OUTNUMBERED

“Do you mean to surrender to that bunch of――of bandits?” sputtered Mr. Traine. “Hang it, Bob, we’d be a lot of pikers if we did that! Let’s give ’em a good time first, anyway! What?”

Mr. Weeks shook his head. “Once they begin popping at the balloon, Ben――――”

“That’s right,” agreed Mr. Jordan. “If they’ll confine their attention to you, Ben, no one’ll object, but we can’t have the old _Fate_ knocked full of holes. What do you suppose this Roza guy intends to do with us once he’s got us, Bob?”

“Keep us prisoners, I guess. That doesn’t suit me much, but it’s a heap better to be a prisoner than dead. And I think our first duty is to protect the ship. Who’s got a white handkerchief?”

“I have, but you can’t use it for that purpose!” Mr. Traine scowled belligerently.

Mr. Weeks laughed. “Well, maybe we won’t need it. Let’s see what their next move is.”

The cavalry formed a loose ring about the dirigible and its defenders several hundred yards away, well out of danger from the fire of the automatics. There was a discouragingly business-like look to the maneuver, and, although horses curveted and fretted, their riders sat steady in the saddles with rifles across the horns. Captain Fosdes alone remained inside the circle. Although he had retired with the soldiers, he had scorned to seek the immunity of distance, and now, digging spurs, he sent his roan prancing back toward the balloon. Fifty yards away he halted, removed his cigarette and blew a cloud of blue smoke into the sunlight.

“I think I might get him,” said Mr. Traine hopefully. “What do you say, Bob?”

“No! No firing first for us, Ben.”

“Señor,” called the Mexican, “I have the orders of my Generalissimo to take you before him. I am all regrets, but what is ordered must be. I beg of you to reconsider your decision.” He waved a brown hand gracefully. “Further refusal would be most unwise, señor!”

“I presume, Captain, that you realize that what you are attempting is an act of war,” replied the commander sternly. “An act of war against a nation with which your country is at peace.”

“Señor, such matters are not for my consideration. I am only a soldier whose duty it is to obey.”

“What does this General Roza want of us?” asked Mr. Weeks. “What is his reason for making this outrageous demand?”

“Señor, how can I know?” The captain shrugged again. “It may be that he wishes to have explained what your purpose is so far beyond the boundary between our countries. The señor says truly that our countries are not at war, and for such reason, it may well be, my general is concerned at the presence here of a military balloon.”

“General Roza can surely conceive of a balloon being driven from its course in such a storm as that of two days since,” said the commander stiffly.

“Possibly, señor, but since the storm traveled west to east?”

“I have already explained that we damaged our rudder. We were forced to descend where we might. Even now we are not certain of our whereabouts.”

“Doubtless General Roza will be as well satisfied with the señor’s amiable explanation as I am,” returned the captain, bowing. “But, with regrets, señor, I must insist that you and your command return with me to the general’s headquarters. It is but a little distance and I have horses that you may ride.”

Commander Weeks considered a moment, his eyes traveling over the encircling line of waiting soldiers. Finally:

“It seems that we have little choice in the matter, sir,” he said dryly. “We are ready to go with you, Captain, but under protest.”

“_Gracias, señor!_”

“And with one proviso,” continued Mr. Weeks.

“If the señor will graciously make it known,” answered the other courteously.

“That no harm comes to our balloon. We must be allowed to deflate it and make all secure before we go.”

“But, señor! General Roza has no wish to take you away from your balloon. My orders are to bring that to him also. I have here men sufficient, have I not? Most carefully, señor, shall your wonderful airship be conveyed. Pray have no uneasiness!”

“It would be simpler to take the balloon under its power, Captain,” responded the commander innocently.

The captain smiled gently. “Pardon, señor, but I dare not take such risk. It might be that the balloon would become unmanageable, lacking a rudder, and that the comandante would not be able to reach the general’s headquarters. _Quien sabe?_ It would be better, I consider, that we _sigar_――how do you say? Tow, is it not?――that we tow the balloon, señor. _Si?_”

“Very well,” consented the commander. He turned to Lieutenant Traine. “Shan’t need your handkerchief, Ben,” he said, smiling.

The lieutenant sniffed. “Wouldn’t have gotten it if you had,” he jeered. “Nice pickle we’re in now!”

“Better be a pickle than a corpse,” said Mr. Jordan cheerfully. “Hope to goodness, though, I get a quiet horse. I’m just about as happy in a saddle as a fly in a glue-pot! Only,” he added, as he prepared to follow Mr. Gandell over the side, “not nearly so secure!”

Twenty minutes later a strange procession began to wend its way northward over the flat llano. Ahead rode a handful of General Roza’s men, behind them the crew of the _F 8_. Then, laughing and joking, some twenty ragged soldiers traveled afoot holding fast to two ropes which depended from the forward underbody of the dirigible. Further back as many more handled the guys from the tail. Behind them, again, rode the remainder of the force with the led horses. And overhead, monstrous, serene, the sunlight aglint on its long silvery cylinder, floated the _F 8_. Straight toward the north, save when a clump of cactus or mesquite sent them aside, the riders ahead led the way. Surely the lizards, peering out from the dried tangles of the mesquite, had never seen a more remarkable sight!

Captain Fosdes rode at the commander’s side and was amiability itself. He offered cigarettes generously and conversation even more generously. It was hard not to feel a liking for the laughing, care-free little chap, and even Jack, to whom the capture seemed the most horrible misfortune that fate could have devised, grudgingly acknowledged a sympathy for him. Jack and Hugh rode side by side, and conversed in low tones. Hugh was very dejected. For that matter, so were they all, although they tried hard not to show it. Even Lieutenant Jordan seemed oppressed, but that may have been due to the fact that he was squeezed into a saddle rather too short for him on a horse which, while selected for its docility, failed to win the lieutenant’s trust.

“He may be all right,” he confided lugubriously to Mr. Gandell beside him, “but what’s he keep turning his head and looking at me for? I don’t like his expression, Pete. He――he’s got something up his sleeve. You can’t tell me!”

The _F 8_, alone of the American force, appeared not to be troubled by the turn of events. The big dirigible followed as quietly and contentedly as a lamb. Jack and Hugh discussed its fate sadly. “You can bet this Roza guy won’t let go of it, once he has it,” declared Hugh. “They’re all robbers, the lot of them. I don’t mean the decent Mexicans, but these renegades that fight under any one who’ll pay them a few pesos a month and feed them.”

“But they say that Tito Roza is an educated man,” said Jack, “one of the decent sort you speak of. If he refused to give up the _Fate_ it will be an act of simple theft, wouldn’t it? And the United States would be down on him hard!”

“How would the United States know he had it?” asked the other, gloomily. “I guess they’re already putting it down for lost; us, too.”

“Why, we’d tell what had happened as soon as we got back,” exclaimed Jack. Hugh turned a pitying look on him.

“Get back? Where do you get that stuff, old son? We aren’t going to get back!”

“Not going――Do you mean――――” Jack’s voice dropped to an awed whisper――“that they’ll _shoot_ us?”

“Search me, but it’s a safe bet that we won’t be reporting at Camp Stanton just yet awhile. Maybe he’ll just keep us prisoners for a stretch. If that’s all we’ll be lucky! He’s a murderous little thug, this Roza.”

“But they haven’t taken our automatics away,” objected Jack. “And they’ve treated us pretty decently so far. It doesn’t look to me as if we were prisoners exactly.”

Hugh shrugged. “Wait and see,” he said pessimistically. “Maybe Roza’s doing this just to amuse himself. Maybe he’s shy a hand at bridge, or whatever the Mexicans play. And maybe he will give us his blessing and let us off after breakfast to-morrow. But I don’t believe it!”

“Seems to me,” remarked Jack, after a few moments of silence, “that if there was danger of being shot Mr. Weeks wouldn’t have given in so easily.”

“What else could he do? If he hadn’t they’d have killed us back there and taken the balloon anyway. Guess the Old Man argues that while there’s life there’s hope.”

“And he’s right,” declared Jack stoutly. “I’m not making my will yet, Hugh.”

“Nor I, but I’m not fooling myself that this is a week-end house-party we’re going to! What makes me maddest is to have it happen on my first voyage. Everything was going so fine and all!”

His companion grinned. “Fine, eh? Wonder what your idea of a rough trip is!”

“Oh, well, you know what I mean. Of course we had our troubles, but those are all in the day’s run, Jack. When you get a berth on a dirigible you naturally look for adventures. But this just sort of ends the story right in the middle.” He turned and looked back and upward at the nose of the dirigible, with its great red-white-and-blue rings glowing in the late afternoon sunlight. “It’s a blamed shame,” he muttered. “I was getting mighty fond of that old bird, Jack.”

“Me, too,” responded the other. “Don’t you suppose, Hugh, that there is some way of――of saving her?”

“How?” asked the ensign morosely.

“I don’t know,” was the helpless reply, “but――but there might be. Suppose we managed to cut her loose!”

“Might as well let Roza have her as that. She’d float around for awhile and then come down somewhere and smash. Or she might go out to sea. One thing we might do, though, is to wreck the engines so she wouldn’t be of any use. I’d do that if I had a chance, even if they shot me for it!”

“And I’d help! But――oh, well, maybe things aren’t as bad as you think, Hugh. Mr. Weeks doesn’t look very worried.”

“He never does. He’d smile if he faced a firing squad. He’s a wonder. If this turns out to be the end, Jack, I’ll be glad of one thing, anyway, and that is, that I served under him!”

“I wish you’d quit talking about firing-squads and――and ends,” protested the other. “Gee, you’re about as cheerful to talk to as an undertaker!”

Hugh laughed, though not very heartily. “Guess I’ve got the dumps,” he said. “What I need, maybe, is a good meal.” He buttoned his jacket closer, for now that the shadows were growing long across the land the air was getting chill. An easterly breeze was blowing, too, and the dirigible had begun to tug harder on the ropes. The sunlight was no longer gold, but had taken on the queer lemon-yellow tinge, and above the warmth of color along the western horizon the sky was a pale, watery green, a chill, clear hue that suggested the depths of an iceberg. Jack shivered and snuggled into his coat.

Already, however, their destination was in sight across the level expanse of amber desert. The vegetation had become more evident. The cactus grew taller and the mesquite denser, and the clumps of the latter were larger and fresher looking. At intervals a low growth, that Jack mistook for some kind of grass, carpeted the ground with faded gray-green. Closer inspection showed that the courageous stranger was a fleshy-leaved little plant whose whitish runners wove a tangle over the dry ground, sending forth thick, spear-shaped leaves at intervals. A half-mile distant lay a dejected looking village of small houses set haphazardly about on the desert. A few tired trees, stunted and wind-bent, marked what in courtesy might have been termed a street, a wide, sandy road bisecting the village. The houses were of adobe brick or rough boards, some few whitewashed. A tiny church sent an arched belfry above the other roofs and beside it a great “organ cactus” reared its long arms. A blue haze of wood smoke lay over the little town.

Their approach had not gone unheralded, it appeared, for long before they reached the first huts the populace awaited them. Picturesque but dirty men in straw sombreros and tattered _serapes_, slatternly women, half-naked children and flea-infested dogs stared and chattered, following the procession toward the plaza. Of the men a few were doubtless soldiers of Roza’s army, although only the possession of a gun made the fact certain. Indians, with black hair hanging in a fringe below the wide brims of their hats, predominated. Shoes were seldom seen, their place being taken by sandals held to the feet by a leather thong over the toes. A priest, barefooted but wearing a sun-faded black derby and clothed in a long black cape, stared near-sightedly through a pair of huge spectacles. Burros wandered dejectedly through the street, if street it could be called.

Commotion there was, and color as well, since even a peon has a passion for bright hues, but anything approaching hilarity was oddly lacking. The inhabitants of Perdero, for such the place later proved to be, seemed a sad and solemn lot, although the sight of the great silver cylinder swaying at the end of the ropes evidently aroused curiosity and a mild excitement. The _F 8_ must have been a strange and even marvelous sight to them, but they were by no means overwhelmed by awe or wonderment; indeed, a blacksmith who was shoeing a horse almost in the middle of the thoroughfare gave but one brief and vacant glance at it before he resumed his work. No effort was made to take the dirigible into the center of the village, although there was space enough to do so, but, obeying the directions of the captain, the soldiers who held it swung it around nose to the wind and fell into comfortable positions and lighted their cigarettes. The Americans, conducted by the amiable captain, rode on along the street, past the crumbling adobe dwellings, between dogs, children and occasional hens, until the church and the plaza were behind them. The village proved larger than the first view had suggested, for, following the wandering street, it continued for some distance across the desert northward. Military occupation became more evident as the party proceeded. A corral well filled with horses and mules appeared, and a sort of barracks built of wooden frames and corrugated iron sides and roof stood nearby, and about it were many of the general’s ragged army. Small fires burned here and there and it was evident that the evening meal was in preparation. Presently the cavalcade drew rein in front of a more pretentious hovel beside the door of which two soldiers lolled.

“Headquarters, señors,” announced the captain. “Have the kindness to alight.”

They did so, Lieutenant Jordan groaning painfully as his cramped body was wrenched from the saddle. The captain led the way through the entrance, the sentries saluting quite smartly as he passed, but at once relapsing into their former somnolence. The pungent odor of burning wood met them inside the door and, for the instant, afflicted their eyes. A fire smoldered on a stone hearth. Two plain pine tables and some chairs were the principal furnishings. Beyond one of them, flanked by a portable typewriter on one hand and by a pile of books, papers and maps on the other, sat a man of slight stature. He was bareheaded, and the light from a casement fell full on his face, with all the effect, in the dim, shadowed room, of a spotlight. Three other men were there, indistinct shapes under their huge _sombreros_, but for Jack and Hugh these others held for the moment no interest. It was at the small, khaki-clad man beyond the littered table that they stared in open-mouthed surprise over the shoulders of their companions. Hugh plucked at Jack’s sleeve. Their eyes met. Jack nodded.

“Señor Gonzales!” he whispered incredulously.