flying ship, and several of their shells burst aboard her. As theChacabucopassed she made the signal “Proceed forthwith to Valparaiso, and report that I am chasing to the northward. Good luck and congratulations.” The two ships swept rapidly away in chase of the Peruvian, and theCovadonga, obeying orders and resuming her voyage, made the best of her way to Valparaiso, which she reached the following evening, dropping her anchor in the middle of the assembled Chilian fleet, to the accompaniment of rousing cheers for her gallant conduct at Iquique Bay and Punto Gruesos.
Jim then bade good-bye to Captain Condell and returned to his own ship, theBlanco Encalada, where he was most enthusiastically received by all his friends, an especially warm welcome being extended to him by his chum Terry O’Meara.
Chapter Eight.Mine and Countermine.Jim found, upon rejoining theBlanco Encalada, that there was great excitement prevailing aboard that ship; for the fleet had received orders to sail, that very day, for the port of Arica, and the squadron was only waiting for Commodore Riveros, who had superseded Rebolledo Williams, to come aboard to start.There were numerous rumours flying about theBlancoas to the object of the cruise northward; but the one which obtained most credence was to the effect that the Chilian fleet had been instructed to find and destroy theHuascar, Union, andPilcomayo, which were waging a destructive war against the Chilian commerce, and which, it was very strongly suspected, had been guilty of certain acts against Chilian and other craft which more nearly resembled piracy than civilised warfare. So much damage, indeed, had been wrought by them that the Chilian Government had decided to hunt down the obnoxious craft; and for this purpose there were now assembled in Valparaiso harbour theAlmirante CochraneandBlanco Encalada, both battleships, the corvetteO’Higgins, and the armed merchant-steamersLoaandMathias Cousino. The little gunboatCovadongahad also been intended to sail with the squadron, but, as has been seen, she had been too badly damaged in her gallant fight with the Peruvian vessels to permit of her doing so.Mid-day came, but it brought no sign of the commodore; and it was three o’clock in the afternoon before his launch was seen to steam away from the naval steps at the jetty. The side was then piped, and Riveros came on board, to the accompaniment of the flagship’s band and a crashing salute from the other vessels in the harbour. Upon his arrival on board he immediately went below to his cabin and sent for his captain, with whom he was in close conference for about an hour. Apparently he informed him as to the plan of campaign, for soon after Captain Castello came on deck it became known, all over the ship, that a telegram had been received from a Chilian spy in Arica to the effect that theHuascarand theUnionwere to call in at that port in about three days’ time, and that they would be detained there for about a week in order to effect certain repairs. Therefore, should the Chilians sail immediately, suggested the telegram, they would be almost certain to catch their prey without difficulty. It was also within the bounds of possibility that thePilcomayoandManco Capacmight likewise be there; and in that case, since the opposing forces would be pretty evenly matched, there was every prospect of a general engagement being fought, a prospect which aroused the keenest enthusiasm of every man in the fleet, and more especially that of such young hot-bloods as Jim and his friend O’Meara, to say nothing of Lieutenant Montt, who was being transferred, to his great gratification, from theCovadongato theBlanco Encalada.A few minutes after Captain Castello had come on deck the bugles shrilled out, “Clear lower deck. Hands up anchor!” and the seamen came tumbling up from below, happy and eager as a parcel of schoolboys off for a holiday. A string of signal-flags soared aloft to theBlanco’smainyard-arm, and half an hour later her screw began to revolve as she led the way out of the harbour, with the other ships following, in column of line ahead.It was five o’clock in the afternoon of October 1, 1879, and the cruise had begun which was to prove so eventful for at least two of the ships comprising the squadron. As they passed out to sea with ever-increasing speed the forts on either side of the bay fired a farewell salute; and the spectacle of the sun sinking over Monte Bajo and the Centinela Alto, coupled with the lurid flashes of flame and clouds of white smoke from Forts San Antonio, Bueras, Valdivia, and the Citadel, constituted a picture the grandeur of which Jim never forgot.A very careful look-out was maintained during the progress of the fleet up the coast, and Commodore Riveros took the precaution to look into Chañeral Bay, Cobija, and Iquique, to make quite sure that the Peruvians—who might possibly have got wind of the expedition—should have no chance of escaping by lying hidden until the Chilians were past, and then making a sudden dash southward upon the comparatively defenceless ports of the lower coast.There was, however, no sign of the enemy anywhere in any of these places, and all the news that Riveros was able to pick up tended to confirm the telegram which he had received at Valparaiso, to the effect that the Peruvians would certainly be found at Arica. Having, therefore, made certain that they had left no enemy in their rear, the Chilians steamed away from Iquique on the 3rd of October, and arrived at a point ten miles to the south of Arica at three o’clock the next morning, where the fleet hove to, in order to allow of a council of war being held by the commodore and captains in the cabin of theBlanco Encalada.The captains of theCochraneand theO’Higginswere in favour of an attack by the whole squadron upon the Peruvian fleet supposed to be lying in the harbour, but the commodore, with the captains of theLoaandMathias Cousino, opposed that plan, on the grounds that the harbour was very strongly defended by forts; consequently, if such an attack were carried out the Chilians would be obliged to silence the batteries before they could turn their attention to the Peruvian ironclads. The scheme favoured by Riveros, and which was ultimately carried out, was to send in a number of steam-launches from the ships, each armed with a couple of spar-torpedoes, and try to blow up the Peruvian ships. The commodore’s argument was that they would almost certainly be successful, if the attack were properly made; while, if it were to fail, the Peruvians would be certain to come out of port in pursuit of the torpedo-boats, and find themselves face to face with the Chilian fleet, and beyond the protection of the shore batteries.This having been decided upon, the captains returned to their ships, and the squadron once more headed northward, at a speed of about five knots, finally coming to an anchor some four miles away from Arica, but completely hidden from it by the headland of Santa Catharina, which forms the southern extremity of the bay. The steam-launches of theAlmirante Cochraneand theBlanco Encaladawere then lowered into the water, together with a small Hereschoff torpedo-boat which theO’Higginshad brought up on her deck. These little craft all rendezvoused at the flagship, and spar-torpedoes were hastily fitted to all three, one projecting from the bow of each boat. As the expedition was likely to be an extremely hazardous one, Commodore Riveros decided to call for volunteers to man the torpedo-boats; and Jim Douglas and Jorge Montt were the first two officers who presented themselves for the service, while Terry O’Meara asked to be allowed to accompany his chum, should the latter be accepted, to take charge of the engines of the boat in which Jim was to go.At length the commodore decided to send Jim in charge of theBlanco’storpedo-boat, with Terry O’Meara in charge of the engines. Montt was to take command of theCochrane’slaunch; and a man named Juarez was given the command of the Hereschoff torpedo-boat, which was a craft of about sixteen tons displacement. Jim, as being second lieutenant of the flagship, was given the command of the little squadron; and, after half an hour’s interview with the commodore, during which he received the most minute instructions as to how he was to proceed, he went over theBlanco Encalada’sside into her steam-launch, and gave the signal to start.There was no cheering at their departure, for all those who were left behind felt that they might never see their comrades again; moreover, it was necessary to maintain the strictest silence, since, the night being very still, sounds would carry to an immense distance over the water. If suspicion were once aroused on shore, it would mean the absolute annihilation of the brave fellows who had started on their desperate errand. The fleet, of course, showed no lights, and neither did the three torpedo—boats; consequently, within a minute after the latter had started the darkness swallowed them up completely, and there was no telling whereabout they were, or what progress they were making.Jim had, however, most carefully taken his bearings before leaving the flagship, and, by the help of the chart and compass, knew exactly where to find the fleet again when his perilous mission had been accomplished. He steamed along northward over the three or four miles which separated him from Arica in extended column of line abreast, so that the chances of detection should be as much reduced as possible, and so that they could pick up any small craft which might perchance be cruising about in the neighbourhood; and he had already arranged a simple code of signals, whereby the three small steamers might communicate with one another without attracting undue attention to themselves.Half an hour after pushing off from theBlanco Encalada, the flotilla came abreast of the southern extremity of Santa Catharina island, and Jim knew that in another five minutes he would obtain a full view of the harbour, when he would also know whether his intended prey lay in the roads or not. The heart of every man in the little flotilla beat fast, and his breath came thickly under the stress of the intense excitement of the moment; and Jim, from his position in the stern of theBlanco’slaunch, tried to pierce the darkness with his eyes to get the first glimpse of the Peruvian vessels.A moment later the three boats, closer together now, swept round the northern end of the island, and Arica roadstead lay in full view before them.It was now the hour before the dawn, and consequently the night was at its darkest, but Jim could hardly repress a cry of delight as he caught sight of four indistinct, dark masses, looming up on the surface of the bay. There were no lights showing anywhere, save in one or two isolated houses on shore, where sickness probably kept the inmates awake; but he had not expected to find any lights showing among the Peruvian fleet, since they would naturally desire to keep their whereabouts hidden from chance Chilian prowlers. But in Jim’s mind there was no doubt that the four shapeless blurs lying close together, about half a mile away, were the vessels of which he had come in search; and he passed the word to the other launches to select each her own particular vessel, torpedo her, and then steam away back to the Chilian fleet. He himself intended to be responsible for two of the Peruvians, while his consorts were instructed to take one a-piece. No conditions, he thought to himself, could have been more favourable to the enterprise. So far as he could make out, no suspicion had been aroused that the Chilians were in the vicinity; the night was dark, and the town seemed to be asleep. In fact, their enemies appeared to be indulging in a feeling of security from which they would awake—too late!The order was now passed for the launches to ease down to half-speed, so that the sound of the churning propellers might be less perceptible, and the three boats crept forward almost in complete silence upon their prey. Jim could now plainly make out the brig-rig of the monitorHuascar, and the three masts and single funnel of the corvetteUnion, and these two ships he intended to account for with his own torpedo-boat. Away to the right, close under the forts, and about four hundred yards from theHuascar, lay what looked like a couple of other monitors. He had quite expected, or at least hoped, to find one other monitor there, theManco Capac, but not a third; for, according to the information received, the fourth ship should have been thePilcomayogunboat. But, no matter; it would be as easy to blow up an ironclad monitor as a gunboat; and Jim ordered each of the other two torpedo-boats to select one of the monitors lying under the forts, while he himself steamed toward the vessels which he took to be theHuascarand theUnion.After waiting about five minutes, to allow of the other two launches getting close to their objectives, Jim inquired in a low tone if all was in readiness; and upon being informed that everything was prepared, called in a whisper to Terry O’Meara, “Full speed ahead, and give her every ounce of steam she can carry!”In response to this command the little steamer’s propeller suddenly started to revolve at a tremendous rate under the pressure of steam which Terry let into the cylinders; her stern dipped several inches deeper into the water, and with a rippling noise like that of tearing silk at her bows, she darted toward the nearest ship, which Douglas took to be theHuascar, and which could not have been more than five hundred yards away.Nearer and nearer they rushed, the men in the bows craning their necks eagerly forward to see where the torpedo would strike, and Jim, in the stern, crouching over the tiller and holding his boat’s bows fair and square for the middle of his prey. It occurred to him, for a moment, as being rather curious that even now he could detect no signs of life aboard either of the Peruvian ships, for he had fully calculated on the launches being seen and an alarm raised ere he had approached so close. But no suspicion entered his mind, and he thanked his lucky stars that he had been fortunate enough to catch the enemy totally unprepared. It would make his task so much the easier.Now the little steamer was quite close to the Peruvian monitor, and in a few seconds more the blow would be struck which would send a warship and her entire crew to the bottom. Oh, the fools! he thought to himself, not to take more care of their ship. They were doomed; nothing could now save them; success was within his grasp. Five seconds more—then three—then two. Now the spar with its deadly torpedo was almost touching theHuascar’sside—Crash!A rending sound of ripping and tearing timber and another awful crash came immediately afterward, and every man in theBlanco Encalada’slaunch was hurled off his feet, and thrown either into the bottom of the boat or overboard, while the little steamer’s bows rose bodily out of the water until her keel reached an angle of almost forty-five degrees, and there she stuck, still quivering in every timber from the shock.In a second Jim realised the terrible truth. By some means or other the Peruvians had got wind of the intended attack, and had placed a stout boom of timber all round the ship, and it was upon this obstacle that the Chilian launch had charged at full speed, running right up on to it with the force of the blow, and remaining there immovable and almost a wreck.Jim’s first thought was of how to warn the people in the other two launches, for if the enemy had been prepared for attack in one quarter, he would certainly have taken the same precautions in the other. Ah, yes! There were several blue rockets in a locker in the stern-sheets; these would serve to show that something had gone wrong, and might perhaps save the others from a similar mishap.Jim scrambled out of his seat and was just raising the locker lid when a long streak of flame burst from theHuascar’sside. There was a deafening, thudding roar, and a stream of machine-gun bullets screeched and hummed over their heads. They had indeed walked right into a cunningly contrived trap, and the Peruvians had been on the watch for them the whole time.The next minute there was a dull roar away to starboard, and Jim saw, out of the corner of his eye, a huge column of water leap up, with something dark poised upon the top of it. In a second he realised that one at least of his consorts had been successful and had torpedoed her prey; but even before the column of water had subsided, there broke out a crash of musketry aboard the second monitor, and sparks of fire sprang up in different parts of her, which quickly brightened into a lurid glare and showed that her people were lighting beacon-fires, the better to see who their attackers might be and their whereabouts.Truly it was the Chilians who had been taken by surprise, not their enemies! And what a mess they had made of it all, too!But there was no time now to think about the other launches; they would have to look after themselves; for Jim’s whole energies were now directed toward the saving of his own boat’s crew. After the first volley of machine-gun fire from the ship which he had attacked, the Peruvians got their aim right, and sent a perfect hail of Gatling, Nordenfeldt, and rifle-bullets hurtling into the wrecked launch, so that her men began to fall in all directions. Beacon-fires were also lighted in bow and stern and at amidships, so that the vivid red glare shed a lurid radiance over everything within a hundred yards. And by their light Douglas saw that the ship which he had attacked wasnottheHuascarat all; neither was the craft lying close to her theUnion! They were a pair of old hulks, roughly metamorphosed so as to resemble the warships, and heavy barriers of floating timber had been thrown out all round them, while they had been armed with machine-guns and crowds of riflemen. The monitor and the corvette had escaped out of Arica harbour to continue their depredations elsewhere, and thePilcomayohad probably gone with them. The Chilians had walked into a cleverly set trap and were paying dearly for their mistake.Jim quickly recovered his presence of mind, and springing out of the launch while the bullets whistled about his ears, started to examine the boat in order to ascertain whether she were still seaworthy. He soon discovered that although there were numerous holes in her planking, they were all above the water-line, as luck would have it, and although a long piece of her keel was gone, it had not started the boat’s timbers so far as he could see.“Now, boys,” he shouted, “if we can get the launch back into the water we may escape after all. Who will lend me a hand?”The men needed no second bidding, but sprang to their young leader’s assistance, and worked with all the energy of despair. Man after man fell under the deadly hail of fire from the hulk, but as fast as they fell others took their places, until at last, under their furious exertions, the little steamer began to quiver, and then moved slightly backward off the boom. There was an ominous cracking of timber for a few seconds, as some part of her splintered planking caught in the obstruction, and then, with a rending, tearing noise, it gave way, and the launch slid into the water of the bay, shipping a ton or two of it over her stern as she splashed in. But she was afloat once more, and could she only come unscathed through that inferno of bullets, the few remaining members of her crew might, even yet, hope to escape at last.“Into the boat with you,” cried Jim; “into the boat, all but four men. You, Terry, get to your engines, and give me all the steam you can, while the others bale the boat clear of all that water. Now, you four men,” he went on, “I am going to ask you to help me in a very dangerous task. I am not going to leave this ship with my duty unfinished. I intend to torpedo her, at all hazards! Cut loose that spar at once, and we will place it along the boom in such a way that the torpedo touches this ship’s side. I will then cut a short length of fuse, and attach it to the explosive, so that it will burn for about a minute. That will just give us time to get out of reach before the powder blows up, and will not leave the Peruvians sufficient to displace the torpedo. Now then, grapple hold of the spar, you four men, and stand by to push all together when I give the word. Be ready, Terry, my boy, to go ahead with your engines directly we scramble on board, for a second’s delay may mean that we shall all be blown to smithereens. Give me that piece of fuse, Carlos. There, that has fixed that up,” continued Douglas, as he cut and placed the slow match in the opening provided for it. “Now then, all together—lift!”As Jim gave the word the men gripped the spar, lifted it, and pushed it forward until the pointed barrel-like apparatus at its further extremity touched the ship’s side. The Peruvians up above were by this time aware of what the Chilians contemplated, and turned all their attention to the men engaged upon the dangerous task of fixing the spar, thus giving those in the launch a welcome respite.But owing to the hulk’s high bulwarks and her great amount of “sheer,” they could not fire directly into Jim’s party, and the bullets plugged harmlessly into the boom about a yard behind the Chilians. Jim then ordered the men to place all their weight upon the spar, and this having been done, he clambered nimbly along it until he came to the torpedo. Then he rearranged the fuse, struck a match and applied it.There immediately began a violent splutter of sparks, accompanied by a fizzing noise, and Jim knew that no power on earth could now avert the imminent explosion. Like a cat he worked his way backwards along the spar, which bent and heaved under his weight, until presently he stood once more upon the beam.“Now, there’s no time to waste,” gasped Douglas, as the five men stood in the shelter of the hulk’s tall sides. “We must make a rush all together, and trust to getting aboard the launch unhit. But if any of us are wounded, the wounded must remain where they are; for any attempt at rescue will mean the death of us all. Now then—go!”As one man the five brave fellows sprang forward, hoping to reach the launch before the Peruvians were ready for them. But the latter were on the look-out, and as the men left their shelter, rifles and machine-guns cracked and roared once more. Two men fell, literally riddled with shot, but the others scrambled aboard the launch, and Jim gasped out, “Go ahead, Terry!” not a moment too soon.The launch had not got more than fifty yards away when there was an appalling explosion, and the whole side of the hulk seemed to fall bodily inward. She heeled over, and almost instantly plunged into the depths of the bay, the waters of which at once closed over her, dragging down the living and the dead, in the fearful vortex which she created.Jim then sent up a blue rocket to call the other boats away, for it was hopeless to attempt anything farther that night, and half an hour later he was rejoined, just as day was dawning, by theAlmirante Cochranelaunch, which was almost in a worse state than his own. She brought word that the two monitors had been theManco CapacandAtahualpa, and that the Hereschoff torpedo-boat, under Juarez, had blown up the latter, but had herself been destroyed by theManco Capac. Three men only had been rescued from her crew, and these were on board theCochrane’sboat, which had herself lost nearly three-quarters of her men. Taking it all round, however, the attacking force had not done so badly, having destroyed a two thousand-ton ironclad and sunk a hulk full of men and guns, with a loss of one small torpedo-boat, and seventeen men killed.Jim then gave orders for the wounded to be made as comfortable as possible under the circumstances, and the two launches continued their journey back to the fleet, which was reached about eight o’clock. The young man immediately made his report to the commodore, and the latter, who seemed to have no mind of his own, then called another council of officers to decide whether they should enter the bay and destroy theManco Capacand the forts, or whether they should take up the pursuit of the other three Peruvian warships which had eluded them in so mysterious a way.It was unanimously decided to pursue, so as to prevent them from doing any further damage; and Riveros therefore divided his squadron into two parts, consisting of theAlmirante CochraneandBlanco Encaladain one division; and theO’Higgins, Loa, andMathias Cousinoin the other. One column, consisting of the three latter vessels, was to steam a hundred miles due westward, and then head south, while the admiral would proceed in the same direction, but would keep close in along the coast.These arrangements having been made, the captains returned to their respective ships, the anchors were raised, and the fleet separated into two divisions—one going south direct, and the other going west in the first instance.
Jim found, upon rejoining theBlanco Encalada, that there was great excitement prevailing aboard that ship; for the fleet had received orders to sail, that very day, for the port of Arica, and the squadron was only waiting for Commodore Riveros, who had superseded Rebolledo Williams, to come aboard to start.
There were numerous rumours flying about theBlancoas to the object of the cruise northward; but the one which obtained most credence was to the effect that the Chilian fleet had been instructed to find and destroy theHuascar, Union, andPilcomayo, which were waging a destructive war against the Chilian commerce, and which, it was very strongly suspected, had been guilty of certain acts against Chilian and other craft which more nearly resembled piracy than civilised warfare. So much damage, indeed, had been wrought by them that the Chilian Government had decided to hunt down the obnoxious craft; and for this purpose there were now assembled in Valparaiso harbour theAlmirante CochraneandBlanco Encalada, both battleships, the corvetteO’Higgins, and the armed merchant-steamersLoaandMathias Cousino. The little gunboatCovadongahad also been intended to sail with the squadron, but, as has been seen, she had been too badly damaged in her gallant fight with the Peruvian vessels to permit of her doing so.
Mid-day came, but it brought no sign of the commodore; and it was three o’clock in the afternoon before his launch was seen to steam away from the naval steps at the jetty. The side was then piped, and Riveros came on board, to the accompaniment of the flagship’s band and a crashing salute from the other vessels in the harbour. Upon his arrival on board he immediately went below to his cabin and sent for his captain, with whom he was in close conference for about an hour. Apparently he informed him as to the plan of campaign, for soon after Captain Castello came on deck it became known, all over the ship, that a telegram had been received from a Chilian spy in Arica to the effect that theHuascarand theUnionwere to call in at that port in about three days’ time, and that they would be detained there for about a week in order to effect certain repairs. Therefore, should the Chilians sail immediately, suggested the telegram, they would be almost certain to catch their prey without difficulty. It was also within the bounds of possibility that thePilcomayoandManco Capacmight likewise be there; and in that case, since the opposing forces would be pretty evenly matched, there was every prospect of a general engagement being fought, a prospect which aroused the keenest enthusiasm of every man in the fleet, and more especially that of such young hot-bloods as Jim and his friend O’Meara, to say nothing of Lieutenant Montt, who was being transferred, to his great gratification, from theCovadongato theBlanco Encalada.
A few minutes after Captain Castello had come on deck the bugles shrilled out, “Clear lower deck. Hands up anchor!” and the seamen came tumbling up from below, happy and eager as a parcel of schoolboys off for a holiday. A string of signal-flags soared aloft to theBlanco’smainyard-arm, and half an hour later her screw began to revolve as she led the way out of the harbour, with the other ships following, in column of line ahead.
It was five o’clock in the afternoon of October 1, 1879, and the cruise had begun which was to prove so eventful for at least two of the ships comprising the squadron. As they passed out to sea with ever-increasing speed the forts on either side of the bay fired a farewell salute; and the spectacle of the sun sinking over Monte Bajo and the Centinela Alto, coupled with the lurid flashes of flame and clouds of white smoke from Forts San Antonio, Bueras, Valdivia, and the Citadel, constituted a picture the grandeur of which Jim never forgot.
A very careful look-out was maintained during the progress of the fleet up the coast, and Commodore Riveros took the precaution to look into Chañeral Bay, Cobija, and Iquique, to make quite sure that the Peruvians—who might possibly have got wind of the expedition—should have no chance of escaping by lying hidden until the Chilians were past, and then making a sudden dash southward upon the comparatively defenceless ports of the lower coast.
There was, however, no sign of the enemy anywhere in any of these places, and all the news that Riveros was able to pick up tended to confirm the telegram which he had received at Valparaiso, to the effect that the Peruvians would certainly be found at Arica. Having, therefore, made certain that they had left no enemy in their rear, the Chilians steamed away from Iquique on the 3rd of October, and arrived at a point ten miles to the south of Arica at three o’clock the next morning, where the fleet hove to, in order to allow of a council of war being held by the commodore and captains in the cabin of theBlanco Encalada.
The captains of theCochraneand theO’Higginswere in favour of an attack by the whole squadron upon the Peruvian fleet supposed to be lying in the harbour, but the commodore, with the captains of theLoaandMathias Cousino, opposed that plan, on the grounds that the harbour was very strongly defended by forts; consequently, if such an attack were carried out the Chilians would be obliged to silence the batteries before they could turn their attention to the Peruvian ironclads. The scheme favoured by Riveros, and which was ultimately carried out, was to send in a number of steam-launches from the ships, each armed with a couple of spar-torpedoes, and try to blow up the Peruvian ships. The commodore’s argument was that they would almost certainly be successful, if the attack were properly made; while, if it were to fail, the Peruvians would be certain to come out of port in pursuit of the torpedo-boats, and find themselves face to face with the Chilian fleet, and beyond the protection of the shore batteries.
This having been decided upon, the captains returned to their ships, and the squadron once more headed northward, at a speed of about five knots, finally coming to an anchor some four miles away from Arica, but completely hidden from it by the headland of Santa Catharina, which forms the southern extremity of the bay. The steam-launches of theAlmirante Cochraneand theBlanco Encaladawere then lowered into the water, together with a small Hereschoff torpedo-boat which theO’Higginshad brought up on her deck. These little craft all rendezvoused at the flagship, and spar-torpedoes were hastily fitted to all three, one projecting from the bow of each boat. As the expedition was likely to be an extremely hazardous one, Commodore Riveros decided to call for volunteers to man the torpedo-boats; and Jim Douglas and Jorge Montt were the first two officers who presented themselves for the service, while Terry O’Meara asked to be allowed to accompany his chum, should the latter be accepted, to take charge of the engines of the boat in which Jim was to go.
At length the commodore decided to send Jim in charge of theBlanco’storpedo-boat, with Terry O’Meara in charge of the engines. Montt was to take command of theCochrane’slaunch; and a man named Juarez was given the command of the Hereschoff torpedo-boat, which was a craft of about sixteen tons displacement. Jim, as being second lieutenant of the flagship, was given the command of the little squadron; and, after half an hour’s interview with the commodore, during which he received the most minute instructions as to how he was to proceed, he went over theBlanco Encalada’sside into her steam-launch, and gave the signal to start.
There was no cheering at their departure, for all those who were left behind felt that they might never see their comrades again; moreover, it was necessary to maintain the strictest silence, since, the night being very still, sounds would carry to an immense distance over the water. If suspicion were once aroused on shore, it would mean the absolute annihilation of the brave fellows who had started on their desperate errand. The fleet, of course, showed no lights, and neither did the three torpedo—boats; consequently, within a minute after the latter had started the darkness swallowed them up completely, and there was no telling whereabout they were, or what progress they were making.
Jim had, however, most carefully taken his bearings before leaving the flagship, and, by the help of the chart and compass, knew exactly where to find the fleet again when his perilous mission had been accomplished. He steamed along northward over the three or four miles which separated him from Arica in extended column of line abreast, so that the chances of detection should be as much reduced as possible, and so that they could pick up any small craft which might perchance be cruising about in the neighbourhood; and he had already arranged a simple code of signals, whereby the three small steamers might communicate with one another without attracting undue attention to themselves.
Half an hour after pushing off from theBlanco Encalada, the flotilla came abreast of the southern extremity of Santa Catharina island, and Jim knew that in another five minutes he would obtain a full view of the harbour, when he would also know whether his intended prey lay in the roads or not. The heart of every man in the little flotilla beat fast, and his breath came thickly under the stress of the intense excitement of the moment; and Jim, from his position in the stern of theBlanco’slaunch, tried to pierce the darkness with his eyes to get the first glimpse of the Peruvian vessels.
A moment later the three boats, closer together now, swept round the northern end of the island, and Arica roadstead lay in full view before them.
It was now the hour before the dawn, and consequently the night was at its darkest, but Jim could hardly repress a cry of delight as he caught sight of four indistinct, dark masses, looming up on the surface of the bay. There were no lights showing anywhere, save in one or two isolated houses on shore, where sickness probably kept the inmates awake; but he had not expected to find any lights showing among the Peruvian fleet, since they would naturally desire to keep their whereabouts hidden from chance Chilian prowlers. But in Jim’s mind there was no doubt that the four shapeless blurs lying close together, about half a mile away, were the vessels of which he had come in search; and he passed the word to the other launches to select each her own particular vessel, torpedo her, and then steam away back to the Chilian fleet. He himself intended to be responsible for two of the Peruvians, while his consorts were instructed to take one a-piece. No conditions, he thought to himself, could have been more favourable to the enterprise. So far as he could make out, no suspicion had been aroused that the Chilians were in the vicinity; the night was dark, and the town seemed to be asleep. In fact, their enemies appeared to be indulging in a feeling of security from which they would awake—too late!
The order was now passed for the launches to ease down to half-speed, so that the sound of the churning propellers might be less perceptible, and the three boats crept forward almost in complete silence upon their prey. Jim could now plainly make out the brig-rig of the monitorHuascar, and the three masts and single funnel of the corvetteUnion, and these two ships he intended to account for with his own torpedo-boat. Away to the right, close under the forts, and about four hundred yards from theHuascar, lay what looked like a couple of other monitors. He had quite expected, or at least hoped, to find one other monitor there, theManco Capac, but not a third; for, according to the information received, the fourth ship should have been thePilcomayogunboat. But, no matter; it would be as easy to blow up an ironclad monitor as a gunboat; and Jim ordered each of the other two torpedo-boats to select one of the monitors lying under the forts, while he himself steamed toward the vessels which he took to be theHuascarand theUnion.
After waiting about five minutes, to allow of the other two launches getting close to their objectives, Jim inquired in a low tone if all was in readiness; and upon being informed that everything was prepared, called in a whisper to Terry O’Meara, “Full speed ahead, and give her every ounce of steam she can carry!”
In response to this command the little steamer’s propeller suddenly started to revolve at a tremendous rate under the pressure of steam which Terry let into the cylinders; her stern dipped several inches deeper into the water, and with a rippling noise like that of tearing silk at her bows, she darted toward the nearest ship, which Douglas took to be theHuascar, and which could not have been more than five hundred yards away.
Nearer and nearer they rushed, the men in the bows craning their necks eagerly forward to see where the torpedo would strike, and Jim, in the stern, crouching over the tiller and holding his boat’s bows fair and square for the middle of his prey. It occurred to him, for a moment, as being rather curious that even now he could detect no signs of life aboard either of the Peruvian ships, for he had fully calculated on the launches being seen and an alarm raised ere he had approached so close. But no suspicion entered his mind, and he thanked his lucky stars that he had been fortunate enough to catch the enemy totally unprepared. It would make his task so much the easier.
Now the little steamer was quite close to the Peruvian monitor, and in a few seconds more the blow would be struck which would send a warship and her entire crew to the bottom. Oh, the fools! he thought to himself, not to take more care of their ship. They were doomed; nothing could now save them; success was within his grasp. Five seconds more—then three—then two. Now the spar with its deadly torpedo was almost touching theHuascar’sside—
Crash!
A rending sound of ripping and tearing timber and another awful crash came immediately afterward, and every man in theBlanco Encalada’slaunch was hurled off his feet, and thrown either into the bottom of the boat or overboard, while the little steamer’s bows rose bodily out of the water until her keel reached an angle of almost forty-five degrees, and there she stuck, still quivering in every timber from the shock.
In a second Jim realised the terrible truth. By some means or other the Peruvians had got wind of the intended attack, and had placed a stout boom of timber all round the ship, and it was upon this obstacle that the Chilian launch had charged at full speed, running right up on to it with the force of the blow, and remaining there immovable and almost a wreck.
Jim’s first thought was of how to warn the people in the other two launches, for if the enemy had been prepared for attack in one quarter, he would certainly have taken the same precautions in the other. Ah, yes! There were several blue rockets in a locker in the stern-sheets; these would serve to show that something had gone wrong, and might perhaps save the others from a similar mishap.
Jim scrambled out of his seat and was just raising the locker lid when a long streak of flame burst from theHuascar’sside. There was a deafening, thudding roar, and a stream of machine-gun bullets screeched and hummed over their heads. They had indeed walked right into a cunningly contrived trap, and the Peruvians had been on the watch for them the whole time.
The next minute there was a dull roar away to starboard, and Jim saw, out of the corner of his eye, a huge column of water leap up, with something dark poised upon the top of it. In a second he realised that one at least of his consorts had been successful and had torpedoed her prey; but even before the column of water had subsided, there broke out a crash of musketry aboard the second monitor, and sparks of fire sprang up in different parts of her, which quickly brightened into a lurid glare and showed that her people were lighting beacon-fires, the better to see who their attackers might be and their whereabouts.
Truly it was the Chilians who had been taken by surprise, not their enemies! And what a mess they had made of it all, too!
But there was no time now to think about the other launches; they would have to look after themselves; for Jim’s whole energies were now directed toward the saving of his own boat’s crew. After the first volley of machine-gun fire from the ship which he had attacked, the Peruvians got their aim right, and sent a perfect hail of Gatling, Nordenfeldt, and rifle-bullets hurtling into the wrecked launch, so that her men began to fall in all directions. Beacon-fires were also lighted in bow and stern and at amidships, so that the vivid red glare shed a lurid radiance over everything within a hundred yards. And by their light Douglas saw that the ship which he had attacked wasnottheHuascarat all; neither was the craft lying close to her theUnion! They were a pair of old hulks, roughly metamorphosed so as to resemble the warships, and heavy barriers of floating timber had been thrown out all round them, while they had been armed with machine-guns and crowds of riflemen. The monitor and the corvette had escaped out of Arica harbour to continue their depredations elsewhere, and thePilcomayohad probably gone with them. The Chilians had walked into a cleverly set trap and were paying dearly for their mistake.
Jim quickly recovered his presence of mind, and springing out of the launch while the bullets whistled about his ears, started to examine the boat in order to ascertain whether she were still seaworthy. He soon discovered that although there were numerous holes in her planking, they were all above the water-line, as luck would have it, and although a long piece of her keel was gone, it had not started the boat’s timbers so far as he could see.
“Now, boys,” he shouted, “if we can get the launch back into the water we may escape after all. Who will lend me a hand?”
The men needed no second bidding, but sprang to their young leader’s assistance, and worked with all the energy of despair. Man after man fell under the deadly hail of fire from the hulk, but as fast as they fell others took their places, until at last, under their furious exertions, the little steamer began to quiver, and then moved slightly backward off the boom. There was an ominous cracking of timber for a few seconds, as some part of her splintered planking caught in the obstruction, and then, with a rending, tearing noise, it gave way, and the launch slid into the water of the bay, shipping a ton or two of it over her stern as she splashed in. But she was afloat once more, and could she only come unscathed through that inferno of bullets, the few remaining members of her crew might, even yet, hope to escape at last.
“Into the boat with you,” cried Jim; “into the boat, all but four men. You, Terry, get to your engines, and give me all the steam you can, while the others bale the boat clear of all that water. Now, you four men,” he went on, “I am going to ask you to help me in a very dangerous task. I am not going to leave this ship with my duty unfinished. I intend to torpedo her, at all hazards! Cut loose that spar at once, and we will place it along the boom in such a way that the torpedo touches this ship’s side. I will then cut a short length of fuse, and attach it to the explosive, so that it will burn for about a minute. That will just give us time to get out of reach before the powder blows up, and will not leave the Peruvians sufficient to displace the torpedo. Now then, grapple hold of the spar, you four men, and stand by to push all together when I give the word. Be ready, Terry, my boy, to go ahead with your engines directly we scramble on board, for a second’s delay may mean that we shall all be blown to smithereens. Give me that piece of fuse, Carlos. There, that has fixed that up,” continued Douglas, as he cut and placed the slow match in the opening provided for it. “Now then, all together—lift!”
As Jim gave the word the men gripped the spar, lifted it, and pushed it forward until the pointed barrel-like apparatus at its further extremity touched the ship’s side. The Peruvians up above were by this time aware of what the Chilians contemplated, and turned all their attention to the men engaged upon the dangerous task of fixing the spar, thus giving those in the launch a welcome respite.
But owing to the hulk’s high bulwarks and her great amount of “sheer,” they could not fire directly into Jim’s party, and the bullets plugged harmlessly into the boom about a yard behind the Chilians. Jim then ordered the men to place all their weight upon the spar, and this having been done, he clambered nimbly along it until he came to the torpedo. Then he rearranged the fuse, struck a match and applied it.
There immediately began a violent splutter of sparks, accompanied by a fizzing noise, and Jim knew that no power on earth could now avert the imminent explosion. Like a cat he worked his way backwards along the spar, which bent and heaved under his weight, until presently he stood once more upon the beam.
“Now, there’s no time to waste,” gasped Douglas, as the five men stood in the shelter of the hulk’s tall sides. “We must make a rush all together, and trust to getting aboard the launch unhit. But if any of us are wounded, the wounded must remain where they are; for any attempt at rescue will mean the death of us all. Now then—go!”
As one man the five brave fellows sprang forward, hoping to reach the launch before the Peruvians were ready for them. But the latter were on the look-out, and as the men left their shelter, rifles and machine-guns cracked and roared once more. Two men fell, literally riddled with shot, but the others scrambled aboard the launch, and Jim gasped out, “Go ahead, Terry!” not a moment too soon.
The launch had not got more than fifty yards away when there was an appalling explosion, and the whole side of the hulk seemed to fall bodily inward. She heeled over, and almost instantly plunged into the depths of the bay, the waters of which at once closed over her, dragging down the living and the dead, in the fearful vortex which she created.
Jim then sent up a blue rocket to call the other boats away, for it was hopeless to attempt anything farther that night, and half an hour later he was rejoined, just as day was dawning, by theAlmirante Cochranelaunch, which was almost in a worse state than his own. She brought word that the two monitors had been theManco CapacandAtahualpa, and that the Hereschoff torpedo-boat, under Juarez, had blown up the latter, but had herself been destroyed by theManco Capac. Three men only had been rescued from her crew, and these were on board theCochrane’sboat, which had herself lost nearly three-quarters of her men. Taking it all round, however, the attacking force had not done so badly, having destroyed a two thousand-ton ironclad and sunk a hulk full of men and guns, with a loss of one small torpedo-boat, and seventeen men killed.
Jim then gave orders for the wounded to be made as comfortable as possible under the circumstances, and the two launches continued their journey back to the fleet, which was reached about eight o’clock. The young man immediately made his report to the commodore, and the latter, who seemed to have no mind of his own, then called another council of officers to decide whether they should enter the bay and destroy theManco Capacand the forts, or whether they should take up the pursuit of the other three Peruvian warships which had eluded them in so mysterious a way.
It was unanimously decided to pursue, so as to prevent them from doing any further damage; and Riveros therefore divided his squadron into two parts, consisting of theAlmirante CochraneandBlanco Encaladain one division; and theO’Higgins, Loa, andMathias Cousinoin the other. One column, consisting of the three latter vessels, was to steam a hundred miles due westward, and then head south, while the admiral would proceed in the same direction, but would keep close in along the coast.
These arrangements having been made, the captains returned to their respective ships, the anchors were raised, and the fleet separated into two divisions—one going south direct, and the other going west in the first instance.