The Best of Mary Roberts Rinehart

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  "The unfortunate part is," she said, "that the Ostermaiers will not see us. I tried to arrange it so they could, but it was impossible. We must content ourselves with the knowledge of a good deed done."

  Her plan, in brief, was this: The sham attacking party was to turn and ride away down the far side of the pass, up which the Ostermaiers had come. They were, according to the young man, to take the girl with them, with the idea of holding her for ransom. She was to escape, however, while they were lunching in some secluded fastness, and, riding back to the pass, was to meet there a rescue party, which the Ostermaiers were to meet on the way down to Gunsight Chalet.

  Tish's idea was this: We would ride up while they were lunching, pretend to think them real bandits, paying no attention to them if they fired at us, as we knew they had only blank cartridges, and, having taken them prisoners, make them walk in ignominy to the nearest camp, some miles farther.

  "Then," said Tish, "either they will confess the ruse, and the country will ring with laughter, or they will have to submit to arrest and much unpleasantness. It will be a severe lesson."

  We reached the pass safely, and on the way down the other side we passed Mr. Oliver, the moving-picture man, with his outfit on a horse. He touched his hat politely and moved out on a ledge to let us by.

  "Mind if I take you as you go down the mountain?" he called. "It's a bully place for a picture." He stared at Aggie, who was muffled in a cape and had the dish towel round her head. "I'd particularly like to get your Arab," he said. "The Far East and the Far West, you know."

  Aggie gave him a furious glance. "Arab nothing!" she snapped. "If you can't tell a Christian lady from a heathen, on account of her having lost her hat, then you belong in the dirty work you're doing."

  "Aggie, be quiet!" Tish said in an awful voice.

  But wrath had made Aggie reckless. "'Dirty work' was what I said," she repeated, staring at the young man.

  "I beg your pardon. I'm sure I--"

  "Don't think," Aggie went on, to Tish's fury, "that we don't know a few things. We do."

  "I see," he said slowly. "All right. Although I'd like to know--"

  "Good-morning," said Aggie, and kicked her horse to go on.

  I shall never forget Tish's face. Round the next bend she got off her horse and confronted Aggie.

  [Illustration: "The older I get, Aggie Pilkington, the more I realize that to take you anywhere means ruin."]

  "The older I get, Aggie Pilkington," she said, "the more I realize that to take you anywhere means ruin. We are done now. All our labor is for nothing. There will be no holdup, no nothing. They are scared off."

  But Aggie was still angry. "Just let some one take you for a lousy Bedouin, Tish," she said, "and see what you would do. I'm not sorry anyhow. I never did like the idea."

  But Tish dislikes relinquishing an idea, once it has taken hold. And, although she did not speak to Aggie again for the next hour, she went ahead with her preparations.

  "There's still a chance, Lizzie," she said. "It's not likely they'll give up easy, on account of hiring the Indians and everything."

  About a mile and a half down the trail, she picked out a place to hide. This time there was a cave. We cleared our saddles for action, as Tish proposed to let them escape past us with the girl, and then to follow them rapidly, stealing upon them if possible while they were at luncheon, and covering them with the one real revolver and the three wooden ones.

  The only thing that bothered us was Bill's attitude. He kept laughing to himself and muttering, and when he was storing things in the cave, Tish took me aside.

  "I don't like his attitude, Lizzie," she said. "He's likely to giggle or do something silly, just at the crucial moment. I cannot understand why he thinks it is funny, but he does. We'd be much better without him."

  "You'd better talk to him, Tish," I said. "You can't get rid of him now."

  But to tell Tish she cannot do a thing is to determine her to do it.

  It was still early, only half-past eight, when she came to me with an eager face.

  "I've got it, Lizzie," she said. "I'll send off Mona Lisa, and he will have to search for her. The only thing is, she won't move unless she's driven. If we could only find a hornet's nest again, we could manage. It may be cruel, but I understand that a hornet's sting is not as painful to a horse as to a human being."

  Mona Lisa, I must explain, was the pack-horse. Tish had changed her name from Jane to Mona Lisa because in the mornings she was constantly missing, and having to be looked for.

  Tish disappeared for a time, and we settled down to our long wait. Bill put another coat of stove polish on the weapons, and broke now and then into silent laughter. On my giving him a haughty glance, however, he became sober and rubbed with redoubled vigor.

  In a half-hour, however, I saw Tish beckoning to me from a distance, and I went to her. I soon saw that she was holding her handkerchief to one cheek, but when I mentioned the fact she ignored me.

  "I have found a nest, Lizzie," she cried. "Slip over and unfasten Mona Lisa. She's not near the other horses, which is fortunate."

  I then perceived that Tish's yellow slicker was behind her on the ground and tied into a bundle, from which emerged a dull roaring. I was wondering how Tish expected to open it, when she settled the question by asking me to cut a piece from the mosquito netting which we put in the doorway of the tent at night, and to bring her riding-gloves.

  Aggie was darning a hole in the tablecloth when I went back and Bill was still engaged with the weapons. Having taken what she required to Tish, under pretense of giving Mona Lisa a lump of sugar, I untied her. What followed was exactly as Tish had planned. Mona Lisa, not realizing her freedom, stood still while Tish untied the slicker and freed its furious inmates. She then dropped the whole thing under the unfortunate animal, and retreated, not too rapidly, for fear of drawing Bill's attention. For possibly sixty seconds nothing happened, except that Mona Lisa raised her head and appeared to listen. Then, with a loud scream, she threw up her head and bolted. By the time Bill had put down the stove brush she was out of sight among the trees, but we could hear her leaping and scrambling through the wood.

  "Jumping cats!" said Bill, and ran for his horse. "Acts as though she'd started for the Coast!" he yelled to me, and flung after her.

  When he had disappeared, Tish came out of the woods, and, getting a kettle of boiling water, poured it over the nest. In spite of the netting, however, she was stung again, on the back of the neck, and spent the rest of the morning holding wet mud to the affected parts.

  Her brain, however, was as active as ever, and by half-past eleven, mounting a boulder, she announced that she could see the Ostermaier party far down the trail, and that in an hour they would probably be at the top. She had her field-glasses, and she said that Mrs. Ostermaier was pointing up to the pass and shaking her head, and that the others were arguing with her.

  [Illustration: "It would be just like the woman, to refuse to come any farther and spoil everything"]

  "It would be just like the woman," Tish said bitterly, "to refuse to come any farther and spoil everything."

  But a little later she announced that the guide was leading Mrs. Ostermaier's horse and that they were coming on.

  We immediately retreated to the cave and waited, it being Tish's intention to allow them to reach the pass without suspecting our presence, and only to cut off the pseudo-bandits in their retreat, as I have explained.

  It was well that we had concealed the horses also, for the party stopped near the cave, and Mrs. Ostermaier was weeping. "Not a step farther!" she said. "I have a family to consider, and Mr. Ostermaier is a man of wide usefulness and cannot be spared."

  We did not dare to look out, but we heard the young lady speaking, and as Aggie remarked later, no one would have thought, from the sweetness of her voice, that she was a creature of duplicity.

  "But it is perfectly safe, dear Mrs. Ostermaier," she said "And think, when you go home, of being abl
e to say that you have climbed a mountain pass."

  "Pass!" sniffed Mrs. Ostermaier. "Pass nothing! I don't call a wall a mile high a pass."

  "Think," said the girl, "of being able to crow over those three old women who are always boasting of the things they do. Probably you are right, and they never do them at all, but you--there's a moving-picture man waiting, remember, and you can show the picture before the Dorcas Society. No one can ever doubt that you have done a courageous thing. You'll have the proof."

  "George," said Mrs. Ostermaier in a small voice, "if anything happens, I have told you how I want my things divided."

  "Little devil!" whispered Aggie, referring to the girl. "If that young man knows when he is well off, he'll let her go."

  But beyond rebuking her for the epithet, Tish made no comment, and the party moved on. We lost them for a time among the trees, but when they moved out above timber-line we were able to watch them, and we saw that Mrs. Ostermaier got off her horse, about halfway up, and climbed slowly on foot. Tish, who had the glasses, said that she looked purple and angry, and that she distinctly saw the guide give her something to drink out of a bottle. It might, however, have been vichy or some similar innocent beverage, and I believe in giving her the benefit of the doubt.

  When at last they vanished over the edge of the pass, we led out our horses and prepared for what was to come. Bill had not returned, and, indeed, we did not see him until the evening of the second day after that, when, worn but triumphant, we emerged from the trail at the Many Glaciers Hotel. That, however, comes later in this narrative.

  With everything prepared, Tish judged it best to have luncheon. I made a few mayonnaise-and-lettuce sandwiches, beating the mayonnaise in the cool recesses of the cave, and we drank some iced tea, to which Aggie had thoughtfully added sliced lemon and a quantity of ginger ale. Feeling much refreshed, we grasped our weapons and waited.

  At half-past twelve we heard a loud shriek on the pass, far overhead, followed almost immediately by a fusillade of shots. Then a silence, followed by more shots. Then a solitary horseman rode over the edge of the pass and, spurring his horse, rode recklessly down the precipitous trail. Aggie exclaimed that it was Mr. Ostermaier, basely deserting his wife in her apparent hour of need. But Tish, who had the glasses, reported finally that it was the moving-picture man.

  We were greatly surprised, as it had not occurred to us that this would be a part of the program.

  As he descended, Tish announced that there must be another photographer on top, as he was "registering" signs of terror--a moving-picture expression which she had acquired from Charlie Sands--and looking back frequently over his shoulder.

  We waited until he reached timber-line, and then withdrew to a group of trees. It was not our intention to allow him to see us and spoil everything. But when he came near, through the woods, and his horse continued at unabated speed, Tish decided that the animal, frightened by the shots, was running away.

  She therefore placed herself across the trail to check its headlong speed, but the animal merely rushed round her. Mr. Oliver yelled something at us, which we were, however, unable to hear, and kept madly on.

  Almost immediately four men, firing back over their shoulders, rode into sight at the pass and came swiftly down toward us.

  "Where's the girl?" Tish cried with her glasses to her eyes. "The idiots have got excited and have forgotten to steal her."

  That was plainly what had happened, but she was determined to be stolen anyhow, for the next moment she rode into view, furiously following the bandits.

  "She's kept her head anyhow," Tish observed with satisfaction. "Trust a lot of men to go crazy and do the wrong thing. But they'll have to change the story and make her follow them."

  At timber-line the men seemed to realize that she was behind them, and they turned and looked up. They seemed to be at a loss to know what to do, in view of the picture. But they were quick thinkers, too, we decided. Right then and there they took her prisoner, surrounding her.

  She made a desperate resistance, even crying out, as we could plainly see. But Tish was irritated. She said she could not see how the story would hold now. Either the girl should have captured them, they being out of ammunition, or the whole thing should have been done again, according to the original plan. However, as she said, it was not our affair. Our business was to teach them a lesson not to impose on unsuspecting tourists, for although not fond of Mrs. Ostermaier, we had been members of Mr. Ostermaier's church, and liked him, although his sermons were shorter than Tish entirely approved of.

  We withdrew again to seclusion until they had passed, and Tish gave them ten minutes to get well ahead. Then we rode out.

  Tish's face was stern as she led off. The shriek of Mrs. Ostermaier was still, as she said in a low tone, ringing in her ears. But before we had gone very far, Tish stopped and got off her horse. "We've got to pad the horses' feet," she said. "How can we creep up on them when on every stony place we sound like an artillery engagement?"

  Here was a difficulty we had not anticipated. But Tish overcame it with her customary resource, by taking the blanket from under her saddle and cutting it into pieces with her scissors, which always accompany her. We then cut the leather straps from our saddles at her direction, and each of us went to work. Aggie, however, protested.

  "I never expected," she said querulously, "to be sitting on the Rocky Mountains under a horse, tying a piece of bed quilt on his feet. I wouldn't mind," she added, "if the creature liked me. But the way he feels toward me he's likely to haul off and murder me at any moment."

  However, it was done at last, and it made a great change. We moved along silently, and all went well except that, having neglected to draw the cinch tight, and the horse's back being slippery without the padding, my saddle turned unexpectedly, throwing me off into the trail. I bruised my arm badly, but Tish only gave me a glance of scorn and went on.

  Being above carelessness herself, she very justly resents it in others.

  We had expected, with reason, that the so-called highwaymen, having retreated to a certain distance, would there pause and very possibly lunch before returning. It was, therefore, a matter of surprise to find that they had kept on.

  Moreover, they seemed to have advanced rapidly, and Tish, who had read a book on signs of the trail, examined the hoofprints of their horses in a soft place beside a stream, and reported that they had been going at a lope.

  "Now, remember," she said as she prepared to mount again, "to all intents and purposes these are real bandits and to be treated accordingly. Our motto is 'No quarter.' I shall be harsh, and I expect no protest from either of you. They deserve everything they get."

  But when, after another mile or two, we came to a side trail, leading, by Tish's map, not to Many Glaciers, but up a ravine to another pass, and Tish saw that they had taken that direction, we were puzzled.

  But not for long.

  "I understand now," she said. "It is all clear. The photographer was riding ahead to get them up this valley somewhere. They've probably got a rendezvous all ready, with another camera in place. I must say," she observed, "that they are doing it thoroughly."

  We rode for two hours, and no sign of them. The stove polish had come off the handles of our revolvers by that time, and Aggie, having rubbed her face ever and anon to remove perspiration, presented under her turban a villainous and ferocious expression quite at variance with her customary mildness.

  I urged her to stop and wash, but Tish, after a glance, said to keep on.

  "Your looking like that's a distinct advantage, Aggie," she said. "Like as not they'll throw up their hands the minute they see you. I know I should. You'd better ride first when we get near."

  "Like as not they'll put a hole in me," Aggie objected. "And as to riding first, I will not. This is your doing, Tish Carberry, and as for their having blank cartridges--how do we know someone hasn't made a mistake and got a real one?"

  Tish reflected on that. "It's a possibili
ty," she agreed. "If we find that they're going to spend the night out, it might be better to wait until they've taken off all the hardware they're hung with."

  But we did not come up with them. We kept on finding traces of the party in marshy spots, and once Tish hopped off her horse and picked up a small handkerchief with a colored border and held it up to us.

  "It's hers," she said. "Anybody would know she is the sort to use colored borders. They're ahead somewhere."

  But it seemed strange that they would go so far, and I said so.

  "We're far enough off the main trail, Tish," I said. "And it's getting wilder every minute. There's nothing I can see to prevent a mountain lion dropping on us most any time."

  "Not if it gets a good look at Aggie!" was Tish's grim response.

  It began to grow dark in the valley, and things seemed to move on either side of the trail. Aggie called out once that we had just passed a grizzly bear, but Tish never faltered. The region grew more and more wild. The trail was broken with mudholes and crossed by fallen logs. With a superb disdain Tish rode across all obstacles, not even glancing at them. But Aggie and I got off at the worst places and led our horses. At one mudhole I was unfortunate enough to stumble. A horse with a particle of affection for a woman who had ridden it and cared for it for several days would have paused.

  Not so my animal. With a heartlessness at which I still shudder the creature used me as a bridge, and stepped across, dryfoot, on my back. Owing to his padded feet and to the depth of the mud--some eight feet, I believe--I was uninjured. But it required ten minutes of hard labor on the part of both Tish and Aggie to release me from the mud, from which I was finally raised with a low, hissing sound.

  "Park!" said Aggie as she scraped my obliterated features with a small branch. "Park, indeed! It's a howling wilderness. I'm fond of my native land," she went on, digging out my nostrils, so I could breathe, "but I don't calculate to eat it. As for that unfeeling beast of yours, Lizzie, I've never known a horse to show such selfishness. Never."

  Well, we went on at last, but I was not so enthusiastic about teaching people lessons as I had been. It seemed to me that we might have kept on along the trail and had a mighty good time, getting more and more nimble and stopping now and then to bake a pie and have a decent meal, and putting up our hair in crimps at night, without worrying about other folks' affairs.