THE MASKED LIGHT.
San Jos? Lighthouse shone from the back of a tunnel-like creek on abarren stretch of the Chilian seaboard. Passing ships caught its secretrays most suddenly; much in the same manner as a lonely wayfarer mightbe startled at a swift glance of a light far down a secret entrance.
The moment the light of San Jos? fell upon a ship, that vessel at oncehugged the land and crept warily along the inshore water. A falseorder, a mistake at the helm, and the "Devil's Teeth," the offshorereef, would grind her ribs to matchwood.
The light was built on top of an old chapel whose ponderous wallscould have carried the Eddystone itself. This building crouched in theleft-hand corner of the creek, with its back built into the angle ofthe cliff, which, on that side, rose plumb as a wall and ran out intodeep soundings. There was, however, one break in it about eighty yardsin front of the lighthouse. From this opening an overhead travelingcable passed across the creek to the mid-level of "Cassandra Mine,"which honeycombed the right bank.
This latter side, though rocky, was fairly easy of ascent by meansof buttress-like masses of rock jutting out from the cliff, and therubbish shot out from the mine.
Such was the lonely creek of San Jos? when the revolution broke outagainst President Balmaceda, and left us, Gilbert and myself, strandedhelplessly on a foreign shore.
Nine months before, we had departed from our homes in the States,appointed engineers to the Cassandra Coppermining Company, Limited.Nine months before! and now our situation was worse than any Boweryloafer's; he, at all events, could try the station house when thenights grew colder.
"I knew it was too good to last," cried Gilbert, one morning as weawoke to find ourselves in a dismal plight. The mine was deserted:every man had gone to shoulder a musket on the principle of "compulsoryvolunteering." We transferred our worries by means of a letter to thehead office, and then fell to unlimited euchre, awaiting instructions.Meanwhile, our funds melted away.
At last came one day of maddening heat that drove us to the shade ofthe mid-level of the mine. There we did what we ought to have done amonth before: we held a council of war.
"We've just three and a half pesos left--that's about three dollars,"quoth Gilbert sourly.
"Then we've got to tramp."
"Tramp!" echoed Gilbert, "in _that_!" and he cast an exasperated glanceat the landscape. It was an open oven. Below us, the lighthouse lensesflashed back the sunlight in such brightness that if we had not knownthat all the lights on the coast had been extinguished by order, wemight have thought the lamps were still burning. The village hutsseemed to shrink and huddle from the glare. Not a creature was abroad;the very air seemed to have swooned in the heat of that narrow creek.
And yet, over the hill crest where the village path cut the upland,a tiny speck rose to sight, and without a pause descended the slopetoward us.
"Impossible!" gasped my chum, starting up in amazement. "He's stark,staring mad!"
It was a man running at a sling trot.
"Madman number two," cried Gilbert, and another speck breasted thecrest, and hurriedly descended on the heels of the first comer. Andthen, by ones and twos, more men appeared and swung downward, hurriedlyand without a halt, until we counted twenty-one of them on the slope.They came nearer and lower, and we saw sparkles of light breaking offthem as they ran; then we both cried together: "Soldiers!" And at thatword all the world was of interest.
By this time they were up to the first huts, and at a cry every soulrushed outside.
Some of the runners had fallen by the houses, and people began to carrywater to them.
"Poor beggars," cried Gilbert, "but if they _will_ run on a day likethis--why on earth don't they go inside and rest peacefully?"
But that was the last thing they gave us any impression of so doing. Wesaw Henrico, the old sailor with the earrings and Spanish handkerchieffor a cap, talking among a group of the soldiers. Now and again theylooked back to the crest, and then toward our side of the creek.Something of great interest was meanwhile passing from hand to hand.Suddenly Henrico turned to the villagers, addressing them in no littleheat. The soldiers seized their guns, and then, led by Henrico, thewhole crowd, villagers and soldiers, began to ascend the talus of themine. Halfway up, Henrico turned and called back to the women, "All youin siesta again." But one of them, Chloe, the sharp-tongued beauty ofthe village, broke away, and headed the whole crowd.
Striding along with her buoyant energy, she soon outstripped them all,and in a few minutes she appeared on the ledge in front of us, twohundred feet above the creek. For a moment she stood silent, a swarthyblack-eyed beauty, holding the two plaits of her hair in outstretchedhands: just in the same attitude and with just the same smile on herarched lips we saw her every morning when she called us to breakfast;for she was Henrico's niece and we lodged with him.
"Fortune, se?ors!" cried she. "Here are soldiers with a message; we donot read in our village; we come to you to speak it to us." And now thesoldiers filed in, and Henrico proffered me a crumpled paper. I read onit: "To Capitan Barras." "Here!" cried I, "this is not for us."
"No," said a dusty, sweat-soaked soldier, "Capitan Barras is killed. Iam his sergeant. Read, se?or, I am the next."
"I nodded and read on:
"The enemy are re?nforcing by sea. Have correct information that they intend capturing the lighthouse at San Jos? on the 12th, and light it to guide the transports which are due to pass the inshore channel of the Devil's Teeth. Detail a command to destroy the lighthouse beyond repair. I have wired to the cruisers; latter will be able to overtake and capture transports if delayed off San Jos? on the night of the 12th. You have six (6) hours start of the enemy.
"RODRIQUE GOMEZ."
As I finished this terse and emphatic message the sergeant cried "Ho!"and "Is that the lighthouse?"
"Yes," sang out the villagers as one man.
"Advance!" cried the sergeant, shouldering to the front of the crowd;Chloe was already on her way out, but with a sharp, smothered cryshe stopped dead in the opening, turned round, and thrust back thefollowing men, hissing the while through her teeth:
"Silence! not a breath; the enemy!"
There came a sudden metallic rattling, a rapid snapping of riflebreeches, then dead, nervous silence.
The lighthouse was in possession of the enemy! Already a couple ofsoldiers leaned over the balcony round the lenses, and we could heartheir voices as they sang out to a mounted officer below. About thislatter, and standing at ease, were some eighty men.
"And the videttes," growled the sergeant, as he pointed to the hillcrest. At this an angry murmur arose about us. They were completelyoutnumbered by the Balmacedians; and outmaneuvred by the fatalmischance to their captain in a skirmish at daybreak. He had been shotthrough the throat. With a last effort he had thrust the note into thesergeant's hands and bade him haste to San Jos?, halting neither tofight nor to rest. This we learned afterward.
From the first appearance of the soldiers in the mine, Gilbert had beeneying them with undisguised irritation. He now called out in a sharpvoice for their attention.
"If you stay here those other soldiers will attack you and 'gastado'the whole set of you. And this mine being American property and not abattle field, the best you can do is to clear out by the level on thefar side before they discover you."
At this the sergeant looked blankly in his face.
"It's no good," quoth Gilbert, "you must clear out."
The sergeant's face changed. He slapped the breech of his rifle, sworea round oath, and cried heartily: "This place is our last stand; Ishoot the first of my men that leaves!"
Gilbert dropped his eyelids in his tired way, and pulled out his watch.
"I give you five minutes," he said, in a level, matter-of-fact voice.
"And we," cried the sergeant, "have to destroy that lighthouse!"
Here Chloe thrust herself into the front of the gathering storm.
"
The soldier has it," she cried, "the lighthouse must be destroyed.You, se?ors, engineer chiefs will show us the way; it will be done."
"I'll see you all hanged first," broke in Gilbert in terse English.Then he added in Spanish: "Clear out! only another two minutes." Chloelifted her head in a passion, and her black eyes narrowed.
"Se?ors," she cried with scorn, "have we idled in the fetching of waterwhen water was so scarce, for the big 'tub' every morn? and you havehad meat and your coffee roasted to the hour. All; and not one pesosthese months. Have we cried 'clear out' to you when you could not nomore than these soldiers?"
Gilbert thrust his watch back in his shirt. We both flushed hotly, andwe both found it disconcerting to look in one another's faces. But ithad to be done.
"That's a bitter pill to swallow," growled he.
"It's true enough," I said.
Gilbert, with a short, grim laugh in his throat, growled out, "Well,let us begin to earn our grub."
Chloe read our decision in our faces. "Huzza," she cried, "the engineerchiefs--capitanos--will show us how to destroy it. We are the legs, thearms; they are the head. The lighthouse shall not be there to-night!"
In this manner Gilbert and I became "capitanos" in the Revolutionaryarmy. From an inert and baffling position we were lifted on a wave, andflung into a rushing current. There was work for our hands and brains:a problem to solve, a thing to accomplish. And we were no longer weary.
Henrico and the sergeant joined us in a short council of war. And asat any moment the enemy's scouts might blunder on us and bring on afight, we decided to retreat to a lower level, where we could hold anarmy corps at bay. Safe in this, Gilbert and I sat apart; the soldiersscooped out resting places, and, with their knapsacks for pillows, fellinstantly asleep.
"Confound that girl," said Gilbert, "and confound the whole place andtheir tin-pot armies too! But it is a fine problem, eh? I suppose theonly way to do it is by--well, anything else but fighting."
I quite agreed with him. But as hour after hour passed, and schemeafter scheme was rejected, we began to think a little less of ourabilities. We wrestled with the problem till our heads reeled. If onlywe could get a side glance even at a workable scheme. But no. At lastGilbert pulled out his Waterbury. "Five o'clock!" he cried, "we areundiluted frauds if we can't do it in another hour. It will be dark bysix!"
Chloe had, in the meantime, crawled out by another level to reportwhat was doing in the creek. She had just come back. The enemy werebivouacked round the lighthouse. On the upland, and commanding everyapproach, sentries and videttes marked the land as far as she could see.
However, she had brought one piece of comfort in the shape of a cooljar of water. As she served us she asked for news of our scheme.
"How soon do the hands and legs begin to work, capitanos?" she askedwith a complacent smile. Gilbert, with a diplomatic, Spanish-fashionwave of his hand, replied: "So! so!"
"Ah, se?ors," said she, "I should want to do it--how? Why, shut up thatlighthouse like flinging a blanket over it: so!"
"And," cried Gilbert, "that's just what we are going to do! Tell themen to be ready on the instant." As she departed he turned to me withdancing eyes.
"See?" he whispered.
"No; not an atom."
"No? Well, old man, she has struck the only plan possible! Observe theoverhead traveling wire. It lands on the flat just outside the otheropening, doesn't it? Well, suppose we hang a curtain--even Chloe'sskirt, if it were big enough--on that wire, and run it out, and cut offthe light from flashing out to seaward."
"But," I objected, "we can't make a screen big enough to intercept allthe light at a hundred feet distance--it is impracticable."
He laughed in my face, and cried out:
"My boy, rays of light from lighthouses are _parallel_!"
I had forgotten this elementary fact. I cried "Eureka!" and then wefaced our task: a race against time.
The men streamed up to us, heard, and set to work immediately. Werequisitioned the tarpaulin covers from the bags of cement; evenemptied the bags themselves. We stripped hundreds of yards of telephonewires in the galleries. We descended to a still lower level; we wereall tailors, sailmakers, anything, everything. Some patched holes,while others sewed cover to cover until a sheet, fifty feet square,grew beneath our hands, sewn together with wire, and impervious to asingle ray of light.
As the last hole was stilettoed with the point of a bayonet, Gilbertand I sought the upper level. We found the night had fallen. The coldsea breeze tasted like nectar after the candle-burnt atmosphere in theworkshop below. Our eyes sought the lighthouse; a couple of men were inthe lantern; one held a candle, and was clumsily striving to light theargand burners.
"Good!" cried Gilbert, "they'll smash some glasses, or I'm an idiot.Now for the launch!"
We descended to our workshop. The flushed, wet faces of the screenmakers confronted us, and Gilbert spoke.
"We want a volunteer to cross to the other side and clear the wire, andto signal back when ready for us to haul out the screen. It must be oneof you from the village, one who knows every stone in the darkness. Andone who is not afraid. Who volunteers?"
There was a silence in which we heard the water dripping in far-deeplevels. Gilbert looked from face to face; in vain, it seemed. Thevillagers were, however, weighing the risk of failure. Chloe steppedquietly from the group, and as quietly said: "This is a woman'sbusiness; is it not so, Uncle Henrico? Who knows so well as I the rockpaths through the lines of the sentinels? And if I meet them--well, Iam a woman and I laugh. If I were a man--well, the end of me and ourventure."
"'Tis true," growled Henrico, "Chloe must go."
He had hardly spoken before she had given a swift wave of her hand tous, and vanished up the adit.
We followed, dragging our great screen, and presently we peered outinto the night. In that little time they had managed to get some atleast of the lamps to burn, and now we saw a glowing circle of light.Henrico, Gilbert, and myself alone crept on to the ledge outside.Everything had to be done by touch. Henrico had been a sailor, and tohim fell the delicate task of hooking the screen on to the travelingwire. Foot by foot it disappeared overhead, and presently Henricoswarmed back to us and we crept together, and laid our ears on the wirecable. It sang and hummed in the night wind like a harp string. Littlejars and metallic jingles broke the even rise and fall of sound. Was itChloe? Should we hear the signal clear or confused, loud or soft? Ona sudden our doubts were settled. Our ears rang as a clear sharp blowquivered on the wire.
"Safe," we cried in delight, and soon after that came the arrangedthree clear blows across the wire.
In another second we were all heaving hard and fast at the traveleroverhead. Foot by foot it crept along, until we saw, with breathlessdelight, a huge blackness slicing into the circle of light. Anunforetold eclipse! It intersected it completely. Not a ray escapedseaward.
So far we had won.
Dripping with sweat, and nigh breathless, we dropped to the rockand looked toward the lighthouse. The lantern seemed to be utterlydeserted. Against the lower windows of the chapel we could see thesilhouettes of the guard. They were playing cards. Not an eye had seenour operations. As we rejoined the sergeant, Gilbert chuckled and said:"The game is ours! Joker, right bower, and left!"
"Not yet," quoth Henrico grimly, "the fight is at the dawn."
"Across there," added the soldier, nodding his head toward the otherlanding place of the wire.
We had much yet to learn of the ups and downs of war; and more, too, tolearn about our mine. For we now found every villager busily polishingup a rifle; and soon, too, they were dragging up half a dozen casesof ammunition from secret places in the far levels. And we were theengineers of this same mine!
Henrico served round the ammunition. The sergeant inspected every newrifle. He handed one to each of us in such an ordinary way of routine,that we accepted them and fell immediately into line to wait the comingof events. Two hours later, the tide had fallen suffi
ciently to enablea crossing to be made outside the mine.
Fifteen men were to guard the other landing place of the wire.
They passed out in single file, five soldiers and ten villagers, thesergeant in command. He carried two rifles. "One for our 'advanceguard,' Chloe," he said, with a laugh wrinkling his brown face as hepassed us. The next instant he stepped through the opening. And so hepassed from our life: a little, sinewy man, of few words, but of mostprompt decision; following his trade cheerfully, and uncomplaining ifin the day's march bad tools or adverse luck befell him. He died acrossthere in the dawn; perhaps he saw the sun rise, and knew the end of thenight's work; I hoped so.
It was now close upon ten o'clock, and there were about seven hours forus to keep most vigilant and secret watch upon the lighthouse. Fromtime to time we saw a man enter the lantern and trim the lamps. Once hestepped out on the balcony, and, leaning over the rail, quietly smokedhis cigarette.
Gilbert clutched my arm like a vise. "If that man moves to the otherside we are done! He will see his shadow on the screen!"
But, to our infinite joy, he passed in and down to join his comrades.Below, in the chapel, they played cards, changed sentries, and slept;all in complete unconsciousness of the ill trick we had played them.
Night was waning. Henrico pointed to a paler shadow on the crest abovethe creek. The wind had dropped; the air was filled with the sound ofthe tide seething in the rocks and weeds below us. Save that, all wasstill. Everything seemed to be watching and waiting.
Presently we could see one another's hands and faces. Henrico at oncemustered all the defenders and posted them among the serried rocks onthe talus.
It was an ambuscade in an amphitheatre. Some one dropped a musket,and, at the sound, we all glanced nervously at the lighthouse; no onestirred within, and we were crouching down--when a most horrid crashand volleying of shots broke out across the creek.
"On guard!" cried Henrico; "the patrol has found our outpost."
Even while he spoke, and even above the din, we caught the ring ofquick hoarse cries of command from the lighthouse. The door was flungopen and a stream of soldiers sallied forth--to instant death. Fromevery stone of our ambuscade, spitting flashes converged on the opendoor. It was a butchery at such a point-blank range, and with a lightbehind to show the mark. The crash of our volley died away as swiftlyas it commenced. For a moment I thought that not a man had escapeduninjured. Nothing but a tumbled, dark heap filled the doorway andthe little circle of light. But, suddenly, from the shelter of theinterior, some one struck down the candle inside with the butt end of amusket, and the darkness swallowed all up, for it was as night yet downthere.
Then we became aware of the hushed silence that was about us. Not ashot resounded from the direction of our outpost. Had the attack failedor had they captured our post? Involuntarily I glanced at our screen.It was still there, now just dimly outlined on the paling sky. Gilbertcalled softly to Henrico to know what he thought of the silence atthe other side. We saw Henrico craning over his rock, and strivingto pierce the blackness at the foot of the creek; his hand was up tokeep silent. At last, out of the vagueness of empty sounds, we caughta faint patter of footsteps, and, as we heard it, it came nearer andnearer: men running in desperate haste. In a trice they were below usin the shadows. Some one cried "Up here"; another called to Henrico:"They have left the post," and all in the same breath we were fightingfor our lives!
TO BE CONCLUDED.
Motor Matt's Queer Find; or, The Secret of the Iron Chest Page 18