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Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz, a novel by H. Irving Hancock |
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Chapter 19. A Traitor In The Service |
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_ CHAPTER XIX. A TRAITOR IN THE SERVICE Crack! spoke a rifle across the street. "I got him, sir!" cried the exultant voice of Riley. "But I'll make sure of him, sir!" Crack! The Navy rifle spoke once more. Noiselessly Darrin darted across the street. On the roof of the house in which Dave had seen the bandit, Cosetta, the previous day, lay a man, his head and shoulders hanging over the edge. "Speak softly," cautioned Darrin. "I don't want those men inside the house to hear you." "He fell just like that when I fired the first shot, sir," Riley whispered. "I sent him the second bullet to make sure that he wasn't playing 'possum." "And now," Dave ordered, "run down the street as noiselessly as you can go, and tell Lieutenant Trent that I wish he would come here in person, if possible, with a few men. Ask him, with my compliments to approach as noiselessly as possible, for I expect to make a surprise 'bag' here." Riley glanced at his officer in swift astonishment, but he saw that Darrin was speaking seriously, so he saluted and departed at a run. Shortly Riley was back. "Lieutenant Trent is coming, sir," whispered the coxswain. "There he is, turning the corner now." "Stand before this door, and if you hear anything inside, so much the better," Darrin murmured, then hastily moved down the street, saluting his superior officer as he met him. "Riley told you, perhaps, he got the sniper, sir," Dave began, "but I have something even more astounding to report. I have every reason to believe that Lieutenant Cantor is in that house." "A prisoner?" cried Trent, in an undertone. "I have reason to believe that he isn't a prisoner," Dave went on. "The house is the same from which I saw Cosetta peer yesterday, and I have reason to think that Lieutenant Cantor and the bandit are on fairly good terms." "Be careful what you say, Darrin," cautioned Lieutenant Trent. "In effect, you are accusing an officer of the United States Navy of treason!" "That is the very crime of which I suspect him, sir," Dave answered, bluntly. "Are you sure that your personal animosity has no part in that suspicion?" "No dislike for a brother officer could induce me to charge him falsely," Dave answered simply. "I beg your pardon, Darrin!" exclaimed Trent in sincere regret. "I shouldn't have asked you that." "Here is the door, sir," Dave reported, in a whisper, halting and pointing. "I heard some one talking in there in low tones," reported Riley. "I couldn't make it out, for he was talking in Spanish." "I suspect that the voices were those of Lieutenant Cantor and Cosetta," Dave whispered. "If they don't get away, we'll soon know," Trent whispered. "Stone and Root, I want you two to head the party that rushes the door. As soon as you get inside don't stop for anything else, but rush to the rear windows and shoot any one who attempts to escape by the rear fence. Now, men, rush that door!" So hard and sudden was the assault that the door gave way at the first rush. Revolver in hand, Dave Darrin was directly behind the two seamen who had been ordered to rush to the rear windows. Just as the door yielded to the assault an excited voice in Spanish exclaimed: "This way---quick!" The two sailors, who had been ordered to do nothing else except guard the rear windows, saw a figure vanish through the cellar doorway. Leaving that individual to others, Stone and Boot dashed into a rear room, throwing up the window. In the darkness a second man also rushed for the cellar doorway. But Dave Darrin's extended right hand closed on that party's collar. "You're my prisoner," Dave hissed, throwing his man backward to the floor. As several men rushed past them one sailor halted, throwing on the rays of a pocket electric light. "You, Cantor, and here?" exclaimed Lieutenant Trent, aghast, as he recognized the features of his brother officer. "In mercy's name-----" "Let me up," broke in Cantor, angrily, and Dave released him. "Ensign Darrin, I order you in arrest for attacking your superior officer." "You won't observe that arrest, Darrin," spoke Trent, coldly. "I'll be responsible for my order to that effect. Now, then, Cantor, what explanation have you to offer for being in the house of Cosetta, the bandit?" "I'll give no explanation here," blazed Cantor, angrily, as now on his feet, he glared at Trent and Darrin---Dalzell was not there, for just at this instant the bolted cellar door, under his orders, was battered down, and Dan, with several sailormen at his back, darted down the stairs, by the light of a pocket lamp. The cellar was deserted. There was no sign of the means by which the fugitive had escaped. "Trent," said Cantor, with an effort at sternness, "you will not question me, here or now." "I'll question you as much as I see fit, sir," Lieutenant Trent retorted, crisply. "Lieutenant Cantor, you are caught here under strange circumstances. You will explain, and satisfactorily, or-----" "Lieutenant Trent," retorted the other, savagely, "while you and I are officers of the same rating, my commission is older than yours, and I am ranking officer here. I direct you to withdraw your men and to leave this house." "And I tell you," retorted Lieutenant Trent, "that I am on duty here. You have not said that you are here on duty. Therefore I shall not recognize your authority." "Trent," broke in the other savagely, "if you-----" "I do," Lieutenant Trent retorted, stiffly. "Just that, in fact. In other words, sir, I place you in arrest! Coxswain Riley, I shall hold you responsible for this prisoner. Take two other men, if you wish, to help you guard him. If Lieutenant Cantor escapes, or attempts to escape, then you have my order to shoot him, if necessary." "Darrin," snarled Cantor, "this is all your doing!" "Some of it, sir," Dave admitted, cheerfully. "I heard you and another man talking in here, and I sent for Lieutenant Trent. As it happens, I know this to be the home, or the hanging-out place of Cosetta, and as I heard you talking just inside the door, I reported that fact to Lieutenant Trent." "You will find nothing in this house, and I have not been, intentionally, in the house of a bandit, or in the house of any other questionable character," snarled Cantor, turning his back on Darrin. "And you are making a serious mistake in placing me in arrest." "If your companion had been a proper one he would not have run away when American forces burst in here," Lieutenant Trent returned. "Both on Ensign Darrin's report, and on my own observation and suspicion, I will take the responsibility of placing you in arrest. I shall report your arrest to the commanding officer on shore, and will be guided by his instructions. You will have opportunity to state your case to him." "And he will order my instant release as soon as he hears why I am on shore. Trent, you have made a serious mistake, and you are continuing to make it by keeping me in arrest." "Sorry, Cantor; sorry, indeed, if I am doing you an injustice," Lieutenant Trent answered, with more feeling. "Yet under the circumstances, I cannot read my duty in any other way." "You'll be sorry," cried Cantor, angrily. "I don't know what to make of this, sir," Danny Grin reported, a much puzzled look showing on his face. "That cellar door was shut and bolted in our faces. We smashed the door instantly, and rushed down the stairs. When we reached the cellar we found it empty; whoever the man was he escaped in some way that is a mystery to me." "Have you thought of the probability of a secret passage from the cellar?" inquired Trent. "Yes, sir, and we've sounded the walls, but without any result." "I'll go below with you," offered Trent. "Ensign Darrin, bear in mind that we are in danger of being surprised here, and would then find ourselves in something of a trap. Take ten men and go into the street, keeping close watch." Twenty minutes later Trent came out, followed by his command, with whom marched the fuming Cantor, a prisoner. "Darrin, there must be a secret passage from the cellar," Trent told his subordinate, "but we have been unable to find it. We are bringing with us the body of the sniper that Riley shot on the roof." Line was formed and the detachment started back, Danny Grin and two sailormen acting as a rear guard against possible attack. Arrived at the post-office Trent, accompanied by Cantor and the latter's guards, hurried off in search of the commanding officer of the shore force. Fifteen minutes later Lieutenant Trent returned. "I was sustained," he informed Dave and Dan. "It was tough, but the commanding officer directed me to send Cantor under escort back to the '_Long Island_,' with a brief report stating why that officer was placed in arrest." There followed more waiting, during which the sound of individual firing over the city became more frequent. Cantor's guard returned from the "_Long Island_," with word that Captain Gales had ordered that officer in arrest in his own quarters. At last orders for Trent's detachment arrived. "We are to push on into the city," Trent informed his ensigns. "Twenty more '_Long Island_' men will reach us within three minutes. We are to silence snipers, and kill them if we catch them red-handed in firing on our forces. Above all, we are directed to be on the alert for any Americans or other foreigners who may be in need of help. We are likely to have a busy night." Then, turning to his men, he added: "Fall in by twos! Forward, march!" _ |
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