CHAPTER I.
CARL'S SERENADE.
Carl Pretzel was singing. If any one with an ear for music had heardhim they might have guessed that he was selling fish, or buying oldclothes, or having an auction with himself, but not, by the wildestflight of fancy, could they have imagined that he had burst into song.
It was a rare evening in old Belize. The moon was like a big yellowtopaz pinned to a cushion of blue-black velvet, and around it lay thestars like scattered diamonds. Carl could not see the moon or starsvery distinctly, for it was so beastly hot that the perspirationtrickled into his eyes and half blinded him.
The zephyrs, laden with spicy fragrance from orange groves andpineapple fields, breathed softly through the tops of the palms;but Carl couldn't enjoy the zephyrs, for a cloud of mosquitoes waspestering him and he had to use both hands on his guitar.
The house before which Carl was playing and singing was a whitewashedbungalow. Between the bungalow and the street ran a high brick wall.The iron gate leading into the yard was locked, and Carl had climbedthe wall, skinning his shins and tearing his clothes. But he didn'tmind that. He had read somewhere that when a gay young Spanish bladeadmires a young Spanish lady, he grabs a guitar and goes and sings toher. Carl wasn't going to let any Spaniard back him off the boards, sohe grabbed a guitar and stole like a thief into that Belize yard toserenade Ysabel Sixty.
Carl was not very well acquainted with the lay of the land in Belize.By an error of judgment he had got into the wrong yard, and by anotherconspiracy of circumstances he began pouring out his enraptured soulunder the window of a room in which Captain Reginald Charles ArthurPierce-Plympton, of the local constabulary, was trying to sleep. MissSixty was staying with relatives a block farther on, around the cornerof the next street.
Utterly unaware of his mistake, Carl fought the discomforts of hissituation and heroically kept to his labor of love. Ysabel Sixty was afine girl, and Carl had a warm spot in his heart for her.
"Der rose iss ret, Der fiolet's plue, Oof I lofe me As you lofe you, No knife can cut us togedder!"
This touching bit of sentiment was merely the overture. Carl knew howto play the guitar, for he had once been a member of a knockaboutmusical team, and he could get music out of anything from a set ofsleigh bells to a steam calliope. If he had been able to use hisvoice as well as he used the guitar, Captain Reginald Charles ArthurPierce-Plympton would probably have slept on or even have been lulledinto deeper slumber; but there were dull spots in Carl's voice wherethere should have been sharps, and high places where there should havebeen flats, and whoops, grunts and falling inflections where thereshould have been trills, grace notes and a soft petal generally.
Captain Reginald Charles Arthur Pierce-Plympton stirred uneasily, satup suddenly in his bed and knocked his high forehead against the ironbar that supported a canopy of mosquito netting. As he rubbed histemples and said things to himself, he listened with growing anger.
"_Du hast diamanten und perlen_-- (Chimineddy, vat a hotness!) _Hast alles was menschen begehren_-- (Whoosh! Der muskedoodles vas vorse as der heat!) _Du hast ja die sch?nsten augen, Mein liebchen was willst du noch mehr?_"
Captain Reginald Charles Arthur Pierce-Plympton blinked his eyes andbegan forming a plan of campaign. There was a pitcher of water on atable in his room, a bulldog in the yard, and a valiant assistant inthe form of Hadji Sing, his Hindoo servant. Getting softly out of bed,the captain prepared for his attack on the enemy.
When Carl climbed over the wall he had dropped into the yard at thefoot of a lemon tree. He had jarred the tree and a half-ripe lemon haddropped on him. This omen should have sent him away and postponed theserenade, but it did not.
After slapping at the mosquitoes and drawing his sleeve across hiseyes, Carl went on picking the guitar.
"Now for der nexdt spasm," he murmured. "I vill put der German vortsindo English for der leedle gal, yah, so.
"You haf plendy oof tiamonts und bearls, Haf all vat a laty couldt vant, You haf likevise der peautiful eye-es, My tarling vat more----"
Just then the water descended. It was well aimed and Carl caught thewhole of it. Probably there was no more than a couple of gallons, butCarl, for the moment, was under the impression that it was a tidal wave.
His song died out in a wheezy gurgle and, for a moment, he was stunned.Then, suddenly, he realized that he had been insulted. Ysabel Sixty,the beautiful maiden who had captured his young fancy, had deliberatelythrown---- But his thoughts were interrupted by a voice from thewindow--a voice that certainly was not Miss Sixty's.
"Bah Jove! I'll throw the pitcher at you, fellow, if you don't clearout!"
Carl was dazed. He knew, then, that he had made a mistake. While hestood there, half drowned and trying to find his voice, the bark of anapproaching dog came from the rear of the house.
Self-preservation is the first law of nature, and it flashed over Carlon the instant that if he wanted to save himself he would have to run.Without standing on the order of his going, he whirled and fled towardthe fence. The dog was close and rapidly drawing closer. Behind thedog came a white-turbaned figure that was urging the brute onward withstrange language.
The front fence looked altogether too high for Carl, and he turned andmade for a wall at the side of the yard. Just as he gained the foot ofthe barrier the dog was snapping at his heels.
"Dere!" he whooped, turning and smashing the guitar over the dog'shead, "how you like dot, hey?"
The dog was rebuffed, but not discouraged. Carl had gained a fewvaluable seconds, and he grabbed at a vine that covered the wall andclimbed frantically upward. He heard a growl below him as he ascended,and felt a shock as the savage teeth closed in his trousers. Thedog was heavy, his jaws were as strong as a steel trap, and as Carlhung wildly to the vine he knew that something would have to giveway or else that he would be captured. It was with a feeling of joy,therefore, that he heard a tearing sound and experienced a suddenrelief from his enforced burden. The next moment he was over the walland floundering about in a thorny rose-bush covered with beautifulblossoms. But the beautiful blossoms did not make so deep an impressionon Carl as did the thorns.
As he rolled out of the bushes his language was intense and earnest;and when he got up in a cleared stretch of ground he felt a suddencoolness below the waist-line that informed him fully of hispredicament. He had left an important part of his apparel in the nextyard.
"Vat a luck id iss!" he muttered. "I porrowed dot kiddar from dervaider py der hodel, und id vas gone to smash. Meppy I vill haf to payas mooch as fife tollars for dot. Und den dere vill be anodder fifetollars for some more pands. Fife und fife iss den. Oof I make somemore serenadings I vill be busted. Vat a laff Matt und Tick vill gifme! Py shinks, I can't go pack py der hodel like dis! Vat iss to bedit? Mit some clot', und some neetles und t'read, I could make somepatches. Vere vill I ged dem?"
He paused to shake his fist in the direction of the yard he had justleft. All was silent on the other side, and the man and the dog, Carlreasoned, must have gone back where they belonged.
A survey of the situation in the moonlight showed Carl anotherbungalow. It was not so pretentious as the house in the next inclosure,but its walls were as brightly whitewashed and the building stood outclearly against its background of shrubbery. The windows of the housewere dark. But this was to be expected, as the hour was past midnight.The noise which Carl had made had not seemed to disturb the inmates.
"Oof I hat der nerf," thought Carl, "I vould go dere und ask der beoplefor somet'ing to fix meinseluf oop, but meppy I vouldt get soaked mitsome more vater, und meppy dere iss anodder tog. No, py shinks, I villgo pack py der hodel und led Matt und Tick laff as mooch as dey vill."
But luck was still against Carl; or perhaps, in the inscrutable waywhereby fate occasionally works in order to secure the greatest goodfor the greatest number, he was merely encountering obstacles in orderto gain knowledge of a plot that had been leveled against
Motor Matt.
Carl found a tall iron gate, set into the high front wall as snugly asa door in its casing. But the gate was locked. More than that, the wallcould not be scaled, for there were no vines or near-by trees to offera lift upward.
Carefully he made his way around all four sides of the inclosure, onlyto be balked at every point. Then he hunted for a ladder, a box, orsome other movable thing on which he could stand while getting over thewall, but his search was fruitless.
"Py shinks," he muttered, again moving toward the house, "I vill haf toshpeak mit somepody in der blace und dry und ged oudt. I don'd vant toshday here undil morning."
At the rear of the house he rapped. Although he pounded heavily, no oneanswered his summons. Alarmed by the thought that there was no one athome, he moved around to the front door and rapped again, still withouteffect. Next he tried the door. To his amazement he found it unlocked.
When the door swung open a blank darkness yawned beyond it.
"Hello, somepody!" Carl called, thrusting his head inside. "I don'd vasa t'ief, or anyt'ing like dot, aber I vas in drouple. Hello! Come undled me oudt oof der yardt, blease, oof you vill be so kindt."
His voice echoed rumblingly through the interior of the house, but wonno response. Hesitatingly, Carl stepped across the threshold. He hadmatches in his pocket, and they had come through the recent delugeunharmed. With fingers none too steady he scratched one, held theflickering glow above him and peered around.
The next moment his startled eyes encountered an object on the floorthat caused him to drop the match from his nerveless fingers and fallback gaspingly against the wall.