CHAPTER XXVI
BEATRICE DARES
An hour later, Stern and Beatrice sat weak and shaken in theirstronghold on the fifth floor, resting, trying to gather up somestrength again, to pull together for resistance to the siege that hadset in.
With the return of reason to the engineer--his free bleeding hadsomewhat checked the onset of fever--and of consciousness to the girl,they began to piece out, bit by bit, the stages of their retreat.
Now that Stern had barricaded the stairs, two stories below, and thatfor a little while they felt reasonably safe, they were able to taketheir bearings, to recall the flight, to plan a bit for the future, afuture dark with menace, seemingly hopeless in its outlook.
"If it--hadn't been for you," Beatrice was saying, "if you hadn'tpicked me up and carried me, when that stone struck, I--I--"
"How's the ache now?" Stern hastily interrupted, in a rather weak yetbrisk voice, which he was trying hard to render matter-of-fact. "Ofcourse the lack of water, except that half-pint or so, to bathe yourbruise with, is a rank barbarity. But if we haven't got any, wehaven't--that's all. All--till we have another go at 'em!"
"Oh, Allan!" she exclaimed, tremulously. "Don't think of _me!_ Of me,when your back's gashed with a spear-cut, your head's battered, armpierced, and we've neither water nor bandages--nothing of any kind totreat your wounds with!"
"Come now, don't you bother about me!" he objected trying hard tosmile, though racked with pain. "I'll be O. K., fit as a fiddle, in notime. Perfect health and all that sort of thing, you know. It'll healright away.
"Head's clear again already, in spite of that whack with the war-club,or whatever it was they landed with. But for a while I certainly wasseeing things. I had 'em--had 'em bad! Thought--well, strange things.
"My back? Only a scratch, that's all. It's begun to coagulate already,the blood has, hasn't it?" And he strove to peer over his own shoulderat the slash. But the pain made him desist. He could hardly keep backa groan. His face twitched involuntarily.
The girl sank on her knees beside him. Her arm encircled him; her handsmoothed his forehead; and with a strange look she studied hisunnaturally pale face.
"It's your arm I'm thinking about, more than anything," said she."We've _got_ to have something to treat that with. Tell me, does ithurt you very much, Allan?"
He tried to laugh, as he glanced down at the wounded arm, which,ligatured about the spear-thrust with a thong, and supported by arawhide sling, looked strangely blue and swollen.
"Hurt me? Nonsense! I'll be fine and dandy in no time. The onlytrouble is, I'm not much good as a fighter this way. Southpaw, yousee. Can't shoot worth a--a cent, you know, with my left. Otherwise, Iwouldn't mind."
"Shoot? Trust _me_ for that now!" she exclaimed. "We've still got tworevolvers and the shotgun left, and lots of ammunition. I'll do theshooting--if there's got to be any done!"
"You're all right, Beatrice!" exclaimed the wounded man fervently."What would I do without you? And to think how near you came to--butnever mind. That's over now; forget it!"
"Yes, but what next?"
"Don't know. Get well, maybe. Things might be worse. I might have abroken arm, or something; laid up for weeks--slow starvation and allthat. What's a mere puncture? Nothing! Now that the spear's out, it'llbegin healing right away.
"Bet a million, though, that What's-His-Name down there, Big Chief theMonk, won't get out of _his_ scrape in a hurry. His face is certainlyscrambled, or I miss my guess. You got him through the ear with oneshot, by the way. Know that? Fact! Drilled it clean! Just a little tothe right and you'd have _had_ him for keeps. But never mind, we'llsave him for the encore--if there is any."
"You think they'll try again?"
"Can't say. They've lost a lot of fighters, killed and wounded,already. And they've had a pretty liberal taste of our style. Thatought to hold them for a while! We'll see, at any rate. And if luckstays good, we'll maybe have a thing or two to show them if they keepon hanging round where they aren't wanted!"
Came now a little silence. Beside Stern the girl sat, half supportinghis wounded body with her firm, white arm. Thirst was beginning totorment them both, particularly Stern, whose injuries had alreadygiven him a marked temperature. But water there was absolutely none.And so, still planless, glad only to recuperate a little, content thatfor the present the Horde had been held back, they waited. Waiting,they both thought. The girl's thoughts were all of him; but he,man-fashion, was trying to piece out what had happened, to frame somecoherent idea of it all, to analyze the urgent necessities that layupon them both.
Here and there, a disjointed bit recurred to him, even from out of thedelirium that had followed the blow on the head. From the time he hadrecovered his senses in the building, things were clearer.
He knew that the Horde, temporarily frightened by his mad rush, hadgiven him time to stumble up again and once more lift the girl, beforethey had ventured to creep into the arcade in search of their prey.
He remembered that the spear had been gone then. Raving, he must havebroken and plucked it out. The blood, he recalled, was spurting freelyas he had carried Beatrice through the wreckage and up to the firstlanding, where she had regained partial consciousness.
Then he shuddered at recollection of that stealthy, apelike creepingof the Horde scouts in among the ruins, furtive and silent; theirsniffing after the blood-track; their frightful agility in clamberingwith feet and hands alike, swinging themselves up like chimpanzees,swarming aloft on the death-hunt.
He had evaded them, from story to story. Beatrice, able now to walk,had helped him roll down balustrades and building-stones, fling rocks,wrench stairs loose and block the way.
And so, wounding their pursuers, yet tracked always by more and evermore, they had come to the landing, where by aid of the rifle barrelas a lever they had been able to bring a whole wall crashing down, tochoke the passage. That had brought silence. For a time, at least,pursuit had been abandoned. In the sliding, dusty avalanche of thewall, hurled down the stairway, Stern knew by the grunts and shriekswhich had arisen that some of the Horde had surely perished--how many,he could not tell. A score or two at the very least, he ardentlyhoped.
Fear, at any rate, had been temporarily injected into the rest. Forthe attack had not yet been renewed. Outside in the forest, no sign ofthe Horde, no sound. A disconcerting, ominous calm had settled like apall. Even the birds, recovered from their terrors, had begun to hopabout and take up their twittering little household tasks.
As in a kind of clairvoyance, the engineer seemed to know there wouldbe respite until night. For a little while, at least, there could berest and peace. But when darkness should have settled down--
"If they'd only show themselves!" thought he, his leaden eyes closingin an overmastering lassitude, a vast swooning weakness of blood-lossand exhaustion. Not even his parched thirst, a veritable torture now,could keep his thoughts from wandering. "If they'd tackle again, Icould score with--with lead--what's _that_ I'm thinking? I'm notdelirious, am I?"
For a moment he brought himself back with a start, back to a fullrealization of the place. But again the drowsiness gained on him.
"We've got guns now; guns and ammunition," thought he. "We--could pickthem off--from the windows. Pick them--off--pick--them--off--"
He slept. Thus, often, wounded soldiers sleep, with troubled dreams,on the verge of renewed battle which may mean their death, their longand wakeless slumber.
He slept. And the girl, laying his gashed head gently back upon thepile of furs, bent over him with infinite compassion. For a longminute, hardly breathing, she watched him there. More quickly came herbreath. A strange new light shone in her eyes.
"Only for me, those wounds!" she whispered slowly. "Only for me!"
Taking his head in both her hands, she kissed him as he layunconscious. Kissed him twice, and then a third time.
Then she arose.
Quickly, as though with some definite plan, she chose from among theirstore of uten
sils a large copper kettle, one which he had brought herthe week before from the little Broadway shop.
She took a long rawhide rope, braided by Stern during their longevenings together. This she knotted firmly to the bale of the kettle.
The revolvers, fully reloaded, she examined with care. One of them shelaid beside the sleeper. The other she slid into her full, warm bosom,where the clinging tiger-skin held it ready for her hand.
Then she walked noiselessly to the door leading into the hallway.
Here for a moment she stood, looking back at the wounded man. Tearsdimmed her eyes, yet they were very glad.
"For your sake, now, everything!" she said. "Everything--all! Oh,Allan, if you only knew! And now--good-by!"
Then she was gone.
And in the silent room, their home, which out of wreck and chaos theyhad made, the fevered man lay very still, his pulses throbbing in histhroat.
Outside, very far, very faint in the forests, a muffled drum began tobeat again.
And the slow shadows, lengthening across the floor, told that eveningwas drawing nigh.
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