CHAPTER IX
CANTOR FINDS HIS CHANCE
Prompt action alone could save the women and children who lay cowering in the launch.
"Corporal, kneel with your men, and let them have it as fast as you can!" ordered Dave. "Riley, get your men into the boat, and take the Colt with you. Post it as fast as you can on the starboard quarter!"
Dave himself stood behind the kneeling marines, a fair target for every hostile bullet.
John Carmody, too, felt in honor bound to risk himself beside the young Navy ensign.
"All sea-going, sir!" called c.o.xswain Riley. "Schmidt, make ready to cast off," sang back Darrin.
Now the different groups of Mexicans, who had been halted for a minute under the brisk fire, saw their prey slipping away from them.
With yells of fury, Cosetta"s men rose and attempted the final charge.
"Marines aboard!" yelled Darrin.
Almost in the same instant, loaded revolver in hand, Dave sprang to the gunwale and landed on the after deck.
Without waiting for the order from his chief, Schmidt cast off, with the aid of the single sailor under his own command. The engineer went ahead at slow speed for a few seconds while Riley steered the launch clear of the wharf and headed for deeper, safer water.
"Half speed ahead!" shouted Darrin, as Schmidt sprang to the wheel, while Riley, s.n.a.t.c.hing up his rifle, joined the fighting men.
Uttering howls of rage as they saw their prey escaping them, the Mexicans rushed out onto the wharf in a mad attempt to board before it was too late.
Three men would have succeeded in boarding the launch, had they not been shot down as they leaped for the after deck.
"Give it to them with the Colt, Corporal!" Dave called. "Every other man fire with his rifle!"
Before he had finished speaking, the reloaded Colt belched forth its rain of death. It was the machine gun, with its muzzle swiftly turning in an arc of a circle that did the most execution among the outlaws, but the riflemen did their share.
Until his rifle barrel was too hot to hold in his hands, John Carmody shot rapidly, yet coolly putting into his work all the pent-up indignation that he had felt for days against Cosetta and his men.
"Stop the gun!" ordered Dave Darrin, resting a hand on the shoulder of the marine corporal. "Don"t waste its fire."
The launch was now free of the sh.o.r.e, and moving down the lagoon at half speed. On the wharf fully a score of Mexicans either lay dead or dying.
Dave"s spoken order to the engineer caused the launch to increase its speed.
"Line up at the starboard rail," Dave called to the men grouped about him. "We"re going to catch it from the sh.o.r.e."
The launch was a few hundred yards down the lagoon when Darrin, alertly watching, made out several figures on the eastern sh.o.r.e.
Patiently he waited until the first flash from a rifle was seen, which was followed instantly by the report and the "pss-seu!"
of a bullet.
"Let "em have the rest of what"s in the Colt," the young ensign directed, calmly. "Men, don"t fire too rapidly, but keep up your work. We want to be remembered by Cosetta, if he has the good luck to be still alive."
It was neither a heavy nor an accurate fire that came now from the enraged Mexicans. Helped out by the Colt, the fire from the moving craft was sharp enough to discourage the rapidly diminishing ardor of the miscreants on sh.o.r.e.
Just as the launch rounded the point of land at the mouth of the lagoon, and stood out into open water at full speed, a stray bullet killed Seaman Hicks.
"Yes, sir, he"s dead, poor fellow!" exclaimed Riley, looking up as Ensign Dave stepped hastily forward for a look at his man.
"Hicks was a fine sailor too."
"For a party that wasn"t expected to fight," returned Darrin wearily, "we"ve had a pretty big casualty list---two killed, and three wounded."
"You"re wounded yourself, sir," exclaimed Riley.
"Oh, my boot was cut," Darrin a.s.sented, indifferently.
"Look at your wrist, sir," urged the young c.o.xswain.
Dave glanced down at his left wrist, to find it covered with blood.
"It must look worse than it is," Darrin commented, listlessly.
"I didn"t even feel it."
"It will need attention, sir, just the same," Riley urged. "Let me fix it up, sir, with a first aid bandage."
There was a water cask aboard. As the launch was now out of close range, and the Mexicans had apparently given up firing, Riley brought a cup of water, poured it over the wrist, and wiped away the blood.
"A scratch, as I thought," smiled Dave. "Not even enough to get excused from watch duty."
"You"ll have it dressed, sir, won"t you, as soon as you get aboard the "_Long Island_" again?" urged Riley, applying the sterilized bandage with swift skill. "If the scoundrels used any of the bra.s.s-jacketed bullets of which they"re so fond, a scratch like that might lead to blood poisoning, sir."
In a few minutes more the launch was out of rifle range. Dave ordered the course changed to east by north-east, in order to reach the rendezvous of the three launches.
"Steamer ahead, sir!" sang out the bow lookout, a few minutes later.
"Whereaway?" called Darrin, moving forward.
"Three points off starboard bow, sir," replied the sailorman.
"It looks like our own launch, sir."
By this time Darrin was well forward. He peered closely at the approaching craft, for she might be a Mexican Federal gunboat that had fallen into the hands of rebels or outlaws.
"It"s our own launch," p.r.o.nounced Darrin, a minute later. He reached for the whistle pull and blew three blasts of welcome, which were promptly answered.
The two craft now neared each other. "Launch ahoy, there!" called a voice from the bow of the other craft.
"Aye, aye, sir!" Darrin answered.
"Is that you, Ensign Darrin?"