CHAPTER XXIII
WHILE THE STABLES BURNED
About nine o'clock that night Liddy came into the living-room andreported that one of the housemaids declared she had seen two men sliparound the corner of the stable. Gertrude had been sitting staring infront of her, jumping at every sound. Now she turned on Liddypettishly.
"I declare, Liddy," she said, "you are a bundle of nerves. What ifEliza did see some men around the stable? It may have been Warner andAlex."
"Warner is in the kitchen, miss," Liddy said with dignity. "And if youhad come through what I have, you would be a bundle of nerves, too.Miss Rachel, I'd be thankful if you'd give me my month's wagesto-morrow. I'll be going to my sister's."
"Very well," I said, to her evident amazement. "I will make out thecheck. Warner can take you down to the noon train."
Liddy's face was really funny.
"You'll have a nice time at your sister's," I went on. "Five children,hasn't she?"
"That's it," Liddy said, suddenly bursting into tears. "Send me away,after all these years, and your new shawl only half done, and nobodyknowin' how to fix the water for your bath."
"It's time I learned to prepare my own bath." I was knittingcomplacently. But Gertrude got up and put her arms around Liddy'sshaking shoulders.
"You are two big babies," she said soothingly. "Neither one of youcould get along for an hour without the other. So stop quarreling andbe good. Liddy, go right up and lay out Aunty's night things. She isgoing to bed early."
After Liddy had gone I began to think about the men at the stable, andI grew more and more anxious. Halsey was aimlessly knocking thebilliard-balls around in the billiard-room, and I called to him.
"Halsey," I said when he sauntered in, "is there a policeman inCasanova?"
"Constable," he said laconically. "Veteran of the war, one arm; inoffice to conciliate the G. A. R. element. Why?"
"Because I am uneasy to-night." And I told him what Liddy had said."Is there any one you can think of who could be relied on to watch theoutside of the house to-night?"
"We might get Sam Bohannon from the club," he said thoughtfully. "Itwouldn't be a bad scheme. He's a smart darky, and with his mouth shutand his shirt-front covered, you couldn't see him a yard off in thedark."
Halsey conferred with Alex, and the result, in an hour, was Sam. Hisinstructions were simple. There had been numerous attempts to breakinto the house; it was the intention, not to drive intruders away, butto capture them. If Sam saw anything suspicious outside, he was to tapat the east entry, where Alex and Halsey were to alternate in keepingwatch through the night.
It was with a comfortable feeling of security that I went to bed thatnight. The door between Gertrude's rooms and mine had been opened,and, with the doors into the hall bolted, we were safe enough.Although Liddy persisted in her belief that doors would prove noobstacles to our disturbers.
As before, Halsey watched the east entry from ten until two. He had aneye to comfort, and he kept vigil in a heavy oak chair, very large anddeep. We went up-stairs rather early, and through the open doorGertrude and I kept up a running fire of conversation. Liddy wasbrushing my hair, and Gertrude was doing her own, with a long freesweep of her strong round arms.
"Did you know Mrs. Armstrong and Louise are in the village?" she called.
"No," I replied, startled. "How did you hear it?"
"I met the oldest Stewart girl to-day, the doctor's daughter, and shetold me they had not gone back to town after the funeral. They wentdirectly to that little yellow house next to Doctor Walker's, and areapparently settled there. They took the house furnished for thesummer."
"Why, it's a bandbox," I said. "I can't imagine Fanny Armstrong insuch a place."
"It's true, nevertheless. Ella Stewart says Mrs. Armstrong has agedterribly, and looks as if she is hardly able to walk."
I lay and thought over some of these things until midnight. Theelectric lights went out then, fading slowly until there was only ared-hot loop to be seen in the bulb, and then even that died away andwe were embarked on the darkness of another night.
Apparently only a few minutes elapsed, during which my eyes werebecoming accustomed to the darkness. Then I noticed that the windowswere reflecting a faint pinkish light, Liddy noticed it at the sametime, and I heard her jump up. At that moment Sam's deep voice boomedfrom somewhere just below.
"Fire!" he yelled. "The stable's on fire!"
I could see him in the glare dancing up and down on the drive, and amoment later Halsey joined him. Alex was awake and running down thestairs, and in five minutes from the time the fire was discovered,three of the maids were sitting on their trunks in the drive, although,excepting a few sparks, there was no fire nearer than a hundred yards.
Gertrude seldom loses her presence of mind, and she ran to thetelephone. But by the time the Casanova volunteer fire department cametoiling up the hill the stable was a furnace, with the Dragon Fly safebut blistered, in the road. Some gasolene exploded just as thevolunteer department got to work, which shook their nerves as well asthe burning building. The stable, being on a hill, was a torch toattract the population from every direction. Rumor had it thatSunnyside was burning, and it was amazing how many people threwsomething over their night-clothes and flew to the conflagration.
I take it Casanova has few fires, and Sunnyside was furnishing thepeople, in one way and another, the greatest excitement they had hadfor years.
The stable was off the west wing. I hardly know how I came to think ofthe circular staircase and the unguarded door at its foot. Liddy wasputting my clothes into sheets, preparatory to tossing them out thewindow, when I found her, and I could hardly persuade her to stop.
"I want you to come with me, Liddy," I said. "Bring a candle and acouple of blankets."
She lagged behind considerably when she saw me making for the eastwing, and at the top of the staircase she balked.
"I am not going down there," she said firmly.
"There is no one guarding the door down there," I explained. "Whoknows?--this may be a scheme to draw everybody away from this end ofthe house, and let some one in here."
The instant I had said it I was convinced I had hit on the explanation,and that perhaps it was already too late. It seemed to me as Ilistened that I heard stealthy footsteps on the east porch, but therewas so much shouting outside that it was impossible to tell. Liddy wason the point of retreat.
"Very well," I said, "then I shall go down alone. Run back to Mr.Halsey's room and get his revolver. Don't shoot down the stairs if youhear a noise: remember--I shall be down there. And hurry."
I put the candle on the floor at the top of the staircase and took offmy bedroom slippers. Then I crept down the stairs, going very slowly,and listening with all my ears. I was keyed to such a pitch that Ifelt no fear: like the condemned who sleep and eat the night beforeexecution, I was no longer able to suffer apprehension. I was pastthat. Just at the foot of the stairs I stubbed my toe against Halsey'sbig chair, and had to stand on one foot in a soundless agony until thepain subsided to a dull ache. And then--I knew I was right. Some onehad put a key into the lock, and was turning it. For some reason itrefused to work, and the key was withdrawn. There was a muttering ofvoices outside: I had only a second. Another trial, and the door wouldopen. The candle above made a faint gleam down the well-likestaircase, and at that moment, with a second, no more, to spare, Ithought of a plan.
The heavy oak chair almost filled the space between the newel post andthe door. With a crash I had turned it on its side, wedging it againstthe door, its legs against the stairs. I could hear a faint screamfrom Liddy, at the crash, and then she came down the stairs on a run,with the revolver held straight out in front of her.
"Thank God," she said, in a shaking voice. "I thought it was you."
I pointed to the door, and she understood.
"Call out the windows at the other end of the house," I whispered."Run. Tell them n
ot to wait for anything."
She went up the stairs at that, two at a time. Evidently she collidedwith the candle, for it went out, and I was left in darkness.
I was really astonishingly cool. I remember stepping over the chairand gluing my ear to the door, and I shall never forget feeling it givean inch or two there in the darkness, under a steady pressure fromwithout. But the chair held, although I could hear an ominous crackingof one of the legs. And then, without the slightest warning, thecard-room window broke with a crash. I had my finger on the trigger ofthe revolver, and as I jumped it went off, right through the door.Some one outside swore roundly, and for the first time I could hearwhat was said.
"Only a scratch. . . . Men are at the other end of the house. . . .Have the whole rat's nest on us." And a lot of profanity which I won'twrite down. The voices were at the broken window now, and although Iwas trembling violently, I was determined that I would hold them untilhelp came. I moved up the stairs until I could see into the card-room,or rather through it, to the window. As I looked a small man put hisleg over the sill and stepped into the room. The curtain confused himfor a moment; then he turned, not toward me, but toward thebilliard-room door. I fired again, and something that was glass orchina crashed to the ground. Then I ran up the stairs and along thecorridor to the main staircase. Gertrude was standing there, trying tolocate the shots, and I must have been a peculiar figure, with my hairin crimps, my dressing-gown flying, no slippers, and a revolverclutched in my hands I had no time to talk. There was the sound offootsteps in the lower hall, and some one bounded up the stairs.
I had gone Berserk, I think. I leaned over the stair-rail and firedagain. Halsey, below, yelled at me.
"What are you doing up there?" he yelled. "You missed me by an inch."
And then I collapsed and fainted. When I came around Liddy was rubbingmy temples with eau de quinine, and the search was in full blast.
Well, the man was gone. The stable burned to the ground, while thecrowd cheered at every falling rafter, and the volunteer firedepartment sprayed it with a garden hose. And in the house Alex andHalsey searched every corner of the lower floor, finding no one.
The truth of my story was shown by the broken window and the overturnedchair. That the unknown had got up-stairs was almost impossible. Hehad not used the main staircase, there was no way to the upper floor inthe east wing, and Liddy had been at the window, in the west wing,where the servants' stair went up. But we did not go to bed at all.Sam Bohannon and Warner helped in the search, and not a closet escapedscrutiny. Even the cellars were given a thorough overhauling, withoutresult. The door in the east entry had a hole through it where mybullet had gone.
The hole slanted downward, and the bullet was embedded in the porch.Some reddish stains showed it had done execution.
"Somebody will walk lame," Halsey said, when he had marked the courseof the bullet. "It's too low to have hit anything but a leg or foot."
From that time on I watched every person I met for a limp, and to thisday the man who halts in his walk is an object of suspicion to me. ButCasanova had no lame men: the nearest approach to it was an old fellowwho tended the safety gates at the railroad, and he, I learned oninquiry, had two artificial legs. Our man had gone, and the large andexpensive stable at Sunnyside was a heap of smoking rafters and charredboards. Warner swore the fire was incendiary, and in view of theattempt to enter the house, there seemed to be no doubt of it.
The Circular Staircase Page 23
