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The Strong Arm

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"'Your life depends on your actions now. Will you utter a sound if I
let go your throat?'

"The man shook his head vehemently, and I released my clutch.

"'Now,' I said to him, 'where is the powder stored? Answer in a
whisper, and speak truly.'

"'The bulk of the powder,' he answered, 'is in the vault below the
citadel.'

"'Where is the rest of it?' I whispered.

"'In the lower room of the round tower by the gate.'

"'Nonsense,' I said: 'they would never store it in a place so liable to
attack.'

"'There was nowhere else to put it,' replied the sentinel, 'unless they
left it in the open courtyard, which would be quite as unsafe.'

"'Is the door to the lower room in the tower bolted?'

"'There is no door,' replied the sentry, 'but a low archway. This
archway has not been closed, because no cannon-balls ever come from the
northern side.'

"'How much powder is there in this room?'

"'I do not know; nine or ten barrels, I think.'

"It was evident to me that the fellow, in his fear, spoke the truth.
Now, the question was, how to get down from the wall into the courtyard
and across that to the archway at the southern side? Cautioning the
sentinel again, that if he made the slightest attempt to escape or give
the alarm, instant death would be meted to him, I told him to guide us
to the archway, which he did, down the stone steps that led from the
northern wall into the courtyard. They seemed to keep loose watch
inside, the only sentinels in the place being those on the upper walls.
But the man we had captured not appearing at his corner in time, his
comrade on the western side became alarmed, spoke to him, and obtaining
no answer, shouted for him, then discharged his gun. Instantly the
place was in an uproar. Lights flashed, and from different guard-rooms
soldiers poured out. I saw across the courtyard the archway the
sentinel had spoken of, and calling my men made a dash for it. The
besieged garrison, not expecting an enemy within, had been rushing up
the stone steps at each side to the outer wall to man the cannon they
had so recently quitted, and it was some minutes before a knowledge of
the real state of things came to them. These few minutes were all we
needed, but I saw there was no chance for a slow match, while if we
fired the mine we probably would die under the tottering tower.

"By the time we reached the archway and discovered the powder barrels,
the besieged, finding everything silent outside, came to a realisation
of the true condition of affairs. We faced them with bayonets fixed,
while Sept, the man who had captured the sentinel, took the hatchet he
had brought with him at his girdle, flung over one of the barrels on
its side, knocked in the head of it, allowing the dull black powder to
pour on the cobblestones. Then filling his hat with the explosive, he
came out towards us, leaving a thick trail behind him. By this time we
were sorely beset, and one of our men had gone down under the fire of
the enemy, who shot wildly, being baffled by the darkness, otherwise
all of us had been slaughtered. I seized a musket from a comrade and
shouted to the rest:--

"'Save yourselves', and to the garrison, in French, I gave the same
warning; then I fired the musket into the train of powder, and the next
instant found myself half stunned and bleeding at the farther end of
the courtyard. The roar of the explosion and the crash of the falling
tower were deafening. All Elsengore was groused by the earthquake
shock, I called to my men when I could find my voice, and Sept answered
from one side, and two more from another. Together we tottered across
the _débris_-strewn courtyard. Some woodwork inside the citadel
had taken fire and was burning fiercely, and this lit up the ruins and
made visible the great gap in the wall at the fallen gate. Into the
square below we saw the whole town pouring, soldiers and civilians
alike coming from the narrow streets into the open quadrangle. I made
my way, leaning on Sept, over the broken gate and down the causeway
into the square, and there, foremost of all, met my general, with a
cloak thrown round him, to make up for his want of coat.

"'There, general,' I gasped, 'there is your citadel, and through this
gap can we march to meet Marlborough.'

"'Pray, sir, who the deuce are you?' cried the general, for my face was
like that of a blackamoor.

"'I am the lieutenant who has once more disobeyed your orders, general,
in the hope of retrieving a former mistake.'

"'Sentore!' he cried, rapping out an oath. 'I shall have you court-
martialled, sir.'

"'I think, general,' I said, 'that I am court-martialled already,' for
I thought then that the hand of death was upon me, which shows the
effect of imagination, for my wounds were not serious, yet I sank down
unconscious at the general's feet. He raised me in his arms as if I had
been his own son, and thus carried me to my rooms. Seven years later,
when the war ended, I got leave of absence and came back to Elsengore
for Gretlich Seidelmier and the hour-glass."

As the lieutenant ceased speaking, Eastford thought he heard again the
explosion under the tower, and started to his feet in nervous alarm,
then looked at the lieutenant and laughed, while he said:--

"Lieutenant, I was startled by that noise just now, and imagined for
the moment that I was in Brabant. You have made good your claim to the
hour-glass, and you are welcome to it."

But as Eastford spoke, he turned his eyes towards the chair in which
the lieutenant had been seated, and found it vacant. Gazing round the
room, in half somnolent dismay, he saw that he was indeed alone. At his
feet was the shattered hour-glass, which had fallen from his knee, its
blood-red sand mingling with the colours on the carpet. Eastford said,
with an air of surprise:--

"By Jove!"




THE WARRIOR MAID OF SAN CARLOS

The young naval officer came into this world with two eyes and two
arms; he left it with but one of each--nevertheless the remaining eye
was ever quick to see, and the remaining arm ever strong to seize. Even
his blind eye became useful on one historic occasion. But the loss of
eye or arm was as nothing to the continual loss of his heart, which
often led him far afield in the finding of it. Vanquished when he met
the women; invincible when he met the men; in truth, a most human hero,
and so we all love Jack--the we, in this instant, as the old joke has
it, embracing the women.

In the year 1780 Britain ordered Colonel Polson to invade Nicaragua.
The task imposed on the gallant Colonel was not an onerous one, for the
Nicaraguans never cared to secure for themselves the military
reputation of Sparta. In fact, some years after this, a single
American, Walker, with a few Californian rifles under his command,
conquered the whole nation and made himself President of it, and
perhaps would have been Dictator of Nicaragua to-day if his own country
had not laid him by the heels. It is no violation of history to state
that the entire British fleet was not engaged in subduing Nicaragua,
and that Colonel Polson felt himself amply provided for the necessities
of the crisis by sailing into the harbour of San Juan del Norte with
one small ship. There were numerous fortifications at the mouth of the
river, and in about an hour after landing, the Colonel was in
possession of them all.

The flight of time, brief as it was, could not be compared in celerity
with the flight of the Nicaraguans, who betook themselves to the
backwoods with an impetuosity seldom seen outside of a race-course.
There was no loss of life so far as the British were concerned, and the
only casualties resulting to the Nicaraguans were colds caught through
the overheating of themselves in their feverish desire to explore
immediately the interior of their beloved country. "He who bolts and
runs away will live to bolt another day," was the motto of the
Nicaraguans. So far, so good, or so bad, as the case may be.

The victorious Colonel now got together a flotilla of some half a score
of boats, and the flotilla was placed under the command of the young
naval officer, the hero of this story. The expedition proceeded
cautiously up the river San Juan, which runs for eighty miles, or
thereabouts, from Lake Nicaragua to the salt water. The voyage was a
sort of marine picnic. Luxurious vegetation on either side, and no
opposition to speak of, even from the current of the river; for Lake
Nicaragua itself is but a hundred and twenty feet above the sea level,
and a hundred and twenty feet gives little rapidity to a river eighty
miles long.

As the flotilla approached the entrance to the lake caution increased,
for it was not known how strong Fort San Carlos might prove. This fort,
perhaps the only one in the country strongly built, stood at once on
the shore of the lake and bank of the stream. There was one chance in a
thousand that the speedy retreat of the Nicaraguans had been merely a
device to lure the British into the centre of the country, where the
little expedition of two hundred sailors and marines might be
annihilated. In these circumstances Colonel Poison thought it well,
before coming in sight of the fort, to draw up his boats along the
northern bank of the San Juan River, sending out scouts to bring in
necessary information regarding the stronghold.

The young naval officer all through his life was noted for his
energetic and reckless courage, so it was not to be wondered at that
the age of twenty-two found him impatient with the delay, loth to lie
inactive in his boat until the scouts returned; so he resolved upon an
action that would have justly brought a court-martial upon his head had
a knowledge of it come to his superior officer. He plunged alone into
the tropical thicket, armed only with two pistols and a cutlass,
determined to force his way through the rank vegetation along the bank
of the river, and reconnoitre Fort San Carlos for himself. If he had
given any thought to the matter, which it is more than likely he did
not, he must have known that he ran every risk of capture and death,
for the native of South America, then as now, has rarely shown any
hesitation about shooting prisoners of war. Our young friend,
therefore, had slight chance for his life if cut off from his comrades,
and, in the circumstances, even a civilised nation would have been
perfectly within its right in executing him as a spy.

After leaving the lake the river San Juan bends south, and then north
again. The scouts had taken the direct route to the fort across the
land, but the young officer's theory was that, if the Nicaraguans meant
to fight, they would place an ambush in the dense jungle along the
river, and from this place of concealment harass the flotilla before it
got within gunshot of the fort. This ambuscade could easily fall back
upon the fort if directly attacked and defeated. This, the young man
argued was what he himself would have done had he been in command of
the Nicaraguan forces, so it naturally occurred to him to discover
whether the same idea had suggested itself to the commandant at San
Carlos.

Expecting every moment to come upon this ambuscade, the boy proceeded,
pistol in hand, with the utmost care, crouching under the luxuriant
tropical foliage, tunnelling his way, as one might say, along the dark
alleys of vegetation, roofed in by the broad leaves overhead. Through
cross-alleys he caught glimpses now and then of the broad river, of
which he was desirous to keep within touch. Stealthily crossing one of
these riverward alleys the young fellow came upon his ambuscade, and
was struck motionless with amazement at the form it took. Silhouetted
against the shining water beyond was a young girl. She knelt at the
very verge of the low, crumbling cliff above the water; her left hand,
outspread, was on the ground, her right rested against the rough trunk
of a palm-tree, and counter-balanced the weight of her body, which
leaned far forward over the brink. Her face was turned sideways towards
him, and her lustrous eyes peered intently down the river at the
British flotilla stranded along the river's bank. So intent was her
gaze, so confident was she that she was alone, that the leopard-like
approach of her enemy gave her no hint of attack. Her perfect profile
being towards him, he saw her cherry-red lips move silently as if she
were counting the boats and impressing their number upon her memory.

A woman in appearance, she was at this date but sixteen years old, and
the breathless young man who stood like a statue regarding her thought
he had never seen a vision of such entrancing beauty, and, as I have
before intimated, he was a judge of feminine loveliness. Pulling
himself together, and drawing a deep but silent breath, he went forward
with soft tread, and the next instant there was a grip of steel on the
wrist of the young girl that rested on the earth. With a cry of dismay
she sprang to her feet and confronted her assailant, nearly toppling
over the brink as she did so; but he grasped her firmly, and drew her a
step or two up the arcade. As he held her left wrist there was in the
air the flash of a stiletto, and the naval officer's distinguished
career would have ended on that spot had he not been a little quicker
than his fair opponent. His disengaged hand gripped the descending
wrist and held her powerless.

"Ruffian!" she hissed, in Spanish.

The young man had a workable knowledge of the language, and he thanked
his stars now that it was so. He smiled at her futile struggles to free
herself, then said:--

"When they gave me my commission, I had no hope that I should meet so
charming an enemy. Drop the knife, señorita, and I will release your
hand."

The girl did not comply at first. She tried to wrench herself free,
pulling this way and that with more strength than might have been
expected from one so slight. But finding herself helpless in those
rigid bonds, she slowly relaxed the fingers of her right hand, and let
the dagger drop point downward into the loose soil, where it stood and
quivered.

"Now let me go," she said, panting. "You promised."

The young man relinquished his hold, and the girl, with the quick
movement of a humming-bird, dived into the foliage, and would have
disappeared, had he not with equal celerity intercepted her, again
imprisoning her wrist.

"You liar!" she cried, her magnificent eyes ablaze with anger.
"Faithless minion of a faithless race, you promised to let me go."

"And I kept my promise," said the young man, still with a smile. "I
said I would release your hand, and I did so; but as for yourself, that
is a different matter. You see, señorita, to speak plainly, you are a
spy. I have caught you almost within our lines, counting our boats,
and, perhaps, our men. There is war between our countries, and I arrest
you as a spy."

"A brave country, yours," she cried, "to war upon women!"

"Well," said the young man, with a laugh, "what are we to do? The men
won't stay and fight us."

She gave him a dark, indignant glance at this, which but heightened her
swarthy beauty.

"And what are you," she said, "but a spy?"

"Not yet," he replied. "If you had found me peering at the fort, then,
perhaps, I should be compelled to plead guilty. But as it is, you are
the only spy here at present, señorita. Do you know what the fate of a
spy is?"

The girl stood there for a few moments, her face downcast, the living
gyves still encircling her wrists. When she looked up it was with a
smile so radiant that the young man gasped for breath, and his heart
beat faster than ever it had done in warfare.

"But you will not give me up?" she murmured, softly.

"Then would I be in truth a faithless minion," cried the young man,
fervently; "not, indeed, to my country, but to your fascinating sex,
which I never adored so much as now."

"You mean that you would be faithless to your country, but not to me?"

"Well," said the young man, with some natural hesitation, "I shouldn't
care to have to choose between my allegiance to one or the other.
England can survive without warring upon women, as you have said; so I
hope that if we talk the matter amicably over, we may find that my duty
need not clash with my inclination."

"I am afraid that is impossible," she answered, quickly. "I hate your
country."

"But not the individual members of it, I hope."

"I know nothing of its individual members, nor do I wish to, as you
shall soon see, if you will but let go my wrist."

"Ah, señorita," exclaimed the young man, "you are using an argument now
that will make me hold you forever."

"In that case," said the girl, "I shall change my argument, and give
instead a promise. If you release me I shall not endeavour to escape--I
may even be so bold as to expect your escort to the fort, where, if I
understand you aright, you were but just now going."

"I accept your promise, and shall be delighted if you will accept my
escort. Meanwhile, in the interest of our better acquaintance, can I
persuade you to sit down, and allow me to cast myself at your feet?"

The girl, with a clear, mellow laugh, sat down, and the young man
reclined in the position he had indicated, gazing up at her with
intense admiration in his eyes.

"If this be war," he said to himself, "long may I remain a soldier."
Infatuated as he certainly was, his natural alertness could not but
notice that her glance wandered to the stiletto, the perpendicular
shining blade of which looked like the crest of a glittering, dangerous
serpent, whose body was hidden in the leaves. She had seated herself as
close to the weapon as possible, and now, on one pretext or another,
edged nearer and nearer to it. At last the young man laughed aloud,
and, sweeping his foot round, knocked down the weapon, then indolently
stretching out his arm, he took it.

"Señorita," he said, examining its keen edge, "will you give me this
dagger as a memento of our meeting?"

"It is unlucky," she murmured, "to make presents of stilettos."

"I think," said the young man, glancing up at her with a smile on his
lips, "it will be more lucky for me if I place it here in my belt than
if I allow it to reach the possession of another."

"Do you intend to steal it, señor?"

"Oh, no. If you refuse to let me have it, I will give it back to you
when our interview ends; but I should be glad to possess it, if you
allow me to keep it."

"It is unlucky, as I have said; to make a present of it, but I will
exchange. If you will give me one of your loaded pistols, you may have
the stiletto."

"A fair exchange," he laughed, but he made no motion to fulfil his part
to the barter. "May I have the happiness of knowing your name,
señorita?" he asked.

"I am called Donna Rafaela Mora," answered the girl, simply. "I am
daughter of the Commandant of Fort San Carlos. I am no Nicaraguan, but
a Spaniard And, señor, what is your name?"

"Horatio Nelson, an humble captain in His Majesty's naval forces, to be
heard from later, I hope, unless Donna Rafaela cuts short my thread of
life with her stiletto."

"And does a captain in His Majesty's forces condescend to play the part
of a spy?" asked the girl, proudly.

"He is delighted to do so when it brings him the acquaintance of
another spy so charming as Donna Rafaela. My spying, and I imagine
yours also, is but amateurish, and will probably be of little value to
our respective forces. Our real spies are now gathered round your fort,
and will bring to us all the information we need. Thus, I can recline
at your feet, Donna Rafaela, with an easy conscience, well aware that
my failure as a spy will in no way retard our expedition."

"How many men do you command, Señor Captain?" asked the girl, with ill-
concealed eagerness.

"Oh, sometimes twenty-five, sometimes fifty, or a hundred or two
hundred, or more, as the case may be," answered the young man,
carelessly.

"But how many are there in your expedition now?"

"Didn't you count them, Donna? To answer truly, I must not, to answer
falsely, I will not, Donna."

"Why?" asked the girl, impetuously. "There is no such secrecy about our
forces; we do not care who knows the number in our garrison."

"No? Then how many are there, Donna?"

"Three hundred and forty," answered the girl.

"Men, or young ladies like yourself, Donna? Be careful how you answer,
for if the latter, I warn you that nothing will keep the British out of
Fort San Carlos. We shall be with you, even if we have to go as
prisoners. In saying this, I feel that I am speaking for our entire
company."

The girl tossed her head scornfully.

"There are three hundred and forty men," she said, "as you shall find
to your cost, if you dare attack the fort."

"In that case," replied Nelson, "you are nearly two to one, and I
venture to think that we have not come up the river for nothing."

"What braggarts you English are!"

"Is it bragging to welcome a stirring fight? Are you well provided with
cannon?"

"You will learn that for yourself when you come within sight of the
fort. Have you any more questions to ask, Señor Sailor?"

"Yes; one. The number in the fort, which you give, corresponds with
what I have already heard. I have heard also that you were well
supplied with cannon, but I have been told that you have no cannonballs
in Fort San Carlos."

"That is not true; we have plenty.

"Incredible as it may seem, I was told that the cannon-balls were made
of clay. When I said you had none, I meant that you had none of iron."

"That also is quite true," answered the girl. "Do you mean to say that
you are going to shoot baked clay at us? It will be like heaving
bricks," and the young man threw back his head and laughed.

"Oh, you may laugh," cried the girl, "but I doubt if you will be so
merry when you come to attack the fort. The clay cannon-balls were
made under the superintendence of my father, and they are filled with
links of chain, spikes, and other scraps of iron."

"By Jove!" cried young Nelson, "that's an original idea. I wonder how
it will work?"

"You will have every opportunity of finding out, if you are foolish
enough to attack the fort."

"You advise us then to retreat?"

"I most certainly do."

"And why, Donna, if you hate our country, are you so anxious that we
shall not be cut to pieces by your scrap-iron?"

The girl shrugged her pretty shoulders.

"It doesn't matter in the least to me what you do," she said, rising to
her feet. "Am I your prisoner, Señor Nelson?"

"No," cried the young man, also springing up; "I am yours, and have
been ever since you looked at me."

Again the girl shrugged her shoulders. She seemed to be in no humour
for light compliments, and betrayed an eagerness to be gone.

"I have your permission, then, to depart? Do you intend to keep your
word?"

"If you will keep yours, Donna."

"I gave you no promise, except that I would not run away, and I have
not done so. I now ask your permission to depart."

"You said that I might accompany you to the fort."

"Oh, if you have the courage, yes," replied the girl, carelessly.

They walked on together through the dense alleys of vegetation, and
finally came to an opening which showed them a sandy plain, and across
it the strong white stone walls of the fort, facing the wide river, and
behind it the blue background of Lake Nicaragua.

Not a human form was visible either on the walls or on the plain. Fort
San Carlos, in spite of the fact that it bristled with cannon, seemed
like an abandoned castle. The two stood silent for a moment at the
margin of the jungle, the young officer running his eye rapidly over
the landscape, always bringing back his gaze to the seemingly deserted
stronghold.

"Your three hundred and forty men keep themselves well hidden," he said
at last.

"Yes," replied the girl, nonchalantly, "they fear that if they show
themselves you may hesitate to attack a fortress that is impregnable."

"Well, you may disabuse their minds of that error when you return."

"Are you going to keep my stiletto?" asked the girl, suddenly changing
the subject.

"Yes, with your permission."

"Then keep your word, and give me your pistol in return."

"Did I actually promise it?"

"You promised, Señor."

"Then in that case, the pistol is yours."

"Please hand it to me."

Her eagerness to obtain the weapon was but partially hidden, and the
young man laughed as he weighed the fire-arm in his hand, holding it by
the muzzle.

"It is too heavy for a slim girl like you to handle," he said, at last.
"It can hardly be called a lady's toy."

"You intend, then, to break your word," said the girl, with quick
intuition, guessing with unerring instinct his vulnerable point.

"Oh, no," he cried, "but I am going to send the pistol half-way home
for you," and with that, holding it still by the barrel, he flung it
far out on the sandy plain, where it fell, raising a little cloud of
dust. The girl was about to speed to the fort, when, for the third
time, the young man grasped her wrist. She looked at him with indignant
surprise.

"Pardon me," he said, "but in case you should wish to fire the weapon,
you must have some priming. Let me pour a quantity of this gunpowder
into your hand."

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