Читать книгу Roughriders of the Pampas: A Tale of Ranch Life in South America - F. S. Brereton - Страница 3

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"One moment please, steward!"

"Yes, sir."

"Bring a little soup and a piece of bread at once, please."

"Soup, sir. Yes, sir."

The steward bustled off, and returned within a minute with a steaming bowl of pea soup.

"Thank you," said the tall passenger who had called for it, nodding pleasantly, and with a knowing wink. "Not for me, steward. For this young gentleman here. Now, sir, tackle that. You will feel a man again. There, don't think me interfering and presumptuous. We are fellow passengers, and you are in want of a little help and advice. Come, set to work at it and you will feel yourself again. You've been feeling very ill. Everyone does that at first, and we have had a dusting in the bay. But that soup, believe me, will do a world of good to you."

The tall stranger leaned on the edge of the saloon table and spoke kindly to the pale-faced youth sitting exactly opposite him. He had noticed Dudley Compton on the day of sailing, for there was something striking about the young fellow. Then he had lost sight of him for three days, for outside the mouth of the Mersey the brig had run into a nasty sea, and had held on right into the Bay of Biscay, lashed all the way by a stiff gale, which had caused her to flounder and roll, and had kept her decks incessantly washed by the spray and the rollers which broke aboard. Of the twenty or more passengers aboard but two had put in an appearance at meals in the saloon, and for them, hardy travellers though they were, eating had been a matter of difficulty, for the table was decked with fiddles, and every scrap of crockery and glassware was secured. To eat soup one had to cling to the basin with one hand and to the spoon with the other, while one balanced oneself in his seat as skilfully as the elements allowed.

Dudley had been utterly miserable. He had not been five miles to sea before, and he had succumbed to nausea within two hours. For three days he had lain in his bunk, tossed this way and that, utterly prostrate, and careless of the many bruises he received, for he was thrown out of his berth on several occasions. Now his natural courage had forced him to get up, for he was not the lad to lie and sulk at any time, and not the one to be easily beaten.

"I feel horribly ill and giddy," he said to himself that morning, "and I really shouldn't mind much if I heard we were sinking or had run on a rock. But a fellow can't stand more of this kind of thing. They'll think I'm shamming. I'll make an effort to get up."

He crawled from his bunk and struggled into his clothing, a process accomplished by dint of clinging to the bunk, and very often interrupted by a pitch and a roll which sent him into the corner of the narrow box which went by the name of cabin. He clambered to the deck and was promptly requested to retire by a bandy-legged seaman, clad in shining oilskins.

"Can't come out here, sir," he said politely, helping the passenger into the saloon entrance. "There's still seas a-sweepin' her decks, and yer don't want ter go overboard, now do yer?"

"I don't know. I hardly care what happens," answered Dudley desperately. "I shall be ill again if I go down to the saloon."

"Ill! You've been that this three days. Pull yerself together, sir. Never say die! Why, Nelson hisself was always that sick the first two or three days at sea that he wasn't fit to fight his own shadder, much less the Frenchies. But he pulled hisself up. He wasn't the lad to go under without a struggle. Jest you slip down to the saloon and call for food. It'll set yer up, sir."

The kindly sailor assisted Dudley to the door of the saloon, and left him there with an encouraging nod. Dudley struggled across the narrow saloon, a cosy enough place as accommodation went in those days, but a wretched enough saloon when compared with those provided on modern-day leviathans. A roll of the ship sent him with a lurch against the table; he grabbed at the fiddles, almost tore them from their place, and was flung into a seat immediately opposite the only other occupant of the saloon. He was giddy. The hot atmosphere choked him after the breath of pure air which he had inhaled on deck. He felt faint, wondered whether he should struggle back to his cabin and give himself up to despair, and then the voice of the passenger broke on his ears.

"Now tackle the soup, and you'll see," he heard. "There's a spoon. Hold on to the bowl, wedge yourself into the seat, and enjoy your meal. Bravo! I see that you will be the very first of our invalids to get over this little trouble. Steward!"

"Sir?"

"A cup of coffee, black and strong, and a few biscuits, for this gentleman."

Dudley felt better already. The very fact of having someone to talk to was a relief, and it took his attention from himself for the moment. He found that the soup tasted as no other soup had done before. Wonderful to relate, he suddenly discovered that he had an appetite, and recollected that he had starved for three whole days, a sacrifice in which he had never before indulged.

"Like it?" asked the stranger shortly.

"The best I've ever tasted," answered our young hero, a thin smile wreathing his lips. "I'm hungry."

"And so you ought to be. Steward, just bring along a plate of beef, and see that there is nothing but lean. This young gentleman is hungry."

There was a broad smile on Dudley's face now, for the hot soup had warmed him right through, and seemed as if by magic to have driven his giddiness and nausea away, such is the rallying power of youth. He took a closer look at the passenger sitting opposite, and found something attractive in his face. He sat high in his chair, and had every appearance of being tall. He was remarkably thin and wiry, as if he were trained to the very last ounce, for no one could suggest that illness had anything to do with his condition. His powerful bronzed face, with its fair, flowing moustache, its prominent nose and cheek bones and piercing, kindly eyes, discouraged that idea, while there was no sign of frailty about the broad shoulders, the deep chest, and the powerful, sun-tanned fingers which were clasped upon the table. This was a man who was engaged in an active, strenuous life, and, inexperienced though Dudley was, something told him intuitively that his new friend had gone through many an ordeal, had faced death, and had battled often for existence.

"Wondering who I am, eh?"

The question was asked abruptly and not unkindly, for there was the suspicion of a smile on the stranger's face. Dudley blushed, and stammered.

"Yes, sir," he admitted, "I was. You see——"

"There's something different about me from the men you have been in the habit of coming across."

There was undoubtedly. Why, even the clothes which this stranger wore were strange to Dudley. They were of a smooth, dark cloth, probably of foreign manufacture, while the cut was decidedly different from that in vogue in England. There was a soft, white shirt beneath the coat, a soft collar attached, and a brilliant-coloured tie of very ample dimensions issued from beneath the collar and fell in soft folds over his shirt and the lapels of his coat. Added to all this, a wide-brimmed felt hat, with an ostrich plume thrust into the band, lay on the seat beside him, the sort of article which one would hardly have expected to have come across at sea, and certainly not in England in those prim days.

"Well? Am I right? Speak out, lad, and don't fear to offend me. My name's Blunt. Harvey Blunt, at your service. Blunt by name and blunt also by nature, I fear."

Dudley smiled, for the stranger beamed on him as he spoke, his kindly face and eyes belying his words. He might be blunt in speech, and perhaps for all Dudley knew had cultivated the habit for some special reason. He might be a man who commanded many workers, and short, sharp orders were appreciated and quickly obeyed. But he was certainly not offensively blunt, and there was a kind heart under his jacket. Dudley reckoned all that out swiftly, while he noticed that Mr. Blunt spoke English perfectly, but sometimes with the faintest foreign accent, while later, as they conversed, he heard many strange exclamations issue from his lips, and he was at a loss to understand what they meant or in what language they were uttered.

"A lad who thinks and notices," Mr. Blunt was saying to himself, as he watched the young passenger opposite. "I like his looks. He is a fine sample of the English boy, well set up, manly, with a lot of character and determination about him, and yet with manners. Ah, I like a lad who is always polite! Well, sir?"

Dudley laughed outright now. He had finished his soup, and was now discussing a big plate of beef, while a steaming cup of coffee was wedged into the corner of the fiddle just at his elbow.

"I must admit that you are a little different, sir," he said. "To begin with, your clothes are not like those we wear, and then, well, you look to me as if you had always lived in the open, and had slept there, too. You look, what we call at school, 'as hard as nails, and awfully fit.'"

"English or not?" was the next question, flashed at him without a second's intermission.

"Yes, undoubtedly, but accustomed to use another language."

"Right! Right, all the way through! A lad who thinks, who uses his headpiece! Good!"

The stranger brought a big bony fist down on to the edge of the fiddle with such force that had Dudley attempted to do the same he would have suffered considerable pain. But Mr. Blunt did not seem to notice any. He smiled at Dudley while he repeated the words. As for the young fellow opposite him, he went red to the roots of his hair, while his thoughts flew away back to the school which he had so recently quitted. Had anyone there given him credit for keen perception, or even taken the trouble to imagine that Dudley Compton ever had a serious thought?

"He is hopeless where work or thought is concerned," the headmaster had said to Dudley's guardian, only a year before. "You will do nothing with him in an office. Send him abroad. He is a jolly lad, good-tempered, steady, and with plenty of pluck, but little head."

And here was a stranger praising Dudley for the very thing which his late master had never imagined him to possess. Straightway he resolved to cultivate a habit which evidently gave pleasure to this tall gentleman.

"Going out to join your parents?" was the next question, fired at Dudley as he devoured his meal. "Where do you disembark? Don't answer if you wish to keep such matters to yourself. I'm not inquisitive, but we seem to have struck up a pleasant acquaintance, and, after all, there are few enough English over in South America, and it's always nice to meet one and exchange views. I'm getting off at Montevideo, where I transship, and make up the River Paraná. Ever been out before?"

"Never. And I am not going to join my parents, sir, for they are dead. I'm an orphan, and have been so for the past ten years."

"Dear, dear! You're about seventeen, I take it. Eh?"

"I shall be in a month, sir."

"Then you have nothing to complain of with regard to English feeding. You are five feet nine, I should reckon."

"And a half," exclaimed Dudley, his nausea and sickness now entirely forgotten, while the blush of robust health was fast returning to his cheeks. "Five feet nine and a half inches, in my socks, sir."

"And your name?"

"Dudley Compton, sir. I'm going out to Montevideo, where I have to make enquiries for a Mr. Bradshaw. He was a great friend of my guardian, and wrote a year ago to say that I was to come out to his ranch and he would give me work. Later I shall buy a farm for myself."

"Humph! You will do well to serve an apprenticeship first, and get to know the country. Besides, until the Indians are settled, and civil war has come to an end, it is not over safe to be in the neighborhood of Montevideo, much less to expend good money on a farm. So you are going out to join a Mr. Bradshaw, Mr. James Bradshaw, a short, wiry gentleman, who came out twenty years ago?"

"That is the description," agreed Dudley, "but I have never seen him. It is a year since he wrote to my guardian."

"Humph! Then there is disappointment for the boy," Mr. Blunt exclaimed beneath his breath. "I will not tell him now. I'll wait till he has got his sea legs and has overcome his homesickness. Anyone could see with half an eye that the lad was feeling lonely and forsaken. Come, we will make for a little nook I know of," he said aloud, seeing that Dudley had finished his meal. "It is just outside the saloon entrance, and the captain has rigged an awning so as to keep off the worst of the spray. Get a good overcoat on and join me here."

Dudley felt a different creature as he rose from his seat, and staggered out of the saloon, clinging to the edge of the table, to the back of the fixed seats, and to the walls as he made his way towards his cabin. And what a different aspect it presented now. Before, it seemed but a dismal hole, black and forbidding. Now, the white paint, and the fact that he looked at it with an eye which was no longer jaundiced, gave it a home-like appearance. He wedged his body into a corner, reached for the rough topcoat which he had purchased before sailing, and, cramming a hat on to his head, he returned to the saloon. Mr. Blunt was already there, his sombrero pulled down over his eyes and secured by a cord beneath his chin, while a cloak of ample proportions and of foreign appearance covered his shoulders and fell to his knees.

"The class of thing you will wear soon," he said, noticing Dudley look at it. "This is a poncho, and many a time have I been grateful for its services. It is the cloak generally used in South America. Now, up we go. Hang on to the rail, and follow me across the deck."

He ran up the companion, stopped for a few moments at the exit from the saloon to the deck, and then darted out, a gust of wind sweeping under the wide flap of his sombrero as he did so and turning it back over the top. Dudley followed swiftly, and in a few seconds he was ensconced with his new friend under a canvas awning rigged between the mizzen mast and the end of the companion. It was but a flimsy shelter, it is true, but it kept the clouds of spray from drenching them, while it was seldom that a wave of any proportions broke over the rail. Dudley sat well back on a roll of rope and watched the sea breaking about the vessel, thoroughly enjoying this magnificent sight, and forgetful of the fact that barely two hours ago all his misery and discomfort, not to say desperation, was due to the waves which he was now watching. It seemed wonderful to him that any ship could live in such a sea, and he was more than half surprised to note how placid and obviously content the two men at the wheel were.

"Settling down to a nice blow, with the wind right aft, and therefore carrying us fast to the end of our journey," sang out Mr. Blunt, for the ordinary tones of the voice were swallowed in the roar of the wind, in the rattle and scream of the rigging. "We are running out of the Bay, and shall be setting our course for Lisbon before the night falls. Then we touch at Cape St. Vincent, and at once set our bows west and south, making for Rio de Janeiro. A week from there will take us to Montevideo, and then the old life again!"

Between the gusts of wind he told Dudley how he had gone to South America, to the province of Entre Rios, many years before, and how he had acquired an estancia. Then he charmed him with a description of his life, mounted on the finest horse at the first streak of day, rounding up cattle which were more than half wild, or galloping over the wide plains in the effort to secure some of the numerous herds of fine horses which roamed the country, utterly wild and untamed. There were Indians, too, and outlaws to be contended with, and a thousand other dangers which made a man a man, and brought out all that was fine in him.

Dudley listened with wide-open ears, enraptured with the tale, and glowing at the thought that this was to be his life once he arrived at Mr. Bradshaw's farm, never dreaming that the kindly friend beside him had sad news to convey. For Mr. Blunt was aware that this same Mr. Bradshaw had been killed six months before in an Indian raid, and that Dudley could therefore no longer count upon his help. Then Mr. Blunt demanded more news of himself, and Dudley told that he had been left an orphan when very young, that a guardian had taken care of him till he was nine, and had then sent him to a school at Blackheath.

"He was a bachelor, and always very kind," he said; "but he was such a very busy man that he had very little time to devote to me, and, in fact, we were almost strangers. I seldom saw him in term time, while during the holidays we saw little of each other, as he did not return from London till late every evening, and left early on the following day. I think he had an idea that I should go into his office, but——"

"You hardly looked on that with favor," interposed Mr. Blunt with a knowing smile. "An office stool was not as attractive, perhaps, as the life which Mr. Bradshaw lived?"

"Hardly, sir. I had heard my guardian often speak of him, and of the life which he lived, and I own I longed to try it. But then, too, the headmaster seemed to think that I should be useless at a desk. He said as much openly."

"Which only proves him to be somewhat lacking in perception," was the short answer. "A youth with average intelligence never knows what he can do till he tries, so why discourage him beforehand? However, here you are, and I am sure you will like the life out in Entre Rios. It is rough, full of difficulty and danger, but one is a man there, as free as the air, and engaged in work far more natural to human beings than is that of the clerk, cooped in a stuffy office and poring over figures. Can you ride, lad?"

Dudley owned that he could, just a little. "I have often mounted a horse on the heath, and have even galloped and stuck on over a few jumps."

"And fallen off on other occasions. Then here's a word of advice. If you are asked if you can ride, don't be anxious to admit to any proficiency. You will be a 'gringo' out there, a foreigner, newly arrived, what is sometimes called a greenhorn, and the gauchos are fond of making fun. Can you shoot? Never fired a gun or a revolver! Time you commenced to learn, then. We'll have a little practice as soon as the sea calms down. You'll want to know the business end of a gun before you reach South America, for ruffians abound there. You see that block in the rigging? Well, before you consider you can shoot you must be able to hit it a score of times running, turning on it swiftly, and firing without a pause. It can be done. I could do it now, even with all this movement. It is simply custom, a knack of hand and eye, a useful knack which has saved my life on more than one occasion. Do you smoke, lad?"

The questions were fired at Dudley with surprising shortness, which almost made him gasp.

"Sometimes," he admitted guiltily. "Not very often."

"Good again. The fellow who commences to smoke too soon upsets his digestion, and therefore his development. A cigar is a fine thing, and helps a man when he's troubled. The weed soothes, somehow. You'll start some day and admit the same."

The very mention of a smoke caused Mr. Blunt to feel in the pocket beneath his poncho, and to extract a long cigar and a match of brilliant hue. Dudley watched him as he dexterously struck the match and kept it alight in spite of the wind, while his nostrils detected the rank fumes which came from the match. His new friend drew at the weed, and every line of his fine open face denoted enjoyment. Then the eyes, which had for a second or more looked somewhat dreamy, fixed themselves on Dudley's face, and scrutinized every feature.

"Hum!" thought Mr. Blunt, "not a bad-looking youngster either, now that the food he has had and this keen air have brought the color to his face. I expect he was a good fellow at school; popular and all that. Perhaps he left to the regret of all, masters as well as boys. Eh?"

"Pardon!" demanded Dudley.

"Not at all," was the answer. "I was thinking aloud, I fear. It is a foolish habit. But tell me, Dudley, are you not somewhat young to be sent out to South America? You tell me you are not quite seventeen. Most youngsters are older than that when they come out. Was there any special reason for your leaving home early?"

He asked the question in his usual manner, his eyes all the time fixed on the face of the young fellow before him. He saw the color rise on Dudley's cheeks. He could almost have declared that he saw tears welling up into the eyes, but he could not be sure, for with such a wind blowing any one might have tears in his eyes. The lad faced his questioner unflinchingly, coughed huskily as if something obstructed his throat, and then answered boldly.

"Yes, sir," he said, "there was a reason. I was to have come out here when I was seventeen and a half but something occurred to send me earlier."

"Something occurred. Exactly so! Just as I thought. And that was——? But there, I am too inquisitive. Your pardon, Dudley. Do not even mention the matter further unless you wish to do so."

"I do wish it, sir," said Dudley with decision, and in such altered tones that Mr. Blunt's attention was again attracted. "I will give you my confidence, knowing that you will not divulge a word. I was expelled."

"Expelled! Sent away from the school! Gracious! For what?"

There was a startled look in Mr. Blunt's eyes. He swung round on his young friend again, for he had turned his head away a moment before, and sat there staring incredulously at him.

"For what? The crime?" he demanded. "It was not a serious one, that I'll be bound."

"I was expelled for theft. When I left the school I was branded forever as a mean and despicable thief."

There was a strange tremor in Dudley's voice. Mr. Blunt was certain now that those were tears in the corner of the eyes. But still the lad faced him without a waver. He made his admission boldly, decidedly, with no attempt to lessen the significance of his words, and as he spoke, despite the tears in his eyes, and the tremor in his voice, Dudley Compton's head went higher, while there was a look on his face which spoke of pride, and of full consciousness of his own innocence.