Jules Verne (19 page)

"Doubtless, Mrs. Weldon," replied Dick Sand; "but if he has forsaken
our company voluntarily, I do not see how we could oblige him to rejoin
us. Who knows but he has his reasons for avoiding us forever?"

And taking Mrs. Weldon aside, Dick Sand confided to her his suspicions.
He was not astonished to find that she had them also. Only they
differed on one point.

"If Negoro reappears," said Mrs. Weldon, "he will have put the product
of his theft in a safe place. Take my advice. What we had better do,
not being able to convict him, will be to hide our suspicions from him,
and let him believe that we are his dupes."

Mrs. Weldon was right. Dick Sand took her advice.

However, Negoro was called several times.

He did not reply. Either he was still too far away to hear, or he did
not wish to return.

The blacks did not regret being rid of his presence; but, as Mrs.
Weldon had just said, perhaps he was still more to be feared afar than
near. And, moreover, how explain that Negoro would venture alone into
that unknown country? Had he then lost his way, and on this dark night
was he vainly seeking the way to the grotto?

Mrs. Weldon and Dick Sand did not know what to think. However it was,
they could not, in order to wait for Negoro, deprive themselves of a
repose so necessary to all.

At that moment the dog, which was running on the strand, barked aloud.

"What is the matter with Dingo?" asked Mrs. Weldon.

"We must, indeed, find out," replied the novice. "Perhaps it is Negoro
coming back."

At once Hercules, Bat, Austin, and Dick Sand took their way to the
mouth of the river.

But, arrived at the bank, they neither saw nor heard anything. Dingo
now was silent.

Dick Sand and the blacks returned to the grotto.

The going to sleep was organized as well as possible. Each of the
blacks prepared himself to watch in turn outside. But Mrs. Weldon,
uneasy, could not sleep. It seemed to her that this land so ardently
desired did not give her what she had been led to hope for, security
for hers, and rest for herself.

The next day, April 7th, Austin, who was on guard at sunrise, saw Dingo
run barking to the little river. Almost immediately Mrs. Weldon, Dick
Sand and the blacks came out of the grotto.

Decidedly there was something there.

"Dingo has scented a living creature, man or beast," said the novice.

"At all events it was not Negoro," observed Tom, "for Dingo would bark
with fury."

"If it is not Negoro, where can he be?" asked Mrs. Weldon, giving Dick
Sand a look which was only understood by him; "and if it is not he,
who, then, is it?"

"We are going to see, Mrs. Weldon," replied the novice. Then,
addressing Bat, Austin, and Hercules, "Arm yourselves, my friends, and
come!"

Each of the blacks took a gun and a cutlass, as Dick Sand had done. A
cartridge was slipped into the breech of the Remingtons, and, thus
armed, all four went to the bank of the river.

Mrs. Weldon, Tom, and Acteon remained at the entrance of the grotto,
where little Jack and Nan still rested by themselves.

The sun was then rising. His rays, intercepted by the high mountains in
the east, did not reach the cliff directly; but as far as the western
horizon, the sea sparkled under the first fires of day.

Dick Sand and his companions followed the strand of the shore, the
curve of which joined the mouth of the river.

There Dingo, motionless, and as if on guard, was continually barking.

It was evident that he saw or scented some native.

And, in fact, it was no longer against Negoro, against its enemy on
board the ship, that the dog had a grudge this time.

At that moment a man turned the last plane of the cliff. He advanced
prudently to the strand, and, by his familiar gestures, he sought to
calm Dingo. They saw that he did not care to face the anger of the
vigorous animal.

"It is not Negoro!" said Hercules.

"We cannot lose by the change," replied Bat.

"No," said the novice. "It is probably some native, who will spare us
the
ennui
of a separation. We are at last going to know exactly where
we are."

And all four, putting their guns back on their shoulders, went rapidly
toward the unknown.

The latter, on seeing them approach, at first gave signs of the
greatest surprise. Very certainly, he did not expect to meet strangers
on that part of the coast. Evidently, also, he had not yet perceived
the remains of the "Pilgrim," otherwise the presence of the shipwrecked
would very naturally be explained to him. Besides, during the night the
surf had finished demolishing the ship's hull; there was nothing left
but the wrecks that floated in the offing.

At the first moment the unknown, seeing four armed men marching toward
him, made a movement as if he would retrace his steps. He carried a gun
in a shoulder-belt, which passed rapidly into his hand, and from his
hand to his shoulder. They felt that he was not reassured.

Dick Sand made a gesture of salutation, which doubtless the unknown
understood, for, after some hesitation, he continued to advance.

Dick Sand could then examine him with attention.

He was a vigorous man, forty years old at the most, his eyes bright,
his hair and beard gray, his skin sunburnt like that of a nomad who has
always lived in the open air, in the forest, or on the plain. A kind of
blouse of tanned skin served him for a close coat, a large hat covered
his head, leather boots came up above his knees, and spurs with large
rowels sounded from their high heels.

What Dick Sand noticed at first—and which was so, in fact—was that he
had before him, not one of those Indians, habitual rovers over the
pampas, but one of those adventurers of foreign blood, often not very
commendable, who are frequently met with in those distant countries.

It also seemed, by his rather familiar attitude, by the reddish color
of a few hairs of his beard, that this unknown must be of Anglo-Saxon
origin. At all events, he was neither an Indian nor a Spaniard.

And that appeared certain, when in answer to Dick Sand, who said to him
in English, "Welcome!" he replied in the same language and without any
accent.

"Welcome yourself, my young friend," said the unknown, advancing toward
the novice, whose hand he pressed.

As to the blacks, he contented himself with making a gesture to them
without speaking to them.

"You are English?" he asked the novice.

"Americans," replied Dick Sand.

"From the South?"

"From the North."

This reply seemed to please the unknown, who shook the novice's hand
more vigorously and this time in very a American manner.

"And may I know, my young friend," he asked, "how you find yourself on
this coast?"

But, at that moment, without waiting till the novice had replied to his
question, the unknown took off his hat and bowed.

Mrs. Weldon had advanced as far as the steep bank, and she then found
herself facing him.

It was she who replied to this question.

"Sir," said she, "we are shipwrecked ones whose ship was broken to
pieces yesterday on these reefs."

An expression of pity spread over the unknown's face, whose eyes sought
the vessel which had been stranded.

"There is nothing left of our ship," added the novice. "The surf has
finished the work of demolishing it during the night."

"And our first question," continued Mrs. Weldon, "will be to ask you
where we are."

"But you are on the sea-coast of South America," replied the unknown,
who appeared surprised at the question. "Can you have any doubt about
that?"

"Yes, sir, for the tempest had been able to make us deviate from our
route," replied Dick Sand. "But I shall ask where we are more exactly.
On the coast of Peru, I think."

"No, my young friend, no! A little more to the south! You are wrecked
on the Bolivian coast."

"Ah!" exclaimed Dick Sand.

"And you are even on that southern part of Bolivia which borders on
Chili."

"Then what is that cape?" asked Dick Sand, pointing to the promontory
on the north.

"I cannot tell you the name," replied the unknown, "for if I know the
country in the interior pretty well from having often traversed it, it
is my first visit to this shore."

Dick Sand reflected on what he had just learned. That only half
astonished him, for his calculation might have, and indeed must have,
deceived him, concerning the currents; but the error was not
considerable. In fact, he believed himself somewhere between the
twenty-seventh and the thirtieth parallel, from the bearings he had
taken from the Isle of Paques, and it was on the twenty-fifth parallel
that he was wrecked. There was no impossibility in the "Pilgrim's"
having deviated by relatively small digression, in such a long passage.

Besides, there was no reason to doubt the unknown's assertions, and, as
that coast was that of lower Bolivia there was nothing astonishing in
its being so deserted.

"Sir," then said Dick Sand, "after your reply I must conclude that we
are at a rather great distance from Lima."

"Oh! Lima is far away—over there—in the north!"

Mrs. Weldon, made suspicious first of all by Negoro's disappearance,
observed the newly-arrived with extreme attention; but she could
discover nothing, either in his attitude or in his manner of expressing
himself which could lead her to suspect his good faith.

"Sir," said she, "without doubt my question is not rash. You do not
seem to be of Peruvian origin?"

"I am American as you are, madam," said the unknown, who waited for an
instant for the American lady to tell him her name.

"Mrs. Weldon," replied the latter.

"I? My name is Harris and I was born in South Carolina. But here it is
twenty years since I left my country for the pampas of Bolivia, and it
gives me pleasure to see compatriots."

"You live in this part of the province, Mr. Harris?" again asked Mrs.
Weldon.

"No, Mrs. Weldon," replied Harris, "I live in the South, on the Chilian
frontier; but at this present moment I am going to Atacama, in the
northeast."

"Are we then on the borders of the desert of that name?" asked Dick
Sand.

"Precisely, my young friend, and this desert extends far beyond the
mountains which shut off the horizon."

"The desert of Atacama?" repeated Dick Sand.

"Yes," replied Harris. "This desert is like a country by itself, in
this vast South America, from which it differs in many respects. It is,
at the same time, the most curious and the least known portion of this
continent."

"And you travel alone?" asked Mrs. Weldon.

"Oh, it is not the first time that I have taken this journey!" replied
the American. "There is, two hundred miles from here, an important
farm, the Farm of San Felice, which belongs to one of my brothers, and
it is to his house that I am going for my trade. If you wish to follow
me you will be well received, and the means of transport to gain the
town of Atacama will not fail you. My brother will be happy to furnish,
them."

These offers, made freely, could only prepossess in favor of the
American, who immediately continued, addressing Mrs. Weldon:

"These blacks are your slaves?"

And he pointed to Tom and his companions.

"We have no longer any slaves in the United States," replied Mrs.
Weldon, quickly. "The North abolished slavery long ago, and the South
has been obliged to follow the example of the North!"

"Ah! that is so," replied Harris. "I had forgotten that the war of 1862
had decided that grave question. I ask those honest men's pardon for
it," added Harris, with that delicate irony which a Southerner must put
into his language when speaking to blacks. "But on seeing those
gentlemen in your service, I believed—"

"They are not, and have never been, in my service, sir," replied Mrs.
Weldon, gravely.

"We should be honored in serving you, Mrs. Weldon," then said old Tom.
"But, as Mr. Harris knows, we do not belong to anybody. I have been a
slave myself, it is true, and sold as such in Africa, when I was only
six years old; but my son Bat, here, was born of an enfranchised
father, and, as to our companions, they were born of free parents."

"I can only congratulate you about it," replied Harris, in a tone which
Mrs. Weldon did not find sufficiently serious. "In this land of
Bolivia, also, we have no slaves. Then you have nothing to fear, and
you can go about as freely here as in the New England States."

At that moment little Jack, followed by Nan, came out of the grotto
rubbing his eyes. Then, perceiving his mother, he ran to her. Mrs.
Weldon embraced him tenderly.

"The charming little boy!" said the American, approaching Jack.

"It is my son," replied Mrs. Weldon.

"Oh, Mrs. Weldon, you must have been doubly tried, because your child
has been exposed to so many dangers."

"God has brought him out of them safe and sound, as He has us, Mr.
Harris," replied Mrs. Weldon.

"Will you permit me to kiss him on his pretty cheeks?" asked Harris.

"Willingly," replied Mrs. Weldon.

But Mr. Harris's face, it appeared, did not please little Jack, for he
clung more closely to his mother.

"Hold!" said Harris, "you do not want me to embrace you? You are afraid
of me, my good little man?"

"Excuse him, sir," Mrs. Weldon hastened to say. "It is timidity on his
part."

"Good! we shall become better acquainted," replied Harris. "Once at the
Farm, he will amuse himself mounting a gentle pony, which will tell him
good things of me."

But the offer of the gentle pony did not succeed in cajoling Jack any
more than the proposition to embrace Mr. Harris.

Mrs. Weldon, thus opposed, hastened to change the conversation. They
must not offend a man who had so obligingly offered his services.