Miss Maitland Private Secretary Part 35

But there was nothing dreamlike in the force with which the rope was thrown about him and tightened round the tree. As he felt it strained across his chest, lashed round his legs, girding him to the trunk close at its bark, he recognized expertness and strength in the hands that bound him. The thing was done with extraordinary speed and deftness, and ended by a lump of waste, that smelled of gasoline, being thrust into his mouth.

The heavy tread moved again through the underbrush, the man pa.s.sed to the rock, and, his back to Ferguson, crouched on the light's edges counting the money. Ferguson saw him in silhouette, a large, humped body with bent head. This done, he went to the door of the coupe and lifted out the child. He had some difficulty in getting hold of her, muttered an oath, then drew her out, carried her to the roadside and set her down on the gra.s.s. There was a moment when he crossed the full gush of illumination and Ferguson had a clear glimpse of him, a chauffeur's cap on his head, the lower part of his face covered by a thick beard.

Returning to his car, he jumped in. Its lurching start broke into a sudden flight, it rushed; Ferguson could hear the bounding of stones, the creaking and wrenching of its body as it hurtled down the road.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Ferguson saw him in silhouette, a large, humped body with bent head_]

Silence settled, the deep, dreaming quiet of the woods. The young man tried to struggle, to writhe and work himself loose, but his bonds held fast, and he found himself choked for air, stifling and snorting over his gag. He gave it up and looked at the child. By straining his eyes he could just see her, a small, relaxed body, one hand outflung, her profile, held in a trance-like sleep, marble white against the gra.s.s. A hideous fear a.s.sailed him:-she might be dead. Some drug had evidently been administered to keep her quiet-an overdose! He wrenched and pressed at the cords, almost strangled and had to stop, the sweat pouring into his eyes, his heart pounding on the rope that cut into his chest. He called on his will, felt himself steadied, his smothered breath came easier, the only sound on the silence.

Then another broke upon it, far away, from the direction of the Sound-a thin, clear report. He stiffened, all his faculties strained to listen, heard it again, several in a spattering run, dropping distinct, like little globules piercing the stillness. "Shooting!" he thought with a wild surge of excitement, "out toward the water-Oh, Lord, have they got him?"

He listened again, but heard nothing. And then from the ground rose a moaning breath, a sleepy cry-Bebita was awake. He wrenched his head till he could see her plainly, her face turned upward, the eyes still closed, the forehead puckered with a look of pain. He tried to emit some word, heard it only as a guttural mutter, and watching, saw her stir, the out-stretched arm sway upward, her eyes open, dazed and heavy, and heard her drowsy whimper of, "Mummy," and then, "Oh, Annie, where are you?"

Slowly, her head moving as her glance swept the unfamiliar prospect, she sat up.

He remembered the next few minutes as something incredibly horrible, the child's consciousness clearing to an overwhelming fear. She looked about, saw him, scrambled to her feet and began to scream, shrill, terrified cries, crouching away from him like a scared animal. She made a rush for the motor, climbing in, cowering down, calling on the names that meant safety: "Mummy! Oh, Mummy! Gramp, Daddy-Come! _Come_ to me!"

An answer came, the hollow bray of a motor horn, the shout of a man's voice, then the twin spears of light, the whirring buzz of a machine shooting out of the road's dark tunnel-Chapman Price in the black car.

He leapt out and ran to her, caught her up, strained her to him, held her head back to look into her face, kissed her, babbled words of love that broke on his lips and he hid his face on her neck. She twined round him, arms and legs clutching and clinging, sobbing out, "Popsy, Popsy!"

over and over.

CHAPTER XXVIII-THE MAN IN THE BOAT

Price took Bebita to Gra.s.slands, handed her over to Annie and telephoned in to the Janneys. Then he left to rejoin Ferguson who was to go to the sh.o.r.e and find out the meaning of the shots. Price, missing the leading car, had decided that it had turned from the pike and scouring the side roads in a blind chase had heard the shots, agreeing with Ferguson that they came from the direction of the Sound.

Ferguson went that way, driving at breakneck speed. He had almost reached the sh.o.r.e, felt the water's coolness, saw the wood's vista widen when, to avoid a deep rut, he slewed his machine to the left. The lights penetrated a thicket, revealing behind the woven foliage, a dark, large body, black among the tangled green. He drew up, peering at it-it was not a rock; its side showed smooth through the boughs. He jumped out and pushed his way through the bushes. It was a taxi, its lamps extinguished, broken branches and crushed foliage marking its track.

It gave evidence of a violent flight and a hasty desertion, careened to one side, its door open, a rug hanging over the step. He went to the back, struck a match and looked at the license tag-the number was that of the motor he had followed. Covered by the darkness, driven deep among the trees, it could easily have pa.s.sed unnoticed until the daylight betrayed it.

The plan of escape revealed a new artfulness-the man had made off either on foot or in another vehicle. It accounted for the license-he knew his pursuers would mark it and look for a car carrying that number. In the face of such a crafty completeness of detail the young man felt himself reduced to a baffled indecision. Cogitating on the various routes his quarry might have taken, he ran out on to the sh.o.r.e road and here again halted.

Before him the Sound lay, a smooth dark floor, along which glided the small golden glimmerings of river craft. He looked up and down the road, discernible as a gray path between the upstanding solidity of the woods and the flat solidity of the water. Some distance in front a black blot took shape under his exploring glance as a small house. He started the car and ran toward it, seeing as he approached a dancing yellow spot come from behind it in swaying pa.s.sage. He stopped, the yellow spot steadied, rose, swung aloft-a lantern in the hands of a man, half dressed, who came toward him spying out from under the upraised glow.

Ferguson spoke abruptly:

"Did you hear shots a while ago?"

The man setting his lantern on the ground, spoke with the slow phlegm of the native:

"I did-close here. I bin down to the waterside seein' if I could make out what they was."

The house was skirted by a balcony along which a second light now came into view; this time from a lamp carried in the hand of a woman. She was wrapped in a bed gown, a straggle of loose hair hanging round a frightened face.

"We was asleep and they woke us up. They was right off there," she jerked her head to the Sound behind her.

"From the water?" Ferguson asked.

"Sounded that way," the man took it up. "We wasn't sure at first what it was; then they come crack, crack, one after the other, from somewheres beyont. My wife, she said it was motor boats, said she heard 'em off across the water. But by the time we got something on and was outside it was over. There wasn't no more and we couldn't see nothing. I bin down on the beach lookin' round, thinkin' they might have come from there, but I ain't found no tracks or signs of anybody."

"I was wonderin'," said the woman, "if may be it was that patrol boat-the one they got this summer runnin' along the sh.o.r.e for thieves-That they caught a sight of one and went after him."

Ferguson was silent for a moment then said:

"Is there any place round here where a boat could be hidden, deep enough water for a launch?"

The man answered:

"Yes, right down the road a step there's a cove and an old dock; used to belong to the folks that lived on the bluff but the house burned down a while back and ain't been rebuilt and no one's used the dock since. A feller could hide a boat there fine; it's all overgrown so you can't see it unless you know where it is."

"I'd like to take a look at it," said Ferguson. "Come along with the lantern."

The place was only a few yards from the mouth of the wood road. Trees and shrubs sheltered it, concealing with their rank growth a small wharf, rotted and sagging to the water line. The lantern rays revealed a recent presence, scattered leaves and twigs on the wooden planking, the long marshy gra.s.ses showing a track from the road to the wharf's edge.

"Yes, sir," said the native, much impressed; "some one's been here to-night and not s'long ago either. You can see where the dew's been swep' off the gra.s.ses right to the water."

Ferguson said nothing; he now saw the whole plan of escape-the coupe left in the woods, a short run to the cove where a boat had been concealed, the get-away down on across the Sound. What had the shots meant? Was the woman right in thinking the police patrol had come upon the fleeing criminal? And if they had what had been the result?

Lantern in hand, the man at his heels, he crushed through the swampy copse to the sh.o.r.e. There his glance swept the long stretch of the water, sewn in the distance with a pattern of moving sparks. Two of them, red and green, stole over the ebony surface toward him, advancing with an even, gliding smoothness, piercing and steady, like the eyes of a stealthily approaching animal, fixing him with a meaning scrutiny. He s.n.a.t.c.hed up the lantern and ran for a point that jutted out in a pebbly cape. Standing on its tip he raised and waved the light, letting his voice ring out across the stillness:

"Boat ahoy!"

The lights drew closer, their reflections stabbing down into the oily depths, gleam below gleam. The pulsing of a m.u.f.fled engine came with them, a prow took shape, a s.h.i.+ne of wood and bra.s.s above the l.u.s.terless tide. Ferguson called again:

"Who are you?"

An answer rose in a man's surly voice:

"What's that to you?"

"A good deal. I'm Ferguson of Council Oaks and I'm looking for the boat that fired on some one round here about an hour ago."

The voice replied, its tone changed to sudden conciliation:

"Oh, Mr. Ferguson; couldn't see who it was. We're what you're looking for-the police patrol. We have the launch here in tow."

"Have you got the man?"

"Yes, sir. He didn't answer our challenge and fired on us. We chased and gave it back to him-a running fight. One of us got him-he's dead."

"Go on to my wharf; I'll be there when you come."

On his way along the sh.o.r.e road he met Price, paused for a quick explanation, and the two cars ran at a racing clip to Ferguson's wharf.

The men were standing on its end when the police boat glided into the gush of light that fell from the high electric lamps at either side of the s.h.i.+p. Behind it, lifted and dropped by the languid wavelets, was a launch, a covered shape lying on the floor.

The story of the police was quickly told. The night, dark and windless, was the kind chosen by the water thieves for their operations. The men had been on the watch faring noiselessly with engine m.u.f.fled and hooded lamps. It was nearly the end of their run, a length of sh.o.r.e with few estates, when they saw a boat glide from a part of the beach peculiarly dark and deserted. The craft carried no lights, a fact that instantly roused their suspicions, and they waited. As it drew out for the open water they challenged. There was no answer, but a sudden acceleration of its speed, shooting by them like a streak for the mid reaches of the Sound.