Our War with Spain for Cuba's FreedomWhite, Trumbull
History
Our War with Spain for Cuba's Freedom
White, Trumbull
Cuba -- History; Spain -- Foreign relations -- United States; Spanish-American War, 1898; United States -- Foreign relations -- Spain
"If ever that declaration was truthfully made, it was made in the
case of this brown-eyed, chestnut-haired girl, who was so anxious
to please the man who made her sign. All she had was the simple
red gown she had on her back and a bundle that contained a suit of
clothes such as a planter's son might have worn.
"Those were the clothes that Juan Sola wore when he ran up the
gang-plank in Havana, with a big slouch hat over the chestnut
hair, that even danger of discovery could not tempt her to cut,
and a fat cigar between a red, laughing pair of lips that
accidentally, maybe, blew a cloud of smoke into the face of the
chief of police, who was watching that plank, and made the
features of the young man very indistinct indeed.
"There was no reason why the chief of police should scan too
closely the young man with the big cigar. Juan Sola's passport had
been duly issued by the Spanish government, and as far as the
papers showed, there was no reason to suspect him.
"Of course Juan Sola was the girl the correspondent had rescued
from prison, and the fame of whose escape was on every tongue in
Havana, the girl for whose capture the police had for three days
been breaking into houses and guarding the roads, and yet she
passed under their noses with no disguise but a boy's suit of
clothes.
"Miss Cisneros did not court any more danger than was necessary,
and at once went to her cabin. The next day, however, when Morro
Castle was left far behind, she appeared on deck, transformed into
Senorita Juana Sola, alias Evangelina Cisneros.
"When the ship sighted Cape Hatteras light the young woman asked
what light it was, and when told that it was an American beacon,
she knelt down in the saloon and prayed. After that she wept for
joy. She must have been all strung up with excitement over her
experiences, and when she saw the light she could contain herself
no longer, but simply overflowed.
"Nothing could be seen of the Cuban girl as the Seneca slowed
opposite quarantine to permit the boarding of the health officer.
The other passengers, after the habit of ocean travelers, grouped
amidships to scan the vessel of the tyrant, who had it in his
power to lock them all up in quarantine. The girl was hidden away
in her stateroom, wondering what reception awaited her in the big
city whose sky-line broke the horizon ahead.
"The people on board were kind to her from the moment she revealed
her identity, but at this moment when she had reached the haven of
refuge, to gain which she and her gallant rescuers had risked
death itself, she fled from the new-found friends and would not
even look out of the door of her stateroom."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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