Produced by Roger Frank and the Online DistributedProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
BY MEREDITH NICHOLSON
BLACKSHEEP! BLACKSHEEP! LADY LARKSPUR THE MADNESS OF MAY THE VALLEY OF DEMOCRACY
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
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Her "Very glad, I'm sure," was uttered with reservations]
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BLACKSHEEP! BLACKSHEEP!
BY
MEREDITH NICHOLSON
ILLUSTRATED BY
LESLIE L. BENSON
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
1920
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Maybe, in spite of their tameless days Of outcast liberty,They're sick at heart for the homely ways Where their gathered brothers be.
Meanwhile, "Blacksheep! Blacksheep!" we cry, Safe in the inner fold;And maybe they hear, and wonder why, And marvel, out in the cold.
--RICHARD BURTON.
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Her "Very glad, I'm sure," was uttered with reservations _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
At the crack of the gun the fugitive stopped short 32
"It's all right about you, Governor, but the kid had bettershake the tree" 112
"We must be in a hurry or that woman will catch you" 234
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BLACKSHEEP! BLACKSHEEP!
CHAPTER ONE
I
Mrs. Howard Featherstone spent much time thinking up things for herbrother Archibald Bennett to do, and as Archie was the ideal bachelorbrother, always remembering the children's birthdays and turning updutifully for Christmas dinners, he accepted her commissions in the mostamiable spirit and his services were unfailingly satisfactory. He knewperfectly well that most of the jobs she imposed upon him had beenpolitely but firmly declined by her busy husband, but this made nodifference to Archie, who had all the time in the world, and infinitepatience, and he rather enjoyed tracing express packages and matchingribbons.
"The agent who's been looking up a summer house for us says this is anunusual opportunity, as there are few places to let at Bailey Harbor andthis one is unexpectedly on the market. The owner is obliged to leavejust after settling in it, so it's all in perfect condition and if itmeets our needs we can go right up. Howard's simply swamped withwork--he's conducting some sort of investigation with night meetings andthat sort of thing--and we'd all appreciate it if you could run up therefor us."
The many preoccupations of his brother-in-law, who held a seat inCongress and took his job seriously, were well known to Archie.Featherstone was an important cog in the governmental machinery whileArchie had nothing on earth to do, so it was eminently fitting that he,as an unattached and unemployed brother-in-law, should assume some ofFeatherstone's domestic burdens. Archie had planned to leave for theCanadian Rockies two days later, but as no urgent business called him inthat direction, he obligingly agreed to take a look at the Bailey Harborhouse that had been placed so providentially within reach of his sister.
"The owner belongs to that old New England Congdon family," Mrs.Featherstone explained; "they date from the beginning of time, and someof them are a trifle eccentric. You remember one of them--he must be thefather or an uncle of the owner of this house--Eliphalet Congdon, wholives in Boston and is horribly rich but is always doing weird things.There was a perfectly killing article in the paper just the other daytelling of his latest exploit, which was getting arrested for refusingto allow them to check his umbrella at the Metropolitan Museum. Theythought, of course, that he was a crank who wanted to poke holes throughthe pictures, and he made such a fuss that they had to arrest him and hewouldn't give bail but had his lawyer get him out on a writ of habeascorpus."
"The same philanthropist who had a bus built just like the Fifth Avenuebusses and wanted to run it himself to pick up women and children theregular busses wouldn't stop for," laughed Archie. "If you're renting ahouse from that family it's just as well to look into it carefully. Allright, May; I'll inspect the premises for you."
In spite of his good-natured assent she continued to pile up excusesfor her husband and explained in great detail the rundown condition ofthe children which made it necessary to get them out of Washington asquickly as possible. Archie was already mentally planning the details ofhis trip with his customary exactness. As he traveled constantly in theinterest of his health, which had been a cause of solicitude to himselfand all his relatives as far back as any one could remember, he knewtrain schedules by heart, and by catching the Federal Express the nextnight he would be able to connect with a train at Boston that would landhim at Bailey Harbor at two o'clock the same day.
With any sort of luck he could escape from the Harbor, reach New Yorkthe following morning and proceed immediately westward. A few telegramswould readjust matters so that he would lose only a day in setting outfor Banff, which his newest doctor had told him was an ideal spot forhim. Many other doctors had posted him off to numerous other places inpursuit of the calm or stimulus or whatever it was he needed to make hima sound man capable of taking some part in the world's affairs. Archie'scondition was always a grateful topic of conversation and now that hissister had told him how many bedrooms her menage required, and warnedhim particularly to be sure that there was a sleeping porch and agarage, and not to forget to look carefully into the drainage system ofthe entire Maine coast; having watched him make notes of these matters,Mrs. Featherstone, in her most sisterly tone, broached the subject ofhis health.
"Your troubles, Archie, are all due to the scarlet fever you had whenyou were a child. I've thought that if you could ever get into someactive work it would cure you. These sanatoriums you live in most of thetime never do you any good. They just keep you thinking about yourself.What you need is a complete upsetting,--something that would give a newturn to your life. And, you know," she went on softly, "I'd hoped,Archie, that the right girl would turn up one of these days and thatthat would prove the panacea. But the girls I've picked out neverpleased you, and here you are, the finest brother in the world, and themost conscientious man alive, always doing generous things forpeople--you know you do, Archie--with nothing ahead of you but just onesanatorium after another. I haven't much faith in this idea of yourgoing to the Rockies; you know you tried the Alps five years ago and thealtitude nearly killed you."
"I seem doomed to sit on the sidelines and watch the game," Archieagreed gloomily.
"But sometimes, I think you yield too easily to discouragement. Pleasedon't think I mean to be unkind or unjust, but if at some turn of theroad you were obliged to put your back to the wall and fight for yourlife! Really, dear, I think you would win the battle and be a verydifferent man afterward."
Archie smiled wanly. He had the lively imagination of the neurasthenicand very often he had dreamed of vanquishing single-handed a dozenenemies, or plunging into a burning house and staggering out half deadbearing a helpless child in his arms. To look at him no one wouldbelieve that he had a nerve in his tall frame. Once a friend carried himoff to a farm where an autocratic athletic trainer rejuvenated tiredbusiness men; and Archie survived the heroic treatment and reappearedbronzed and hardened and feeling better than he had ever felt in hislife. But a winter spent in an office and leisure to think of himself asan invalid brought back the ol
d apprehensions, and there being no one athand to drag him again to the trainer's, he renewed his acquaintancewith the waiting-rooms of specialists.
"There will be a few people in for dinner tonight," remarked Mrs.Featherstone as he rose to go; "very simple, you know; and Howard justtelephoned that he can't possibly come, so if you can arrange it,Archie--"
"All right, May. Weld and Coburn are in town and I was going to havedinner with them at the Army and Navy, but if you really want me--"
"Oh, that's perfectly fine of you, Archie! You are splendid to breakyour engagement with them when you three don't meet very often; but itwill be a real help to me to have you. It's so late now that I can't askany one else in Howard's place. And Isabel Perry will be here; you knowshe's the dearest girl, and I always thought you really did like Isabel.Her father lost all his money before he died and she's had a position asgymnasium teacher in Miss Gordon's school. This summer she's to run agirls' camp up in Michigan and she can't help making a splendid successof it."
Archie did not at once detach Miss Perry from the innumerable host ofyoung women his sister had introduced him to; they were a hazy compositein his memory, but when Mrs. Featherstone insisted that he couldn't haveforgotten Miss Perry's smile and merry laugh, he promptly declared thathe remembered her perfectly. When he found himself sitting beside herlater at Mrs. Featherstone's table, with a lady on his right who wasundoubtedly most distinguished in spite of the fact that he failed tocatch her name and understood very little of her rapid French, he wasvery grateful for Miss Perry's propinquity. The smile and the laugh wereboth better even than Mrs. Featherstone's specifications, and herEnglish had a refreshing Western tang and raciness that pleased him.
"I passed you on the street the other day and made frantic efforts toattract your attention but you were in a trance and failed to see mysignals."
"I was taking my walk," he stammered.
"'_My_ walk!'" she repeated. "You speak as though you had a monopoly ofthat form of exercise. I must say you didn't appear to be enjoyingyourself. Your aspect was wholly funereal and your demeanor that of aman with a certain number of miles wished on him."
"Four a day," Archie confessed with an air of resignation; "two in themorning and two before dinner."
"Then you were doing your morning lap when I passed you. Only four milesa day?"
"By the doctor's orders," he assented with the wistful smile thatusually evoked sympathetic murmurs in feminine auditors.
"Oh, the doctors!" remarked the girl as though she had no great opinionof doctors in general or of Mr. Bennett's medical advisers inparticular. He was used to a great deal of sympathy and he was convincedthat Miss Perry was an utterly unsympathetic person.
"What would you call a good walk?" he asked a little tartly.
"Oh, ten, twenty, thirty! I've done fifteen and gone to a dance at theend of the tramp."
"But you haven't my handicap," he protested defensively. "You can't bevery gay about walking when you're warned that excessive fatigue mayhave disastrous consequences!"
She was not wholly without feeling for her face grew grave for a momentand she met his eyes searchingly, with something of the professionalscrutiny to which he had long been accustomed.
"Eyes clear; color very good; voice a trifle weak and suggestingtimidity and feeble initiative. Introspective; a little self-conscious,and unimportant nervous symptoms indicated by the rolling of breadcrumbs."
"I've paid doctors large fees for telling me the same things," he said,hastily hiding the bread crumbs under the edge of his plate. "I wishyou'd write those items down for me. I'm in earnest about that."
"When did you say you were leaving town?"
"Tomorrow evening. If you'll write out your diagnosis and anysuggestions you may have as to my habits, diet and general course oflife, I promise to put them into practice."
"Your case interests me and I'll consider this matter of advising you."
"I shall expect the document tomorrow afternoon!"
"I should want to be very sure," she laughed, "that you were reallyleaving town and that I shouldn't see you for a long time--perhaps neveragain!"
"That has an ominous sound, as though you were going to give me a deathsentence! Is my case as bad as that?"
"Not at all; but it calls for that disagreeable frankness we all dislikein our friends and very properly resent in mere acquaintances. I shouldbe enormously embarrassed to meet you until after--"
She paused and surveyed him once more, questioningly. The French ladywas telling a story to the whole company, and they were obliged to giveheed to it; and as Archie failed to catch the point of it Miss Perryvery kindly gave him the clue. The talk was general for a few minutesand then he begged her to finish the sentence that had been left in theair.
"Oh, it doesn't matter! I think I was going to say that it would beembarrassing to see you until after you had given my little hints atrial. I'll say now that just the orderly course of your life, with fourmiles a day, no more, no less, isn't a bit likely to get you anywhere.My treatment for such a case as yours would be very drastic. I'd set yousome real stunts to do if you were my patient. May tells me that theywon't have you in the army, the navy, or the flying corps, but I believeI could find some excitement for you," she ended musingly.
"As, for example--?" he asked, finding the French lady conspiring withan attache of the Italian embassy. "To meet the competition of the nervespecialists, you'll have to be very explicit and tell me exactly what todo."
"Right there is one of your troubles--living by fixed schedules. You'venever felt the world's rough hand; you don't know life! Clubs andsanatoriums and week-ends in comfortable houses don't count. You're atremendously formal person, Mr. Bennett! What you really need is a goodhard jar! Every morning you know exactly what you're going to do everyhour of the day. It's routine that kills! Now just suppose when you'reout on one of your walks you were to overpower the chauffeur of, we willsay, the British ambassador, and drive the car bearing his Excellencyinto some lonely fastness of the Virginia hills, and hold him for aransom, and collect the money in twenty-dollar gold pieces and escapewith it and then come back to Washington and spend it all on a big partywith the ambassador as the guest of honor. There would be a realachievement--something that would make you famous in two hemispheres."
"And incidentally lock me up for life if I escaped being shot! Such anescapade would very likely spoil our cordial relations with England andcause no end of trouble."
"There you are!" she exclaimed, "thinking always of the cost, never ofthe fun! Of course you would never do any such thing. Let me try again!Suppose you were to hold up a bank messenger in Wall Street and skipwith a satchelful of negotiable securities and then, after the paperswere through ragging the police for their inefficiency, you would driveup to the bank in a taxi, walk in and return the money, saying you hadfound it in the old family pew at Trinity when you went in to say yourprayers! Here would be an opportunity to break the force of habit andawaken your self-confidence."
"Am I to understand that you practice what you preach? I don't mean tobe impertinent, but really,--"
"Oh, I'm perfectly capable of doing anything I've suggested. I'm merelybiding my time. Parents are pardonably fussy about the sort of personthey turn their children over to, so I must have a care. I mean to digfor buried treasure this summer, realizing the dream of a lifetime."
"That appeals to me strongly. Perhaps you'd let me assist in thatundertaking?"
"Impossible! I want all the glory and eke the gold if I find the hiddenchests. Talk about romance being dead! My grandfather was a planter inMississippi before the Civil War. In about 1860 he saw trouble ahead,and as he was opposed to secession he turned everything he had intogold, bought several tracts of land in Michigan and New York andsecretly planted his money. His wife and children refused to share hislonely exile and he sent them to England but clung to America himself,and died suddenly and alone the second year of the war on the very acresmy father inherited in
Michigan. That's where I'm opening my camp."
"And the gold hasn't been found?" asked Archie deeply interested.
"Not a coin so far! You see grandfather made his will in war time andonly divided the land, being afraid to mention the buried treasure in adocument that would become a public record when he died."
"This is most exciting. It's only unfortunate that it's not pirate goldto give zest to your enterprise."
"Oh, the pirate in the story is a cousin of mine, who inherited the landup near the St. Lawrence and has dug all over it without results. Myfather gave the Michigan scenery to me, but this cousin has beendigging on my land, most unwarrantably! He's rather a dashing youngperson!"
Archie was so enthralled that he forgot the typewritten dietary healways carried in his pocket and ate most of his portion of beeftenderloin before he remembered that red meats were denied him. He laiddown his fork so abruptly that she asked him what was the matter.
"Nothing; only you've interested me so much that I've eaten a whole lotof stuff that's positively forbidden. You've already scored a victoryover my specialists!"
"Splendid!" she cried. "Eat when you're hungry and never think aboutyour food. Don't let a mere piece of beef know that you're a coward.Have you ever committed murder? You pale at the suggestion and yet apleasant little murder might be the very thing to set you on your feetagain!"
From time to time he caught Mrs. Featherstone's eyes fixed upon himapprovingly, and he knew that she was thinking that at last he had met agirl who interested him. The impression that he was an invalid inimminent peril of death caused his friends and acquaintances to talk tohim as though he were a sick child, and it was refreshing to find a girlwho openly chaffed him about his health and went the length ofprescribing a career of riotous crime as a cure for his ills. This wasenormously amusing for in prep school and college he had been guiltlessof the traditional pranks and in the six years that had elapsed since heemerged into the world he had walked circumspectly in the eyes of allmen.
Isabel Perry was not afraid of him and she didn't treat him as girlsdid who had an idea that if they talked to him very long he might faintor even die on their hands. He noted her fine rounded arms and supplefingers that spoke for strength, reflecting that very likely she couldpick him up and pitch him through the window. He had always dislikedathletic girls, fancying that they nodded to him patronizingly as theypassed him on country club verandas all aglow from golf or tennis. Thisamiable Isabel was quite capable of making him dance through a set oftennis and with her high spirits and strong will might even bring himout alive. It was obvious that the sudden sweeping away of her father'sfortune had not troubled her in the least. He marveled at this, for hehad a great deal of money that had been conferred upon him in the cradleand what he should do if he lost it was a depressing possibility thathad contributed not a little to his neurasthenia.
When it came time for Isabel to say good-night to her hostess Bennettwas hovering near to offer his services in calling her car.
"Nothing like that for me! I brought walking shoes and shall foot ithome, thank you. But--" she hesitated and said with mock gravity, "ifyou're not afraid of the night air or the excessive fatigue, you mighttake me home. That will add a mile to your prescription but you can rideback!"
The other guests had gone when she reappeared, wrapped in a long cloakand bearing a party-bag containing her slippers. She spoke of her plansfor the summer with charming candor as they set off at a brisk pace.Little bits of autobiography she let fall interested him immensely. Shewas born in Wyoming, where her father had been a ranchman, and she hadfirst known Mrs. Featherstone in college. She was enthusiastic about thesummer camp; if it succeeded she meant to conduct an outdoor school forgirls, moving it from Michigan to Florida with the changing seasons.
"People have been so kind to me! And I shall have a wonderful lot ofgirls--just think of it,--one hundred dear young beings from all overthe country. It's a big responsibility but that land of my grandfather'sis a lovely site for the camp. It's on a bay, where the swimming will beperfectly safe, and there's a wonderful forest, with Indian trails thatrun back to Marquette's time. We shall have a doctor--a woman, ofcourse--and two trained nurses and some splendid young women to act, ascouncilors."
There was no question of her making a success of it, he said, marvelingat her vitality, her exuberance, the confidence with which she viewedthe future.
"I wish you all good luck," he said when they reached the house of thefriend she was visiting. "The camp will be a great success,--I'm sure ofthat."
"Oh, it's a case of sink or swim--I've got to make it go!" she repliedwith her buoyant laugh. "If I don't succeed I can't emerge from thewoods next fall and face my creditors!"
"There's the buried treasure; you mustn't neglect that! I'm greatly yourdebtor for all the interesting things you've told me. This has been thehappiest evening I've spent since----"
"Since you began taking everything so hard? Please quit looking on yourlife as a burden; try to get some fun out of it!"
The door opened to the key she gave him and the light of the hall lampfell upon her face and glinted her brown hair as she put out her hand.
"Don't forget me in the rush of things! And particularly don't forgetthat note of instructions. I'm counting on that!"
"Not really?" she exclaimed. "I was just in fun, you know."
"If I don't get it before I leave tomorrow evening, I shall be terriblydisappointed. I shall take it as a sign that you don't think me worthbothering about!"
There was a pleading in his voice that held her for a moment; shesurveyed him gravely, then answered lightly,
"Oh, very well! You shall have it, sir!"
II
Archie didn't know that the note caused Isabel a great deal of trouble.It was one thing to promise to tell a man who was all but a strangerjust how to alter his way of life with a view to a happier existence,but to sit before a sheet of white paper and compose a letter on thesubject was a very different matter, as Isabel's waste-paper basketcould have testified. Her first experiments had been very serious, withurgent recommendations of hard physical labor; but this provedunsatisfactory. Then she attacked it from an ethical angle and suggestedsocial service as a means of destroying the selfishness which shehonestly believed to be one of his troubles.
She scribbled on a pad the titles of half a dozen hooks designed forweary and disconsolate souls, but they hardly touched his case andbesides he had probably been deluged with just such literature.Moreover, she must write a note that would not require an answer; thisshe felt to be imperatively demanded by the circumstances. She thoughtArchibald Bennett a nice fellow and she was sorry for him, but no moreand no less sorry than she would have been for any one else who failedto find the world a pleasant place to live in. Something a littlecryptic, yet something that would discourage further confidences withoutwounding him--this would solve the problem--and she spent an hourturning over the pages of a book of quotations searching for somestirring epigrammatic utterance. The wise of all the ages seemed to havebeen strangely unmindful of the needs of neurasthenic young men, butfinally she hit upon these lines and copied them in her best hand:--
He either fears his fate too much, Or his deserts are small, That dares not put it to the touch To gain or lose it all.
She wondered who the Marquis of Montrose was who had lived in theseventeenth century and bequeathed this quatrain to posterity, but thisdidn't matter, and after reading the lines aloud several times shedecided that they would serve her purpose admirably. If Mr. Bennett tookthem seriously, well enough; and if he didn't like them it made nodifference as she would probably never meet him again.
She wrote on a calling card, "Best wishes and good luck," and put thisinside the note sheet, and as the hour was late she despatched it to Mr.Bennett by special messenger.
The note reached Archie just as he was leaving his sister's house. Whenhe was seated in the train he drew it out and inspected the envelopecarefull
y, held it to the light and speculated fearfully as to thenature of its contents. His thoughts had played about Isabel Perry mostof the day and he had listened to his sister's enthusiastic praise ofher with an unusual attention that had not been lost upon Mrs.Featherstone. He had hoped for a long letter in the vein of the girl'schaffing humor, and the size of the missive was a distinctdisappointment.
He opened it guardedly, and his face fell as he pondered the verse. Itwas a neat, well-bred slap at him as a man without initiative orcourage. At the dinner table she had expressed much the same thoughtthat was condensed in the verse, but the quotation, unrelieved by hersmile, carried a sting. He read it over until the lines marched with animble step through his memory. There was something oddly haunting inthem, and he experimented with a variety of emphases and pauses,particularly as to the last line, which he found might be read in agreat number of ways. He decided finally that it was best interpreted bya little pause after "gain," with the remaining words vanishing in adespondent sigh. Perhaps this was the way Isabel Perry thought of him,as a loser in the game of life; but he experienced a pleasant tingle inthe blood when he reflected that this may have been the wrong readingand very different from the sense she meant to convey. His spiritssoared as he decided that the last line was intended to be readunbrokenly and that it constituted a challenge, flung at him with a tossof her head, a flash of the brown eyes.
This thought was wholly heartening and he dwelt upon it a long time. Shemust have thought him capable of deeds of high emprise or she would nothave chosen this fragment as her last word to him. Her choice of amessage implied a certain faith that he might, if he chose, break theshackles of fear and custom that bound him and do something that wouldlift him out of himself. The card with the good wishes gave a soothing,saving personal touch to the communication. She had drawn the pen acrossa Chicago street number and supplied no other address; but after a darkmoment in which he accepted this as a delicate hint that the incidentwas closed, he concluded that very likely she had deleted the addresshastily for the reason that she was to disappear into the woods for thesummer. Still, she might have substituted the camp address and hefretted over this for an hour. She left him without excuse for a reply,and he gravely reflected that the Marquis of Montrose was the onlyperson to whom he could protest, but as she had copied from thequotation book the figures "1621-1640" and added them to the name forhis illumination, it was clearly impossible to ask the author for aninterpretation of his stanza.
Archie was lulled to sleep by the encouraging thought that what she haddone was to give him a commission to redeem himself by strange andmoving adventures, and he dreamed that he had climbed to the remotefastnesses of the Rockies, and captured a mountain sheep alive andwalked into his sister's house with the animal under his arm andpresented it to Miss Perry at the tea table.
He changed trains at Boston and again at Portsmouth, where he checkedhis bag. At two o'clock he reached Bailey Harbor, where he verified hismemorandum as to the return trip and found the telegram he expected fromthe New York brokerage office in which he was a silent partner, sayingthat his booking for Banff had been changed as requested. He never tookthe chance of being stuffed into an upper berth, or riding in a daycoach, and he congratulated himself upon his forethought and the easewith which he was proceeding upon his sister's errand.
He stepped into the only taxi in sight and drove to the villagedruggist's for the key to the Congdon house.
"Just go in and take your time to it," said the man. "Lights and waterhaven't been turned off and if you take the house your folks can stepright in. Mrs. Congdon left only yesterday. Suppose you'll be going onthe five eleven; it's your only chance of getting back to Bostontonight. If you don't find it convenient to stop here again, just leavethe key under the door mat."
"I guess you'll find the place all shipshape," said the driver, as theyset off. "Folks came up early but didn't stay long. Left in a hurry;kind o' funny, skippin' the way they did."
"There hadn't been sickness in the family?" asked Archie, apprehensivelythinking that he might be stumbling into infection.
"Lord no! Family troubles, I reckon! They been comin' here a long timeand usually came earlier and stayed later than anybody else. I don'tknow nothin', mind ye, but there's talk she had trouble with herhusband."
"You mean Mr. and Mrs. Congdon have separated?"
"I'm sayin' nothin'! But the Congdons are all queer. His pap used tohave a house here and he was the worst ole crank on the shore. YoungPutney's a pretty decent fellow. Mighty fine woman, his wife. Ever'bodylikes _her_."
The confidences of the weatherbeaten chauffeur only mildly interestedArchie, who was bent upon inspecting the house as quickly as possiblewith a view to footing it back to the station, and thus crediting twomiles to the day's exercise account. It was unseasonably warm and theair was lifeless and humid.
"Think it will rain?" asked Archie.
"Yep," replied the driver with a glance at the sea. "There's goin' to bea lively kick-up before mornin'."
Archie eyed his top-coat and umbrella with the pardonable satisfactionof a man who travels prepared for all weathers. To follow the shore pathin the teeth of a storm would do much toward establishing hisself-confidence and prove that he was not a mollycoddle. Isabel Perryand her note were firmly imbedded in his subconsciousness and werecausing curious slips and shifts of his mental machinery. Certain of herutterances at his sister's table rankled, and his thousandth conjectureabout the note was that it mocked his weaknesses and defied him toprove that he was far from being the worthless social parasite shebelieved him to be.
III
He discharged the driver and in a moment was standing in a bigliving-room that exhaled an atmosphere of comfort and good taste. Onevery hand were the evidences of a hasty abandonment of the house by itsrecent occupants. A waste-paper basket by a writing table in one corneroverflowed with scraps of discarded letters; the family had evidentlysnatched a hasty luncheon before leaving and the dining table had notbeen cleared. A doll lay sprawled on the landing as he made his wayupstairs, and in the bed chambers empty chiffonier drawers gaped asthough from surprise at their hasty evacuation. He made a survey of thewhole premises and then went through again from cellar to garretchecking off his sister's queries. There was something disconcerting inthe intense silence of the place broken only by the periodic thump ofthe sea at the base of the cliff.
The house would serve the Featherstones admirably. There was even thesleeping porch opening from the nursery that his sister had expresslystipulated and a tiny retreat back of the living-room with desk andshelves that would meet the requirements of his congressmanbrother-in-law at such times as he might find it possible to join hisfamily.
Fully satisfied with his investigations, Archie picked up a book with apaper-cutter thrust through it to mark the place of its last reader,became absorbed and read until he, was roused by a clap of thunder thatseemed to shake the world. Hurrying to the window he found that thestorm had already broken. There was a greenish light over the sea andthe waves had begun to smite the rocks with dismaying ferocity. To catchthe five eleven he would have to leave at once, and he seized hisbelongings and opened the door, but upon stepping out upon the verandathe walk he had contemplated along the shore path to the village seemeda foolhardy thing to undertake. An unearthly darkness had fallen uponthe world and a misstep in the rough path over the rocks might pitch himheadlong into the sea. He had marked the presence of a telephone in thehouse and decided to summon a taxi, but as he clapped the receiver tohis ear he was startled by a blinding glare and the crack of a mightywhip overhead. He snatched the instrument again and bawled into it, butit was buzzing queerly and he sprang away from it as another glare litup the room.
He turned on the lights and sat down to think. He might return by thehighway over which he had reached the house, but the driver had told himit was the longer way. The roof and walls rang under the downpour and hedecided that after all to spend the night in an abandoned house would b
efully as heroic as to subject himself to the ruthless fury of thehurricane. It would be a lark to camp in the Congdon villa, a break inthe deadly routine of his days which Isabel Perry had pointed out as apossible cause of his invalidism. He made himself comfortable andstudied the sheaf of time tables he had brought with him, methodicallyformulating the messages he would be obliged to despatch in the morningto change his westward passage.
The storm showed no sign of abating and as nightfall deepened the gloomhe set the broad fireplace in the living-room glowing, drew the shades,and feeling twinges of hunger explored the kitchen pantry. The Congdonshad left a well-stocked larder and, finding bacon, eggs and bread, hedecided that the cooking of a supper would be a jolly incident of theadventure. He laid aside his coat and rolling up his sleeves soon had afire going in the range, which smoked hideously until he mastered thedampers. He removed the dishes that had been left on the dining-roomtable and carefully laid a cover for one. The roses in a bowl thatserved as a centerpiece were still fresh and were a pathetic reminder ofthe mistress of the house. In rearranging the table he found a telegramunder a plate at what he assumed to be Mrs. Congdon's place. To read amessage not intended for his eyes was decidedly against his strict code,but his curiosity overcame his scruples and these words met his eyes:
New York, June 10, 1917. Mrs. Alice B. Congdon, Bailey Harbor, Maine.
Your letter has your characteristic touch of cruelty. We may as well part now and be done with it. But the children you cannot have. Remember that I relinquish none of my rights on this point. I demand that you surrender Edith at once and I will communicate with you later about the custody of Harold until such time as he is old enough to come to me.
Putney Congdon.
The cautious hint of the taxi driver that domestic difficulties wereresponsible for the breaking up of the Congdon household found here apainful corroboration. He chivalrously took sides at once with theunhappy Alice; no matter how shrewish the absconding wife might be, onlya brute of a husband would fling such a message at her head. Archiehated discord; the very thought of it was abhorrent. He had never had acare in his life beyond his health, and quarrels of every sort he leftto underbred people with evil tempers. Here was a furious lunatictelegraphing his wife of the severance of the most sacred of ties anddemanding the immediate transfer of one child to his possession andrelinquishing only temporarily the custody of the other, presumablyyounger and the lawful owner of the doll he had picked up on the stairlanding.
He now visualized the whole scene that followed upon the receipt of thetelegram; the hurried, tearful packing, the bewildered children, thepanic-struck servants rushing about obeying the orders of a hystericalmistress. The more he thought of it the warmer became his defensiveattitude toward the unknown Alice. She had met the situation like awoman of quick decisions,--perhaps she was a little too unyielding andthis had caused the rupture; but no man worthy to be called a gentlemanwould commit to the wires so heartless a message directed at the motherof his children.
His attention had been arrested several times by a photograph of a younggirl, of eleven or twelve, set in a silver frame on the living-roomtable, whom he assumed to be the Edith mentioned in the telegram. Shewas a lovely child, with a wealth of hair falling about her shoulders,and roguish eyes that looked at him teasingly. It was a thoroughlyfeminine face with an unusual perfection of line. Very likely the childwas the reembodiment of her mother who must, he thought, be a veryhandsome woman indeed. His resentment hardened against the husband andfather, the author of the brutal message that disposed of his maritalobligations as coolly as though he had been canceling an order for acarload of merchandise, as he held up the picture for the joy of meetingthe gaze of the merry eyes.
Though the breaking of eggs into the skillet had proved a fearsomematter and the bacon sizzled strangely, the cooking had proved muchsimpler than he had believed possible. He burnt his fingers handling thetoaster, but after ruining a considerable quantity of bread he producedthree slices of toast that were the equal of any offered by his favoriteclub. As usual when frustrated in his plans (something that had rarelyhappened in his whole life) he made the most of the situation, eatingslowly while the rain poured in an unbroken sheet down the windows. Hewished Isabel could see him and know that for once the routine of hislife had been interrupted only to find him resourceful and the easymaster of his fate.
He made a point of washing the dishes and cooking utensils and puttingthem carefully away. These matters attended to, he roamed over the housewhich now had a new interest for him since the Congdon family skeletonhad come out of its closet and danced round the dinner table. In one wayand another he found it possible to make a fair acquaintance with thelate inmates of the house. In a bedroom adjoining the nursery therewere books in abundance, and very good books they were--essays, poetry,a few of those novels that appeal only to sophisticated readers, andchildren's books, including a volume of Bible stories retold for theyoung. He could readily imagine Mrs. Congdon reading aloud from thesevolumes to her youngsters as they stood beside the wicker rocker in thebay-window. Only a few hours earlier the house had rung with the happylaughter of children; he fancied he could hear them calling to theirmother up the stair. Mrs. Congdon was a blonde, he decided, from thepresence in a closet of a blue peignoir overlooked in her flight and abolt of blue ribbon that had rolled under the bed as though seekingrefuge from the general confusion.
In the adjoining room he sought traces of the hard-hearted husband, butin his departure, presumably sometime earlier, Congdon had made a cleansweep; there was nothing to afford a clue to his character beyond afour-in-hand tie whose colors struck Archie as execrable. Below in thesnuggery fitted up for masculine use was a table, containing a humidorhalf filled with dried-up cigars, and an ill-smelling pipe--Archie hatedpipes--and a box of cigarettes. A number of scientific magazines layabout and a forbidding array of books on mechanics and chemistryoverflowed the shelves. He threw open a cabinet filled with blue printsillustrating queer mechanical contrivances. They struck him as verysilly and he slammed the thing shut in disgust, convinced that Congdonwas a crank, or he wouldn't have indulged in such foolishness. In adrawer of the desk was an automatic pistol and a box of cartridges. Ata country house where he once week-ended a burglar scare had inspiredfeverish intensive pistol practice among the guests and Archie hadlearned to load and fire and even developed some skill as a marksman.There were three cartridges in the magazine and Archie thrust it intohis pocket thinking it not a bad idea to be prepared for invasion.
He was oppressed with a fleeting sense of his isolation as he drew backa shade and pressed his face to the pane. The house stood at the edge ofthe summer colony and a considerable distance from its nearest neighbor.The landward horizon still brightened at intervals with a languidmockery of lightning, dimmed by the fog that was dragging in from thesea. The siren in the harbor had begun its mournful iterations, and hecaught the occasional flash of the revolving light that gleamed now andthen through breaks in the fog.
He switched off the lights in the lower rooms and established himself inthe guest chamber. The bed had been dismantled but he found blankets andlinen and addressed himself to the novel task of making a couch forhimself. If he had consulted his pleasure in advance he would haveshrunk from camping in a lonely seaside house for a night; but now thatthe experience was forced upon him he was surprised to find that he wasnot afraid. The revelation was an agreeable one. He, Archibald Bennett,was a perfectly normal being, capable of rising to emergencies; and whenhe saw Isabel Perry again, as he had every intention of doing at the endof the summer, this little trip to Bailey Harbor would make a verypretty story which could not fail to convince her of his fortitude andcourage.
Sleeping in his underwear was distasteful but this was only anothersmall item that proved his resolute fiber and ability to acceptconditions as he found them. He opened the windows and performed hisusual before-retiring calisthenics, tested
the reading lamp beside thebed, placed the pistol within easy reach and became absorbed in a volumeof short stories.
He read the book through, put out the light and was half asleep when hewas roused by footsteps on the veranda below.
IV
It was close upon midnight and the presence of a prowler on the premisescaused his heart to gallop wildly. He seized the pistol, crept to thewindow and peered cautiously out. Between the crash of the breakers helistened intently and had decided that the steps had been the illusionof a dream when a sound in the room below renewed his alarm. He gainedthe door in two jumps. He could hear the opening and closing of drawersand see the flash of an electric lamp as the thief moved swiftly about,apparently taking it for granted that he had the house to himself. Theswish of the swing-door between dining-room and pantry marked hisinvestigations in the rear of the house. He evidently found nothingthere, for he was back in the hall again in a moment. Then through thevast silence of the big house the unknown gave voice to his anger anddisappointment:
"Well, I'll be damned!"
This, reaching Archie very clearly, added nothing to his comfort. Hedebated making a dash for the switch and flooding the lower rooms withlight, but a burglar angrily damning himself for his stupidity inentering a house where plated silver was the only booty in sight was nota person to provoke unnecessarily. Then a series of quick flashes on thewall of the stair gave warning of the intruder's invasion of the upperrooms.
Archie drew back and waited. His thoughts and emotions in this hour ofdanger interested him. He had always imagined that he would collapse inany moment of peril. The fingers of his left hand sought the wrist ofhis right that grasped the automatic and while his heart was stillbeating quickly the pulse was regular. This was immensely gratifying andhe resolved to report the fact to his medical counselor at the firstopportunity.
The thief had become more cautious and was tiptoeing up the uncarpetedtreads of the stair, still sending occasionally a bar of light ahead.All the doors of the bedrooms stood open, Archie remembered, and thethief would not be long in discovering that the recent occupants hadleft behind them nothing of the slightest value. His courage wasmounting; he was enormously surprised to find that his hands were quitesteady, and his mind had never functioned more perfectly. The burglarwas now in Mrs. Congdon's room, where he stumbled over a chair thatrocked furiously until stilled by the invader. He was now coming boldlydown the hall as though satisfied that the house was empty. A flash ofhis lamp fell upon the door frame just above Archie's left hand.
He crawled hastily across the bed and swung round and waited with hisback against a chiffonier in the corner, sternly resolved that notwithout a struggle would he be shot and his body left lying crumpled ina corner with no one to tell the tale. He had the advantage of theknowledge of the enemy's approach, and he raised the gun and covered thedoor in readiness. A flash clipped the dark for an instant. Then a handgroped along the wall seeking the switch. Archie could hear its softrasping over the wall. As the switch snapped the room flooded withlight. The bewildering glare leaping out of the darkness held the man inthe doorway and he raised his arm and passed his hand over his eyes toshield them from the light.
Between the front windows stood a long mirror swung in a movable frame,and as he measured distances and calculated chances Archie found himselfstaring at the reflection of a tall man with a cap pulled low over hishead and with the collar of a yellowish raincoat turned up about hisface. The eyes of the two met, the gaze of each gripping and holdingthat of the other.
The burglar's shoulders drooped as he gaped at the mirrored apparition.Then swiftly he jerked a pistol from his pocket and fired point blankinto the mirror. The report crashed horribly in the room, followed bythe tinkle of fragments of glass. Archie aimed at the doorway, but hisshot seemed only to hasten the man's flight. A rug slipped and thefugitive fell with a frightened yell that rang eerily through the house.
In the hall Archie turned on all the lights and gaining the landingfired at the retreating figure as it plunged toward the front door. Atthe crack of the gun the fugitive stopped short, clapped his hand to hisshoulder and groaned, then sprang through the front door and Bennettheard immediately the quick patter of his feet on the walk.
The lock bore no evidence of having been forced. It was a curiousbusiness and Archie closed the door, placed a heavy chair against it,and feeling a little giddy he threw himself down on a davenport in theliving-room. He began thinking very hard. He had shot a man and for allhe knew the victim might be lying dead somewhere on the premises. To besure the shooting of an armed housebreaker was justifiable, but thethought of coroner's inquests and dallyings with the police filled himwith horror. The newspapers would seize upon the case with avidity, andhis friends would never cease twitting him about his valor in firing abullet into the back of a fleeing burglar.
The frame of the photograph of the young girl that had so charmed himlay on the floor face down. Bennett picked it up and found that thepicture had been removed. He wondered a little at this but dismissed thesubject from his mind to consider the graver business of how to avoidthe disagreeable consequences of his encounter. He must leave the houseand escape from Bailey Harbor before daybreak, and he went upstairs andhurriedly began dressing.
At the crack of the gun the fugitive stopped short]
But for the tangible evidence of the smashed mirror (the bullet hadpierced the wooden back and was imbedded in the wall behind it) he mighthave dismissed the whole thing as a nightmare. Instinctively he beganbuilding up an alibi and planning his flight. The druggist who had givenhim the key and the taxi driver both supposed that he had inspected thehouse and taken the evening train for Boston. As he got into his clotheshe decided to make a wide detour of the town, perhaps tramping on toPortsmouth, and there recover his bag and be off for the Rockies.
At one o'clock he was drinking coffee and munching toast and jam tofortify himself for his journey. He had shot and perhaps killed a man,and his mind surged now with self-accusations. He needn't have fired theshot--the thief was running away and very likely would not have molestedhim further. He was sorry for the fellow, wounded or dead; but in amoment he was shuddering as he reflected that the bullet that splinteredthe mirror had really been meant for him, and it had struck with greatprecision just where the reflection of his head had presented a fairtarget to the startled marksman.
He turned out the lights and placing the key under the door mat stolethrough the garden. The man he had shot might even now be lying dead inhis path, and he lifted his feet high to avoid stumbling over thecorpse. But more appalling was the thought that the fugitive might belying in ambush, and he carried his pistol before him at arm's lengthagainst such an emergency.
He gained the road, glanced toward the house and set off in the generaldirection of the New Hampshire border.
V
There was neither star nor moon, and a chill wet wind bore in from thesea. His immediate business was to get as far away from Bailey Harbor aspossible. He started with a long swinging stride that was quicklyarrested as he splashed through pools left by the rain or stumbled offthe road where it turned sharply. Once he wandered into a driveway andseeking a way out crashed into a sunken garden. His feet were wet andhis trousers flapped heavily about his legs. The shrubbery pricked himlike barbed wire and a scratch along his cheek bled most disagreeably.He hurriedly felt his way along a hedge to the highway, hating himselfwith the greatest cordiality. If this was the adventurous life it wasnot for him, and he solemnly resolved that if he didn't die of pneumoniaas the result of his indiscretions he would stick close to clubs andcomfortable hotels for the remainder of his life.
He had no way of keeping track of his progress, but on bumping into across-roads sign-board he struck a match and read "Bailey Harbor 5 M.,"and the discovery that only five miles lay between him and the Congdonhouse filled him with rage and terror. A little later he caught thefirst glimmer of dawn breaking over a gray world. This was hearteningbut it brought a
lso new dangers for he had no idea of where his tramphad brought him and mud-splashed as he was and with the scratch acrosshis face stinging uncomfortably, he was in no haste to meet thestrangers who would soon be passing him in the road.
A curious whistle, a long pipe and then a short quick one, in theroadside a little way ahead brought him to a halt. He drew the gun fromhis overcoat pocket and stood perfectly quiet. In a few seconds thewhistle was repeated and Archie, grown suddenly bold, checked an impulseto fly and imitated it.
A man rose from behind a stone wall on the right and walked toward him.
"That you, Hoky?" he called sharply, peering through the mist.
Seeing that it was not Hoky but a stranger with a pistol, he sprangforward and wrenched the gun from Archie's hand.
"Stop squealing! Bad enough for you to fool me with that whistle withoutpulling a gun. Now you get right over there by the fence where I'mpointing and we'll consider matters a little!"
"I was just walking to Portsmouth," began Archie in a blithe tone hehoped would prove convincing.
His captor laughed ironically, and throwing open Bennett's coat,demanded:
"Where's your badge? Don't lie to me! You're one of these villageconstables or a plainclothes man from Boston. Either way you'd bettershow your hand."
"If you think I'm connected with the police," Archie faltered, "you werenever more mistaken in your life!"
The man clapped his hands over Archie's pockets and then struck a matchand surveyed his face with care. This done he stuck his nose close tohis captive's mouth and bade him breathe.
"You haven't the bouquet of an inebriate, son. You stepped along likeHoky, my pal, and that's why I whistled; and you warbled the answer likea mockingbird. Now listen to me! You've been up to something, so don'ttell me again that you're taking a little before breakfast stroll toPortsmouth to work up an appetite. In the first place, have you seen aman about your size along the road anywhere?"
"Not a soul!" declared Archie solemnly.
"Mighty queer Hoky doesn't turn up! I warned the beggar against theseseaside villas; they're all outfitted with fancy burglar alarms thatmake a deuce of a row when you step on the wire. Electricity is the baneof the craft; you light a wire that rings a gong loud enough to wake thedead and then some chap jumps out of bed and turns on all the lights inthe house and very likely opens up with a gun before you can sayJerusalem. But Hoky thought he knew better."
Archie clutched at the stone fence against which his captor had pushedhim and his breath came in long gasps.
"You mean," he faltered, "that you fear your friend has been shot!"
"That, my dear sir, is exactly what troubles me! Hoky didn't need to doit; that's what rouses my indignation! He's been running free for twoyears, and not a thing against him--wiped out all his indictments withgood time like an honest thief, and now very likely he's been potted bysome large prosperous householder as he was trying to lift a bit ofsilver; and these country houses never have anything worth risking yourlife for! My dear boy, can you blame me for being peeved, enormouslypeeved, when I reflect that Hoky, one of the best pals in the world, isprobably lying as dead as a pickled mackerel somewhere back yonder? Orif he has escaped death in his felonious enterprise he may have met theconstable and be awaiting the pleasure of a grand jury of righteousfarmers of the old commonwealth of Maine!"
Archie's tongue clung to the roof of his mouth as he tried to murmurhis sympathy for the stranger's sorrow. The thought that he was probablytalking to the accomplice of the man he had shot was terrifying; thestranger seemed enormously fond of Hoky and if he knew that he hadwithin his grasp the person who was responsible for Hoky's failure toreturn from his visit to Bailey Harbor he would very likely make hasteto avenge his friend's death. It seemed to Archie that the gods wereplaying strange tricks upon him indeed. The man's speech was not theargot he had assumed from his reading of crook stories to be the commonutterance of the underworld. There was something attractive in thefellow. He carried himself jauntily, and his clean-shaven, rounded faceand fine gray eyes would not have suggested his connection withburglary. He was an engaging sort of person, and overcoming hisdiscomfiture at having sent a bullet into the foolish Hoky, Archiedecided suddenly that the man might be of service to him. He was inpressing need of a change of clothes but he was in no condition toproceed to Portsmouth to redeem his suitcase; an impression that wasconfirmed unexpectedly by his captor.
"You will pardon my candor, but you certainly look like the devil.There's a rip in your trousers that needs explaining and that swipe onyour face reminds me of a map of the Mississippi done in red ink. Let meintroduce myself to you as the Governor. Among the powers that prey thatis my proud cognomen, not to say _alias_. Now please be frank--whatmischief brings you here at this pale hour?"
Archie gave serious thought to his answer. If he could convince thissingular person that he was a crook he would be less likely to suspectthat he had been the instrument of Hoky's undoing. And there was thepossibility that if he met the Governor's friendly advances in areciprocal spirit the man might help him out of his predicament. TheGovernor was waiting for his answer, humming pleasantly as he surveyedthe heavens.
"I've got to make a getaway and be in a hurry about it," declared Archiewith a confidential air that caused a humorous light to play in theGovernor's eyes.
"A little trouble of some sort, eh? Perhaps fearing a collision with therevised statutes of this or adjacent states?"
"Something like that," Archie answered huskily.
"It rather occurred to me that you were not promenading for merepleasure," replied the Governor, drawing his hand across his chin. "Thecauses that lead people to travel have been enumerated by no less anauthority than Mr. Laurence Sterne as--
"Infirmity of body,
"Imbecility of mind, or
"Inevitable necessity.
"Unless my memory errs the same authority classifies travelers as theidle, the inquisitive, the lying, the proud, the vain, the splenetic; towhich he added the delinquent and felonious traveler, the unfortunateand innocent traveler, the traveler without aim and the wanderingsentimentalist. From the looks of your clothing I should judge that youbelong to the necessitous group, though from a certain uneasy expressionI might easily place you among the delinquent and criminal. Afashionable defaulter perhaps? No. Then let it go at murder, though Iconfess you don't look as though you'd have a stomach for homicide."
"I came damned near getting pinched!" asserted Archie stoutly. "The copsback there in that town gave me a hard run for it."
Feeling that he was making an impression on the Governor he warmed tohis work.
"I was just crawling through the window of a drug store when here comesa chap tiptoeing through the alley flashing a dark lantern, and I boltedfor the tall timber as hard as I could sprint. The fire bell rang andthe whole town woke up and I got lost running through a garden back ofone of those swell's houses on the shore. That's how I got this slash inthe face, and I'm in a pretty pickle now. There'll be a whole armylooking for me; and if your friend Hoky's been killed they'll be keen topinch me as another member of the gang."
The Governor listened patiently as Archie jerked this out, nervouslytrying to conceal his Harvard training in the use of the Englishlanguage by resorting to such terms as he imagined bold bad men employin moments of mental stress.
"An amateur, I take it?" remarked the Governor with the humorous twinklethat seemed to be habitual with him.
"Hell, no," grumbled Archie scornfully. "But I always play the gamealone; I never had any use for pals. They get in the way."
"Wrong, my boy; wrong! A good partner like me is essential to thesuccessful prosecution of the art or craft felonious. As for myself Irarely venture to expose myself in these little affairs; but I adviseand counsel the brethren. I am their confidant and assist them ininnumerable ways purely for the joy of it, I assure you. Now Hoky and Ihad been on the road all spring, and he made a good haul or two under mydirection; but he would
n't let well enough alone. I warned him againstmaking an attempt back yonder last night. A stormy night always makeshonest householders wakeful. Take it from me, son, there couldn't be aworse time for a burglary than a night melodious with rolling thunder.You haven't the judgment of a month-old infant. I bought a toothbrush atthat drug store yesterday evening and there's a light right over thesafe at the end of the prescription counter. Your attempt, my son,speaks for courage but not for discretion. You should always ask meabout such things."
"I'm sorry," replied Archie meekly, "that I didn't run into you sooner."
"The loss is mine!" cried the Governor heartily. "But let us bepractical. The coast will ring with this, particularly if Hoky is lyingcold at the undertaker's. He must be dead or pinched or he'd be here bythis time. We shall make a long jump, son, and ponder the future."
He walked off briskly with Archie close beside him.
"When Hoky persisted in his ill-chosen enterprise I felt a wearinessupon me and lifted a little roadster that I've tucked away down here ina peaceful lane. Thought I'd be all ready to give the old boy a longpull for freedom when he came back, but alas--!"
Sure enough the roadster was there; a very handy little car indeed, andArchie was profoundly interested to know that it was in this fashionthat a man who from his own confession was counselor extraordinary tothieves, toured the country. The Governor had become suddenly a man ofaction. Kneeling down he detached a New York license tag from themachine, drew from his pocket a Maine tag and attached it, hummingmeanwhile.
"The rural police haven't learned this simple device," he explained, ashe sent the discarded tag skimming into a corn field. "I've got aboutforty miles to run inland. The back roads only and Providence ourguide!"
He jumped in and bade Archie take the seat beside him. The car was soonbumping merrily over a rough road that wound through a pine wood. Asnear as Archie could reckon from the sun that was crawling into viewthey were bound for Halifax, but to be going anywhere was an infiniterelief, and to be traveling with a man whose comrade he had shot andprobably killed only a few hours earlier, imparted a piquant flavor tothe journey. This astonishing person who called himself Governor might,for all he knew, be hurrying him to some lonely place to murder him, butif this was his plan he was most agreeable about it. He had taken offthe mackinaw coat in which he had first appeared in the road and thebrown coat underneath was of modish cut; and as his foot played upon thebrake Archie noted that he wore silk hose. He had never dreamed thatoutlaws were so careful of their raiment. And the man's talk was that ofa cultivated gentleman who wore his learning lightly and was blessedwith an easy conscience; not at all like the philosopher and guide ofcriminals.
"You seem to know this country well," Archie remarked as they penetratedmore deeply into the woods and followed a grass-grown trail that endedabruptly at an abandoned lumber camp.
"Oh, I know most of the whole United States just as well," remarked theGovernor, steering the car slowly among the deep ruts. "We'll shoot thecar around behind that pyramid of sawdust and walk a bit to stretch ourlegs."
There was no trace of a path where he struck off into the woods but hestrode along with the easy confidence of one who is sure of hisdestination. They brought up presently beside a brook and in a momentmore reached a log hut planted on the edge of the high bank.
"What do you think of that, Sir Archibald?" inquired the Governorcarelessly.
Archie paused, wavering in the path. The man had called him by his rightname, throwing in the prefix with a tinge of insolence.
"Oh, your name?" remarked the Governor turning from a leisurely surveyof the dwelling. "Perfectly easy! Archibald Bennett was neatly sewedinto your coat pocket by your tailor as I observed when I rubbed myhands over your waistcoat to see if you wore a badge. Your bill-fold isthere intact--it's rather indelicate of you to feel for it! If I'd meantto rob you I'd have biffed you on the head long ago and thrown yourcarcass to the buzzards."
"I got these duds out of a suitcase I sneaked from an auto in Boston,and that's no name of mine," Archie explained hurriedly, still anxiousto convince the Governor that he was a thief.
"A deft hand, son; but very careless of you not to rip out the label.Men have been hanged on slighter evidence. But Archibald is not a nameto sneeze at, and I rather like Archie; and Archie I shall continue tocall you. Now we'll see what we can do to shake up a breakfast."
He drew out a key and opened the door of the hut. On one side stood adilapidated cook stove of an obsolete pattern, surrounded by a fewkitchen utensils. In the far end were two bunks, one above the other,and on a chair beside them a pile of blankets neatly folded. In themiddle of the room was a table littered with old magazines.
"Not a bad place, Archie! I stumbled upon it a couple of years ago quiteby accident and use it occasionally. The retreat of some artist whoprobably starved to death. When I first found the shack it was full ofimpressionistic studies that looked as though the poor boob stood on hishead to paint. I made a burnt offering of the whole lot to outragedNature." He opened a cupboard revealing a quantity of provisions. "Poorold Hoky was a great lover of ham; I never saw such an appetite forsmoked pork, and he had just stocked us up with a few specimens helifted somewhere."
Besides three hams there were coffee, cartons of crackers and cans ofcondensed milk.
"We fellows who live by our wits need the open air just as much as bankpresidents, for our business makes a heavier drain on the nerves,"continued the Governor after they had prepared breakfast. "Your pallorsuggests that you may have emerged quite recently from one of thoseinstitutions designed for the moral reconstruction of the weak anderring."
Archie's eyes fell under the Governor's keen gaze. But he realized thathe must firmly establish himself in the man's confidence by palminghimself off as a crook with a prison record. In no other way could he besure of the assistance and protection which the Governor alone couldgive him.
"Three months' jail sentence," he replied smoothly.
"Ah! A minor felony, I judge, from the brevity of your incarceration,"replied the Governor, emptying the coffee pot into Archie's cup. "I havenever been in jail and to the best of my knowledge I have never beenindicted; or if I have the sheriff has never caught up with me! My heartbleeds nevertheless for these poor devils who are always in the toils,and in my poor weak fashion I try to help them. Really, my dear Archie,thieves as a class are shockingly deficient in intelligence. Until Idropped into the underworld they were a peculiarly helpless lot--likedear old Hoky whose loss I shall mourn to my dying day."
Archie flinched, but he was beginning to feel at home in his new role ofa fugitive from justice, and murmured his sympathy without a quaver.
"My friend," said the Governor soberly as they rose from the table, "wehave dipped our hands in the same dish and broken bread together. I'mstrong for the old traditions of Arab hospitality and that sort ofthing. There's honor, you know, among thieves, and I'm rather keen forthe sentimental side of the business. You may trust me, telling me asmuch or as little of yourself as you please. I don't mind saving thatyou're a likable chap, but pathetically helpless in emergencies likemost of our brethren. It's well for you that you fell in with me, withthat little episode of the drug store hanging over you. I'll be a goodpal to you and I ask you to be straight with me. Are we friends or--"
He put out his hand questioningly. Archie grasped it, meeting the gazeof the keen gray eyes squarely, but with something of an appeal in them.
"All right, Archie--for such you shall be to the end of the chapter,whether you lied about it or not. And now let's deal with practicalaffairs. I'm going to spend the afternoon on that stolen machine we'vegot back there; you'll hardly know it when you see it again. I'llpaint'er white to symbolize our purity. There's an assortment of clothesthe boys have left here from time to time--all sizes and ready for anyemergency. You can pick'em over while I'm working on the car. I've got abag of my own stuff stuck around here somewhere." He filled and lighteda pipe, walked toward the
kitchen end of the room and kicked a long box."If you'll just push that aside you'll find a door in the floor--quite acellar underneath--made it myself. Candles on the shelf there. Don'tbreak your neck on the ladder."
He gathered up several cans of ready-to-use paint, and paused in thedoorway to deliver a final admonition.
"If Hoky _should_ turn up--tall chap, a little bent in the shoulders,clean, sharp profile--call him Hoky and yell Governor before he shoots.He's very sudden with the gun, that Hoky; a lamentable weakness; spoiledhim for delicate jobs, but I'm afraid that at last somebody's got thedrop on him."
The cellar was really a cave gouged into the earth and piled with trunksand hand bags stuffed with all manner of loot. There was enoughsilverware to equip a dozen households, and Archie amused himself bystudying the monograms, thinking that quite possibly he was handlingspoons that he had encountered on happier occasions in the homes of hisfriends. The trunks contained clothing in great variety and most of itwas new and of good quality. He carried up an armful and found a graysuit that fitted him very well. Another visit yielded shirts, socks andunderclothing, a slightly used traveling case with shaving materials andother toilet articles.
He bathed in the brook, shaved, dressed and felt like a new being. Onlya few hours had elapsed since he walked uprightly in the eyes of allmen; now he was a fugitive, and for all he knew to the contrary amurderer. He had accommodated himself with ease to lying and thepractice of deceit; and even the taking of human life seemed no longer amonstrous thing. If he were caught in the Governor's company he wouldhave a pretty time of it satisfying a court of his innocence; but heconsidered his plight tranquilly.
In doffing the clothing he had acquired honestly and substituting stolenraiment, it was almost as though he were changing his character as well.In transferring his effects from the old to the new pockets he came uponIsabel Perry's note, and grinned as he re-read it. He wondered whatIsabel would say if she knew that he had already slipped the leash thatbound him to convention and performed even more reckless deeds than shehad prescribed for him.
"No callers? Well, I must say you're a credit to our gents' clothingdepartment!" the Governor remarked on his return. "That stuff wasaccumulated early in the spring by a couple of the boys who had no moresense. Silver, yes; you can melt it and sell it like pig iron; but howabsurd to risk your neck stealing mere raiment! Still the word's gonedown the line and any of the brethren who're in need of shelter and achange of clothes will find what they want here. You've picked about thebest of the lot. What do you make of this? Found it in the car."
He extended a crumpled telegram which read:
Bailey Harbor, Me. June 11, 1917.
Putney Congdon, Thackeray Club, New York.
I am offering the house for rent. Shall take every precaution to protect my children from your brutality.
A. B. C.
Archie felt the hut whirling round him. What he held was beyond questionthe reply of Mrs. Congdon to her husband's telegram that had been leftlying on the dinner table. And if Congdon had left New York for BaileyHarbor immediately to put into effect his threat to abduct his child, itmight have been Congdon he had shot--not Hoky! The Governor, scrubbingthe paint from his hands, called over his shoulder:
"An odd message! It had slipped under the seat. Good thing I found it."
"Where did you find that car?" asked Archie with an attempt atindifference.
"Oh, the bloomin' thing was run up under a clump of trees on the backroad on the far side of Bailey. I thought maybe it was a stolen car.Hoky and I separated there when the storm started. So I drove themachine to the place you found me waiting for him. Mr. Congdon hasprobably notified all the world of his sad loss." He held out his handsfor Archie's inspection. "This is certainly hard and fast paint, but itdid the work all right. The owner of that machine wouldn't know it now.And not more than a spoonful of gas gone out of the tank; so we can makea long jump, Archie."
No jump they could make would be long enough, Archie reflected. He wasafraid to ask further questions about the car and his senses were numbedby the effort to determine whether it was Hoky he had shot or Mr. PutneyCongdon. If his bullet had impinged upon Congdon's person, the man wouldundoubtedly believe his wife had ordered him murdered, and Archie foundno consolation in the conjecture that he had added to Mrs. Congdon'sdistress. If Congdon wasn't dead he would be sure to make diligentinquiries in the village as to his assailant and the stolen car. Thedruggist would know who had taken the key and Archie had stated hispurpose to walk to the station and take the five eleven train. Butbeyond Bailey Harbor he saw his alibi crumbling.
The Governor's ceaseless flow of talk fortunately diverted his thoughtsto more cheerful channels. He must stick to the Governor, who to be sureshowed no inclination to desert him. Indeed the Governor evinced asincere pleasure in his society, and if he behaved himself he might fillthe void created in the man's life by the loss of Hoky. He would remainin hiding until the whole thing blew over, whether it was Hoky or PutneyCongdon he had shot in Congdon's house.
He obeyed with alacrity a hint that he prepare luncheon; and after thishad been consumed the Governor suggested a game of chess, produced a setof ivory chessmen from a cupboard and soon proved himself a skilfulplayer.
"It's wonderful for sharpening the wits," he explained. "When I've got adifficult job on hand I find a game stimulating to my faculties. Let mesee, who was that telegram addressed to? Congdon; yes, that's right.Dropped into a chess club in Boston about a month ago and watched a chapplaying, highly nervous fellow but a pretty stiff player at that. Theycalled him Congdon all right and he may be the owner of that car. Thethought pleases me. Heard him asking for his father, Eliphalet Congdon,who's a chess fiend, too, it appeared. Had heard of him before--the oldboy carries his will around in his umbrella just to tantalize hisrelations, who are all crazy to know what he's going to do with hismoney. Something pathetic in a man chasing his own father over thecountry; doesn't gee with our old ideal of the patriarchal system withfather at the head of the table serving the whole family from onemiserable duck. Ever notice a queer streak of eccentricity in people whotoy with the chessmen? Of course you're thinking I'm no exception to therule, but the thought isn't displeasing to me. That was a neatmove--you're waking up, Archie! Well, sir, young Congdon was offeringsomething handsome to any one who'd steal the old man's umbrella so hecould get hold of the will. I've sunk pretty low, Archie, but stealingumbrellas is distinctly not in my line!"
At the end of two hours the Governor declared that they must take a napbefore setting out and turned into one of the berths and was soonsnoring. Archie was glad of a chance to be alone with his thoughts, buthe found them poor company. After kicking about restlessly for a time heslept but only to wander through a wild phantasmagoria of crime in whichIsabel Perry, dressed precisely as he had seen her at his sister's, ledhim on from one wild scene to another, clapping her hands with delightat each exploit.
"You are doing splendidly," she laughed, as he turned to her, pistol inhand, after shooting a gigantic policeman with fiery red whiskers."Really you exceed my expectations. I am proud of you, Mr. Bennett," shewas saying when a vigorous shake brought him up standing.
"To gain or lose it all," he stammered rubbing his eyes. But it was notIsabel he was addressing but his confederate, blandly smiling.
"The boy quotes poetry!" the Governor exclaimed. "Archie, you've come inanswer to my prayers! Together we shall drink of the fount of Castalia.We shall chum with Apollo and the Muses Nine! But the gods call uselsewhere! We'll snatch a bite and be off! And we've got a job allwaiting for us. One of the brotherhood has commissioned me to dig upsome boodle he's planted over in New Hampshire. You may recall theincident. Red Leary, a rare boy, who pulled off some big enterprises inKansas and Missouri a dozen years ago, emerged from Leavenworth andfloated into good old conservative New England where he held up anexpress messenger and sauntered off with fifty thousand dol
lars in newbank notes fresh from the Treasury. I've been in touch with Redlately--he's been up in Nova Scotia but doesn't like the climate, and hewants his boodle. Do you follow me?"
"He hid it somewhere and wants your help in recovering it?"
"Right the first time! In the summer there's a lot of travel north andsouth and Leary, who's had an honest job up there since he made thehaul, is even now wandering down Lake Champlain to meet me. No, Archie,communication through the underworld is much less difficult than youimagine. Regular post offices and that sort of thing. That cash istucked away in the cellar of a church and by this time tomorrow nightwe'll have it, all ready for old Red and check the item from ourtablets."
"But the numbers of those notes are in every bank in the country,"suggested Archie; "the police are only waiting for the bills to get intocirculation to pounce on the thief."
"I am more and more delighted with you, my son! That point had given meno little worry. But something will turn up; there will be a way out ofthe difficulty. Chuck your old duds into the creek and close thewindows. We'll hit the long trail!"
Blacksheep! Blacksheep! Page 1
