Black Caesar's Clan Part 24

Strolling over to the front door, he unbarred it and opened it wide, standing fearlessly in its lighted threshold.

"Pa.s.s him along to me," he bade Standish. "Or, you can let him go. He won't miss the way out."

"But," argued Milo, stubbornly retaining his grip on the ragged s.h.i.+rt collar, "I don't agree with you. I'm going to keep him here and lock him up, till--"

He got no further. The sight of the open door leading to freedom was too much for the youth's stolidity. Twisting suddenly, he drove his yellow teeth deep into the fleshy part of Standish's hand. And, profiting by the momentary slackening of Milo's grasp, he made one wildly scrambling dive across the hall, vaulting over the excited Bobby Burns (and losing a handful of his disreputable trousers to the dog's jaws in the process) and volleying over the threshold with the speed of an express train.

While Standish nursed his sorely-bitten hand, Brice watched the lad's lightning progress across the lawn.

Then, still standing in the open doorway, he called back, laughingly to the two others: "Part of my well-built scheme has gone to smash. He didn't stop to look for any of his clansmen. Not even the redoubtable Pop. He just beat it for the hidden path, without hitting the ground more than about once, on the way. And he dived into the path like a rabbit.

He'll never stop till he reaches the beach. And then the chances are he'll swim straight out to sea without even waiting to find where the Caesars' boats are cached .... Best get some hot water and iodine and wash out that bite, Standish. Don't look so worried, Miss Standis.h.!.+ I'm in no danger, standing here. In the first place, I doubt if they'll have the nerve to rush the house at all,--certainly not yet, if they didn't recognize our fast-running friend. In the second, they're after Hade and your brother. And in this bright light they can't possibly mistake me for either of them. h.e.l.lo!" he broke off. "There went one of them, just then, across that patch of light, down yonder. And, unless my eyes are going back on me, there's another of them creeping along toward the head of the path. They must have seen--or thought they saw--some one dash down there, even if it was too dark for them to recognize him. And they are trying to get some line on who he is .... The moon is coming up. That won't help them, to any great extent."

He turned back into the room, partly shutting the door behind him. But he did not finish the process of closing it.

For--sweet, faint, yet distinct to them all--the soaring notes of a mocking-bird's song swelled out on the quiet of the night.

"Rodney Hade!" gasped Standish. "It's his first signal. He gives it when he's a hundred yards from the end. Good Lord!

And he's going to walk straight into that ambus.h.!.+ It's--it's sure death for him!"

CHAPTER IX

THE FIGURE IN WHITE

For a moment none of the three spoke. Standish and his sister stared at each other in dumb horror. Then Milo took an uncertain step toward the door. Brice made no move to check him, but stood looking quietly on, with the detached expression of a man who watches an interesting stage drama.

Just within the threshold, Standish paused, irresolute, his features working. And Gavin Brice, as before, read his emotions as though they were writ in large letters. He knew Milo was not only a giant in size and in strength, but that in ordinary circ.u.mstances or at bay he was valiant enough. But it is one thing to meet casual peril, and quite another to fare forth in the dark among six savage men, all of whom are waiting avidly for the chance to murder.

A braver warrior than Milo Standish might well have hesitated to face sure death in such a form, for the mere sake of saving a man whom he feared and hated, and whose existence threatened his own good name and liberty.

Wherefore, just within the shelter of the open door, the giant paused and hung back, fighting for the nerve to go forth on his fatal errand of heroism. Gavin, studying him, saw with vivid clearness the weakness of character which had made this man the dupe and victim of Hade, and which had rendered him helpless against the wiles of a master-mind.

But if Standish hesitated, Claire did not. After one look of scornful pity at her wavering half-brother, she moved swiftly past him to the threshold. There was no hint of hesitation in her free step as she ran to the rescue of the man who had ruined Milo's career. And both onlookers knew she would brave any and all the dire perils of the lurking marauders, in order to warn back the unconsciously oncoming Hade.

As she sped through the doorway, Brice came to himself, with a start. Springing forward, he caught the flying little figure and swung it from the ground. Disregarding Claire's violent struggles, he bore her back into the house, shutting and locking the door behind her and standing with his back to it.

"You can't go, Miss Standis.h.!.+" he said, in stern command, as if rebuking some fractious child. "Your little finger is worth more than that blackguard's whole body. Besides," he added, grimly, "mocking birds, that sing nearly three weeks ahead of schedule, must be prepared to pay the bill."

She was struggling with the door. Then, realizing that she could not open it, she ran to the nearest window which looked out on the lawn and the path-head. Tugging at the sash she flung it open, and next fell to work at the shutter-bars. As she threw wide the shutters, and put one knee on the sill, Milo Standish caught her by the shoulder. Roughly drawing her back into the room, he said:

"Brice is right. It's not your place to go. It would be suicide. Useless suicide, at that. I'd go, myself. But--but--"

"'They that take up the sword shall perish by the sword,'"

quoted Gavin, tersely. "The man who sets traps must expect to step into a trap some day. And those Caesars will be more merciful a.s.sa.s.sins than the moccasin snakes would have been .... He's taking plenty of time, to cover that last hundred yards. Perhaps he met the conch boy, running back, and had sense enough to take alarm."

"Not he," denied Standish. "That fool boy was so scared, he'd plunge into the brush or the water, the second he heard Rodney's step. Those conchs can keep as mum as Seminoles.

He'd never let Rodney see him or hear him. He--"

Standish did not finish his sentence. Into his slow-moving brain, an idea dawned. Leaning far out of the window and shouting at the top of his enormous lungs, he bawled through the night:

"Hade! Back, man! Go back! They'll kill you!"

The bull-like bellow might have been heard for half a mile.

And, as it ceased, a m.u.f.fled snarling, like a dog's, came from the edge of the forest, where waited the silent men whose knives were drawn for the killing.

And, in the same instant, from the head of the path, drifted the fluting notes of a mocking bird.

Disregarding or failing to catch the meaning of the thickly-bellowed warning, Rodney Hade was advancing nonchalantly upon his fate. The three in the hallway crowded into the window-opening, tense, wordless, mesmerized, peering aghast toward the screen of vines which veiled the end of the path.

The full moon, which Brice had glimpsed as it was rising, a minute or so before, now breasted the low tops of the orange trees across the highroad and sent a level shaft of light athwart the lawn. Its clear beams played vividly on the dark forest, revealing the screen of vines at the head of the path, and revealing also three crouching dark figures, close to the ground, at the very edge of the lawn, not six feet from the path head.

And, almost instantly, with a third repet.i.tion of the mocking bird call, the vine screen was swept aside. Out into the moons.h.i.+ne sauntered a slight figure, all in white, yachting cap on head, lighted cigarette in hand.

The man came out from the black vine-screen, and, for a second, stood there, as if glancing carelessly about him.

Milo Standish shouted again, at the top of his lungs. And this time, Claire's voice, like a silver bugle, rang out with his in that cry of warning.

But, before the dual shout was fairly launched, three dark bodies had sprung forward and hurled themselves on the unsuspecting victim. There was a tragically brief struggle.

Then, all four were on the ground, the vainly-battling white body underneath. And there was a gruesome sound as of angry beasts worrying their meat.

Carried out of his own dread, by the spectacle, Milo Standish vaulted over the sill and out onto the veranda. But there he came to a halt. For there was no further need for him to throw away his own life in the belated effort at rescue.

The three black figures had regained their feet. And, on the trampled lawn-edge in front of them lay a huddle of white, with darker stains splashed here and there on it. The body lay in an impossible posture--a posture which Nature neither intends nor permits. It told its own dreadful story, to the most uninitiated of the three onlookers at the window.

With dragging feet, Milo Standish turned back, and reentered the house, as he had gone out of it.

"I am a coward!" he said, heavily. "I could have saved him.

Or we could have fought, back to back, till we were killed.

It would have been a white man's way of dying. I am a coward!"

He sank down in a chair and buried his bearded face in his hands. No one contradicted him or made any effort at comfort.

Claire, deathly pale, still crouched forward, staring blindly at the moveless white figure at the head of the path.

"Peace to his soul!" said Brice, in a hushed voice, adding under his breath: "If he had one!"

Then, laying his hand gently on Claire's arm, he drew her away from the window and shut the blinds on the sight which had so horrified them.

"Go and lie down, Miss Standish," he bade her. "This has been an awful thing for you or any other woman to look on. Take a double dose of aromatic spirits of ammonia, and tell one of the maids to bring you some black coffee .... Do as I say, please!" he urged, as she looked mutely at him and made no move to obey. "You may need your strength and your nerve.

And--try to think of anything but what you've just seen.

Remember, he was an outlaw, a murderer, the man who wrecked your brother's honorable life, a thorough-paced blackguard, a man who merits no one's pity. More than that, he was one of Germany's cleverest spies, during the war. His life was forfeit, then, for the injury he did his country. I am not heartless in speaking this way of a man who is dead. I do it, so that you may not feel the horror of his killing as you would if a decent man had died, like that. Now go, please."

Tenderly, he led her to the foot of the stairs. The house man was just returning from the locking of the upstairs shutters.

To him Brice gave the order for coffee to be taken to her room and for one of the maids to attend her there.

As she pa.s.sed dazedly up the stairs, Gavin stood over the broken giant who still sat inert and huddled in his chair, face in hands.

"Buck up!" said Brice, impatiently. "If you can grieve for a man who made you his slave and--"