The Treasure of Pearls: A Romance of Adventures in California
fired on the disappearing pony, burdened with the double charge, but
gallantly bounding away.
At the same time, to draw off a second volley from their gallant chief,
a number of Apaches, and the rebels who ran up the incline as far as
the verge of the ditch, shot arrows and bullets into the corral. The
Mexicans were compelled to drop down and retire.
True to the chivalric creed that a chief's scalp is to be rescued at
any cost, Iron Shirt had saved his brother commander.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE HARVEST OF THE KNIFE.
With similar fortitude, the American and his associate had resisted the
rain in the best shelter the rocks afforded. At least, the relentless
downpour had prevented any completion of the mounting of the piece,
and it was not till full day, after the Apache chief had triumphantly
brought the Mexican back to the encampment, amid the _vivas_ of the
rebels, that Garcia's cannoneers had obtained the fitting elevation.
This done, the robber lieutenant applied his cigar, after having puffed
it into active incandescence, to the piece of slow match stuck in the
rusty touchhole, and embedded there with ample powder to ensure the
ignition.
Gladsden gave the hunter an appealing look, but the latter's face was
immobile as a statue's. He had, therefore, to control his throbbing
heart as best he might, whilst the match spluttered and hissed like
a serpent, and lessened in length. All eyes were fastened upon the
farmhouse, and the unutterably deep silence which pervaded the
thousands of enemies to the beset handful was most impressive.
Hardly had a few seconds, which seemed minutes to all concerned, fled
away, than the spark reached the powder; there was a faint flash, then
a much brighter and broader one, and with a gush of flame, as at the
opening of an iron furnace door, the old gun awoke from its centuries'
repose, with the roar of a menagerie lion that was at last released
from captivity.
Through the rolling smoke the huge round stone, which had been chosen
for bullet, sped noisily in an arc of trajectory which gave señor
Stefano much credit, and crashed into the farmhouse a little below the
roof edge, knocking three little bits of windows into one broad gap.
An immense shout of savage joy hailed this result, and even the
bystanders, injured by the splinters of the logs, smashed by the recoil
of the gun, forgot their hurts in the success.
Gladsden had leaned forward out of the covert, and seemed on the verge
of seeking to avenge this hurling of death in amid the Mexican's home;
but the American placed both hands on his shoulders, and dragged him
back and downwards.
"Wait!" said he, grimly. "Before they fire a second ball, our turn to
play comes in. They will leave powder round loose, will they? I'll show
'em! You jes' hold your hosses--I'll show 'em to shoot at women and
children."
Indeed, there was plenty of time for the planning and execution of
a countermeasure, for the remounting of the forty pounder, though
cheerfully, even merrily, performed, was a lengthy labour.
Mr. Gladsden, chafing at his impotence, fixed his eyes on the
farmhouse, where the great hole seemed to reproach him for this
inaction. There did appear at its edges what seemed men at that
distance, but the Yaquis immediately showered stones and darts on these
repairers, who shortly retired.
The unfortunate victims of the bombardment would have no choice but to
put the women in the cellars and perish in the ruins, or sally out at a
disadvantage when the cannon rendered the place quite untenable.
In the meantime, Oliver, calculating with much exactitude the time
required by the Mexicans and their assistants to replace the gun on
its rests, was splitting a length of old pine in halves; this done, he
hollowed out the centre with his knife, and soon had a pair of troughs
which served very fairly as rocket tubes. As soon as he had finished,
his jogging the elbow of the Englishman for him to look, set the latter
to comprehend in part the hunter's intention.
He aided him eagerly to lay the rockets in the hollow of the wood,
itself supported firmly between the stones, the mouth directed with
all the care he would have given a shot on which life depended at the
powder canisters.
It is true that several horses and men came between the mark and
the two projectiles, but their iron heads would make light of such
obstacles, perhaps.
Enthusiastic at the great result of the first discharge, many of the
Yaquis swarmed up the slope to see the second discharge more closely,
and, spite of orders from the guard of the robber captain, they
clustered so as to almost impede the smiling cannoneer in his second
essay.
Three of the Apaches on their horses on one side, and half a dozen
Mexicans charged them slowly to bear them back. An opening was made
thereby, a vista from the two watchers, even to the cannon and its
ammunition pile.
"It is the time! Touch off!" whispered Oliver.
The Englishman gave him a fusee out of his cigar lights box, and
kindled one himself simultaneously. The two, with one and the same
movement, clapped them to the rocket matches, which they had pinched
off short, and blew at the flames to accelerate the burning.
Engrossed in the application of the fire to the cannon, none of the
enemy heard this slight crepitation, or saw the thin sparks on the
barranca's crest.
Almost immediately the match was blazing within each case, and,
covering the two whites with a shower of sparks, the rockets, slowly
at first, but soon far distancing the initial velocity, traversed the
intervening space, and deflecting towards the ground, rushed noisily
through the little group of robbers, Apaches, Yaquis and leaders,
into the very heap of powder. The explosion occurred, but, not in the
least pausing, the rockets continued an erratic flight, ploughing up
the ground, ricocheting, separating, crossing and joining, diffusing
silver and ruddy golden fireballs, and thus careering among the amazed
multitude till the cases fell as blackened coals.
Meanwhile, the powder which was loose had flared up and frightened the
horses; then the open tins burst and showered the ground with flaring
rain. The full tins went off like bombs, and one of them, dislocating
the arrangement of timber under the gun, upset the whole pile. The
cannon, of which the match had been uninterruptedly burning, went off
whilst thus overturned, and the stone ball, perforating a herd of the
Yaquis, split in three pieces, which fell upon the upturned, curious
faces of their fellows beneath the hill.
"I'm inclined to b'lieve," remarked Oliver, drawing his revolver, "that
the folks on the farm hev' seen our rockets go off at last."
Whilst the smoke was enshrouding the hill top, and the ground still
quaking, the mounted men who had not been unsaddled, using both hands
to restrain their terrified steeds, and the unhurt savages flying to
and fro and against one another in great consternation, the rockets
had been truly taken for their signal of action by both the Mexican
parties, however far divided.
Out of the wood debouched the mounted Mexicans, shaking their
banneretted lances as if they were reeds, and shouting "Mexico
forever!" As they came on, well thinned out, their swiftness gave them
the appearance of a much more numerous column.
"The soldiers! The soldiers from Ures!" screamed the Yaquis in the
hollow. "Look out for yourselves! The lancers are coming!"
On seeing them in confusion, and shrinking back from all sides so as
to form a serried mass under the walls of the hacienda, don Benito and
don Jorge, each at the head of a troop, dashed out of the corral at the
main portal and the secret one, and executed a dreadful double charge
to the cry of "Down with the rebels!"
The shock of the pretended lancers and the hacendero's followers on
opposite sides of the insurgents' agitated ranks, occasioned a combat;
but when the horsemen, with spear or cutlass, were intermingled with
the footmen, it became slaughter. Neither side craved for mercy, and
they fought as only men can fight who were either masters who feared to
lose the upper hand of subjects, or slaves who were seeking reprisals
for wrongs inflicted on anterior generations.
Whenever the swaying of the mob brought a mass near the hacienda or its
stockade, all the defenders within, to whom were added the women, armed
with obsolete firearms, musketry, and blunderbusses, fired upon them,
and added not inconsiderably to the dismay and butchery.
In the interval, on the summit of the hill, where the smoke still
lingered from the explosions, the salteadores had sought to punish the
rocket dischargers, whom they had perceived in the rocks and under the
pine stumps. It is true that the Englishman had most imprudently stood
up in order to see what really was the extent of the damage done. The
Apaches, at a word from Iron Shirt, had descended the hill towards the
hacienda, rallying their own comrades preparatory to a prudent drawing
off with all the livestock which might be added to their previously
collected droves. They considered the battle lost to them on seeing
the immovable Yaquis struck with panic, an emotion which extended
with marvellous rapidity even to those on the other side of the farm,
entirely unaffected by actual danger.
Stunned by the cannon report, a noise too great of its kind to have
ever come within their experience, the banditti's horses were found to
be unmanageable, and they had alighted, all but their maimed leader,
whose steed was less incapable of guidance, to punish the authors of
the disaster which had turned the tide.
Three times they made a rush at the natural bulwarks in full belief
that they could hurl the paltry opposition over, a-down the ravine; but
each time their retreat was marked by a line of corpses. So near a mark
was fatal to the heavy thirty-eight calibre repeaters.
"This is the second time you are running agen this snag," taunted the
hunter, with that bitter loquacity common to him and Indians in the
fever of combat, "but come on agen! Bless you, that's on'y an appetiser
to the pie to foller! Thar's roast ribs the next dish! Come and sweep
the platter--only two tender chickens left, and plenty of gravy! Do
come now, while the offer is open! Did any gentleman say, 'Mercy!'
Well, I'm not sparing white skunks today! P'raps you're only drawing
our fire--loafing round tell we haven't a cartridge left! Yes, do walk
up for a grapple and a hug--we are only the worst kickers you ever
seen, that's all."
All this sarcasm was echoed by Pedrillo; his fury was indescribable, to
say nothing of the effects of the native brandy which had been given
him as a remedy after his prostration under the fear of death. When
he recognised the Englishman, all the pent up rage of fifteen years
inspired him, and his _absent leg_ ached again as lively as when it
had been torn off by the shark. The _gringo_, who had sunk his ship,
after having run away with his bride and his cruiser; who had taken the
treasure which the law of robbers assigned to the captain in good part;
this impudent spoilsport again had marred the consummation of vengeance
upon his fellow foe, don Benito. He cast all prudence aside; he himself
advanced with his surviving men prominently.
"We'll bury them in the dry _arroyo_!" he yelled, foaming at the
mouth, and his wooden leg beating the horse's shoulder in his feverish
convulsions. "Down with them."
What was their surprise to see the two men leap disdainfully over their
breastwork, and stride towards the eight or ten Mexicans with revolver
and knife in hand, spurning the dead and wounded due to the same
well-plied weapons.
The bandits slackened their pace, but the mounted leader, still