H. A. Lamb

“ The waves had grown bigger as soon as we were in the boat, so we couldn't see the schooner except when we were on top of one. Pretty soon we were near enough to make out the name painted on the bow, and I whistled to myself.
It was the Bella Clara.
“They must have good reasons for staying here,” muttered Kempton as the cutter swung up near the other's rail. “There's a storm coming up, and they'll have to get out in a few minutes.”
Only one man was on deck when we jumped to the rail and climbed over. He was at the wheel, and scowled at us blackly when we came up to him. ”

“ My fingers slipped as I tried to fit on my leather head-dress in my cabin. A moment's listening told me there was nothing doing at the wireless, and I went to the port and looked out.
The motion of the ship told me we were making speed. Every now and then—blam! blam!—the big gun would go off somewhere ahead of us, and after a while there was the rattle of a quick-firer. By craning my neck out of the open port, I could make out the flashes. There was a big flash and roar off on our port bow, and then a series of little darts of flame three or four miles away on the starboard bow. ”

“ TWO days after we passed the Dunstan we arrived at Puntas Arenas. The Badger needed coal, and Captain Godfrey wanted to pick up information that might be circulating in that port concerning derelicts. We had not been able to sight any up to now.
You know Puntas Arenas, don't you? A little, corregated iron town snuggled in the foot of the usual mountains, half-way through the strait. There are no customs dues, and this makes it a clearing house for smuggling on a large scale. The town itself is a sort of hang-out for the political driftwood of South America. ”

“ As soon as it was light enough to see things distinctly, Kempton and I took up our position at the foot of the companion, ready for our drive. What worried me most was the absence of Tom Roth and his bunch. You know, the living part of a schooner is at the bow and the stern—forecastle and cabin—with the hold between, and no means of communication except by the deck. ”

“ There was no chance to try to reach the swamped cutter as it was swept astern of us. A big wave caught the Bella Clara full on the side and climbed over the rail, sweeping the deck up to the poop where we were standing. The man at the wheel bent every ounce of his strength to getting the ship around on its course and out of the trough of the waves.
Two or three more waves side-swiped us before our bow came around more into the wind, and we headed offshore just in time. ”

“ The fact is, they got it. We know that from the note on the schooner.”
“How the devil can we know that the derelict really can steam?” demanded the captain, half to himself.
“It's pretty clear, sir. If you think of it, we searched all this part of the coast for a week without finding a trace of the craft. Then all at once it appears and lays right in the middle of things. How did it get there? No currents could drift it about like that. It came out of a hiding place in the coast, and it steamed out.” ”

“ I noticed that Captain Godfrey's eye was beginning to light up, and he nearly tugged off his mustache. The idea hadn't penetrated yet to Kempton's bomb-proof of a brain.
“Let's hear it all, Henderson,” urged the old man.
“It goes back to the naval battle off the Chile coast, sir,” I explained. “The British third-class cruiser Phaeton was run ashore after the battle. The crew abandoned her as worthless—as she was, for war purposes. Tom Roth's beach-combing schooner got wind of it, and looted the Phaeton. ”

“ Borden was in the cutter, and when we cleared the gunboat he pointed out a sloppy-looking schooner that was coming lazily up the bay. A broad, squat man of powerful build was at the wheel. On the stern of the craft the name Bella Clara was painted.
“D'ye see that fellow,” whispered Terry, “at th' wheel? Well, that's Tom Roth—a good man to steer clear av. He bears a bad name along th' coast here, an' not without cause. There's many a wreck near here that Tom Roth's seen th' inside av, an' taken away more than he took in. ”

“ Captain Godfrey ordered me to take over the wireless, and it was just as well that I did so.
The other fellow's sender was a whopper, and I recognized the bellow of the Wiltshire, which I had listened to before, although they had tuned down their spark to get in touch with us. I scribbled down the message, grinning to myself as I did so with thinking what the old man would say to it. ”

“ Sure, th' man had his charts, an' he was dead in th' shteamer track, wasn't he? A drunken shtoker could av brought her into th' strait safely an' gone to shlape over it, at that.” Borden shook his head gloomily. He is a religious man, and has odds and ends of scripture at his tongue's end. “'For as th' wind goeth over it, it is gone, an' th' place thereof shall know it no more,'” he quoted. “It is a sad thing, lad, if that fine ship is lost with all hands.”
“The sea takes its toll of ships, Terry.” ”

“ Henderson,” said Moritz—he was Spanish or Portuguese, but spoke excellent English—“because I own several schooners around here and no derelict has been reported for the last year. If there was one where you say I would be certain to know it. My schooners pass the Evangelistas two or three times a week.”
The Evangelistas? They are three big rocks with some smaller ones, lying just out of the entrance to the strait, a little north, and with a light on one. You have to watch out for them when you are making the entrance in a fog.
“What kind of a ship is this derelict?” went on Moritz. ”

“ Then things began to happen. There was a blam! and flash from the derelict, and a shell went over us. It gave a weird sort of whee-ee as it did so, and I tingled from toes to the back of my neck. Then our bow gun roared out, and the fight was on.
In a minute we knew that there were two pieces on the derelict that were in working order. Our five-incher in Terry's hands worked quicker than either of them, however, and we had the advantage of the spotlight, which must have blinded them.
But not for long. One of their shells scored a hit on us somewhere up near the bridge. ”

“ IT was two days after that, if I remember right, that we sighted the derelict we were after.
It was early in the afternoon, and Borden dropped into my cabin after a session of small arms drill on deck. I was listening on the wireless. I had been doing that, off and on, for two days now.
One ship, the British cruiser Wiltshire, I guessed, was sending out calls every hour or so in code. These calls did not vary, until an answer came for the first time early this morning. Then the cruiser tuned down her spark a bit and started a long conversation with the other craft—all Greek to me. ”

“ A spot it is that God loves less than anny av th' sivin seas, to my mind. You'll hear it called th' jumpin'-off place by the men that's been there, and whin they have they turn their backs on it with thanksgivin's and praise.
“There's the island inhabited wance by Mr. Robinson Crusoe in th' midst av it, an' stiddy winds from th' nor'west day in an' day out. Th' coast is mostly rocks, with grand mountains for scenery, an' nothin' much else. There's wan town in th' strait, Puntas Arenas.” ”

“ It is not th' sea that takes ship's like th' Dunstan. Sure th' fishing craft go down, an' souls with thim. But th' men who die have taken their toll av livin' from th' sea for wife an' family. They pay th' price, Dick. Whin a grrand boat like th' liner we passed goes down it is th' handiwork av men. Men like Tom Roth, an' his kind, that taint th' waters. ”

“ Several others spoke up in agreement, and Terry was puzzled. We couldn't figure out how the ship could have missed the port coming through the strait. You see they don't navigate at night in Magellan Strait, on account of the tide rips and williwaws, especially craft that don't know the passage well. It wasn't possible that the Dunstan had gone by in the night. It was plain that our news stirred up quite a little interest among the men at the bar. They got to talking among themselves pretty earnest. ”

“ I was on deck, chinning with a gunner's mate, Terence Borden, who used to come to my cabin and kid me along—me being a landlubber.
“Terry,” said I, “do you think we'll bombard Vera Cruz or just blockade it?”
Terence stopped chewing his plug-cut long enough to look at me out of the corners of his blue eyes.
“Nayther,” he said, “it's a long ways from Very Cruz we're going. Phwat put th' idee av fightin' into yer head?”
“That's the idea that made me enlist,” I said. “There's a war, isn't there?”
“Sure,” Terry smiled on me widely, “there ain't any war, lad. ”

“ Does Braun know them?”
“Braun is away at Buenos,” returned Moritz, “he can tell us nothing. It looks suspicious, their clearing out as soon as you come in. What are you going to do about it?”
“Watch the gunboat as closely as we can. We have been calling the Dunstan by wireless for two days, without an answer. Captain Pemberton is awfully cut up over it. You know the liner was to meet us at Puntas. We received a wireless from her when she was about a hundred miles out of the strait. After that the Dunstan seems to have been wiped out, wireless and all. ”

“ Two ships were firing at each other, and the one with the big gun seemed to be stationary, while the quick-firer was moving away steadily.
What were the ships? There were no lights showing that might have served as a clue. ”

“ When the pain in the back of my neck had eased up a bit, and my head had stopped going around in circles with the pain as the center of the orbit, I sat up in the bunk where I was fixed and took an inventory of the forepeak. ”

“ You can't find an account of it in the reports of three navies, and the Blue Belt line skippers aren't volunteering information. The papers never printed a line about it. So I guess if anybody's going to get busy and tell what really happened, it might as well be me.
Anyway, I want to see Kempton, who is just out of Annapolis, get the credit that's coming to him. Kempton is one of those stiff, uniformed ducks with a mind as exact as the crease in his pants ”