He stooped down, but his
head was sufficiently above the barrier to observe everything.
The two boats came rapidly on, and were run up on the beach, and the men
jumped out and drew them up, high and safe. Then, without the slightest
hesitation, the ten of them, each with a gun in his hand, advanced in a
body toward the line of bags.
"Ahoy!" shouted the captain, suddenly rising from behind the barrier.
"Who are you, and what do you want?" He said this in English, but
immediately repeated it in Spanish.
"Ahoy, there!" cried Cardatas. "Are you Captain Horn?"
"Yes, I am," said the captain, "and you must halt where you are. The
first man who passes that line is shot."
Cardatas laughed, and so did some of the others, but they all stopped.
"We'll stop here a minute to oblige you," said Cardatas, "but we've got
something to say to you, and you might as well listen to it."
Shirley and Burke did not understand a word of these remarks, for they
did not know Spanish, but each of them kept his eye running along the
line of men who still stood on the other side of the furrow the captain
had made in the sand, and if one of them had raised his gun to fire at
their skipper, it is probable that he would have dropped. Shirley and
Burke had been born and bred in the country; they were hunters, and were
both good shots. It was on account of their fondness for sport that they
had been separated from the rest of their party on the first day of the
arrival of the people from the _Castor_ at the caves.
Pages:
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348