The Riddle of the Spinning Wheel Part 24

Sit down, for heaven's sake, if you must be here, and don't let those men down there see you. I'm--I'm making some observations on my own, but at any minute someone may come up here--and I wouldn't answer for the consequences. You've fallen into a hornet's nest, Catherine, and only a woman with some desperate plan of action would do that. Don't you know what's being carried on down there?"

She shook her dark head, and dropped instantly into a little heap of satin and dark-coloured velvet beside him in the darkness.

"No," she whispered softly. "I wondered what you were doing, and who your companion might be. Send him away, Ross. I _must_ speak with you alone!"

"All right." The inflection of voice was so identical with that of the new lord of the manor as to make Dollops fairly jump at sound of it. He would hardly have been able to believe the evidence of his own ears if he had not seen this thing done before in those old Apache days, in the Inn of The Twisted Arm, when the notorious Margot and her crew had run them to earth and this was the only way out: "Get along there, Parsons.

There's nothing more to be seen now. You can meet me some time next week--if things go all right with me and I'm not already swinging at the end of a long rope! And we'll have another confab together. But you'd better make yourself scarce now. There'll be a d.i.c.kens of a kybosh if they find we've broken parole, and I don't want you hauled into the beastly thing. So long. And _listen--listen_: be careful--do!"

Dollops nodded his head forthwith, and by dint of wriggling and scrambling made his exit from this astonis.h.i.+ng pair, and, free of the bare moorside at last, broke cover and started off at a good run, wondering what the d.i.c.kens they had stumbled into _now_.

Meanwhile the erstwhile Ross and his lady friend sat on behind the furze-bush in their somewhat ridiculous predicament, and talked in whispers.

"What is it you want to say to me?" said "Ross," a hint of sharpness in his low-pitched voice. "That you should run this risk--it is madness, Catherine--madness!"

"Nothing is madness that I could do for _your_ sake," she responded pa.s.sionately, putting a hand over his as it rested upon the brown earth, and bending toward him. "Don't you know, Ross, haven't you guessed my secret yet? Surely you must have seen it? I have tried to tell you with my eyes, time and time again, and when I have caught that odd look in yours when you looked at Cynthia. I felt my heart bound with gladness that you did not care for her. And that has made me brave. Oh, my dear--my dear! Listen to me, and do what I ask of you. If you _did_ kill your father, Ross, that man down there at the Castle will make you swing for it. I know it--I feel it here--here! Those penetrating eyes of his can see beyond the veil of deception right down into your heart. If you have done this dreadful thing, tell me, and I have made all arrangements that you can escape at once. I've a car waiting in the lane. I 'phoned for it at the garage by the station only a bare two hours ago--and I had a difficulty, too, as you can imagine, with the whole house full of policemen and our every action watched. But I was desperate--desperate!

I couldn't see you arrested for _that_! And so, while there is yet time.... Oh, don't you see? It's your liberty I'm offering you! And we could start away together and make our lives afresh in a new country.

Ross, Ross, don't you hear, don't you _see_? Every minute is precious while that man is in command at the Castle. He looks a fool--but he is a clever fool at that. I don't trust him. I'm not a weak woman, Ross, to be afraid of a murderer--pshaw! what is that? If a man has need to do it, and the courage, I can even _admire_! And I love you! Don't speak now, Ross--just come, and let us slip away together. In this wild country we can soon be lost--slip down the coast and get away on the first steamer to--anywhere! I've money on me--see here. Plenty of it! I sent Hilda down to draw it all out of the bank this morning. (Thank G.o.d for the comfort of your telephone!) She'd do anything for me--that girl--since I caught her stealing Cynthia's pearl necklace, and threatened her if she didn't return it to tell the whole sordid story to the family. And she swore to help me any time I needed her. So come, Ross--come now--come quickly! but come--come!"

Her whispered words trailed off into silence at last, and Cleek, catching his breath for a moment at the whole audacious plot which she had laid so successfully, could not help but admire, even as he felt the rush of contempt that a man must feel for every woman who can cheapen herself thus in his eyes. But here was a pretty kettle of fish indeed!

What to say to her? what to do? It took time to think, so he merely caught her hand and squeezed it, and felt all sorts of a beast for making such use of her confession as to lead her on to even deeper things.

She reached a hand out at the pressure of his fingers, and wound it about his neck.

"You'll come?" she whispered close against his ear.

He shrugged his shoulders. The issue must be faced, and faced now.

"Let's get out of this danger-zone, where we can talk in a little more comfort and less fear of our lives," he responded quickly, casting his eyes about him to see if the coast was clear. "Quick! draw your dark wrap over your head and make for cover. That furze-bush over there! Get behind it, and drop down, and I'll follow. From there, there is a chain of bushes behind which we can make for the high-road at last. Quick! the men are coming this way, some of them. And if we're caught...!"

Her face was fearless. She acted instantly upon his suggestion, gathering her dark velvet cloak about her and pulling it up over her face and head, and then sped out suddenly across the open s.p.a.ce like a fleet shadow, until a shaft of moonlight, penetrating through the clouded sky, fell full upon her hurrying figure, etching it almost as clearly as though it had been day.

Cleek sucked in his breath and, half-crouching, half-running, sped after her. G.o.d! what if the men had seen! He glanced back quickly over his shoulder, and then redoubled his pace. For, of a sudden, with the speed of a lightning-flash every flare in that valley had gone out--zip!--like that. Every voice had dropped to stillness, and the night was a hideous thing of running footsteps, pelting, he knew only too well, up the hillside after them--those watchers who had seen the secret of the night, and to-morrow might give it forth to an unsuspecting world. Their lives wouldn't be worth much if _this_ crew caught them, that was certain.

Panting, he reached her side, caught hold of her elbow, and pinning it close in his fingers hurried her forward, every faculty alert, every nerve a-tremble. Her panting breath was like the breath of a spent runner; she wouldn't last far in those high heels, he knew; the going was too hard. It was only a matter of time now. The hurrying footsteps seemed to be coming nearer and nearer.

He bent his face down to hers.

"The motor-car? Where?" he said in a quick, panting voice.

She managed to stammer out a reply, stumbling feet falling over the rough ground, tripping in clumps of heather, bruising themselves against harsh stones.

"In the lane--beyond--over there! I've been a fool--leave me and go yourself!" she panted out in disjointed sentences that were ringing with despair.

"Never! We'll get there yet. Gather up your skirts.... Gad! you're done!" It was his own voice that spoke to her, and for a sudden moment he had forgotten the part he played in the exigencies of this distressing situation. He heard her gasp suddenly, send startled eyes up into his face, and then sway against him, and realized his folly--too late. The shock of the thing had unnerved her. In the darkness she could not see his face clearly but the voice had been--different. He'd brought the whole structure about his ears by one foolish momentary mistake.

Then quite suddenly she fainted against him.

"Fool!" he apostrophized himself. "Blind fool!" and, stopping instantly, caught her up in his arms just as the lane hove in sight, and throwing her across his shoulder, took the added burden in his best athletic fas.h.i.+on, and ran.

CHAPTER XXV

THE MAN IN THE BLACK MASK

They reached the motor only just in the nick of time, for already the darkness behind them was rent with cries of "There they are! Head them off!--there they are!" making the night hideous with the noise of them, and the stampede of feet seemed to grow more dense with every minute.

Cleek flung his unconscious burden in the car, leaped in after it, and tapped the chauffeur upon the shoulder.

"Extinguish your lamps and make for Aygon Castle--as quick as you can!"

he gave out in the sharp staccato of excitement. "And the quicker the better! There's trouble here, and if those men catch up with us to-night I'll not answer for the lady's safety."

"Yessir."

Then with a whizz and a whirr the car was off, rocketing down the lane and taking the corners upon two wheels, so that Cleek had hardly a breath left in his body, and the rush of air that swept them as they sped away began to revive the unconscious form of Catherine Dowd who lay upon the seat beside him.

A drop of brandy, rather uncertainly administered because of the darkness and the jolting of the car, revived her still more, and in another moment she had opened her eyes and let them dwell upon his face.

In the darkness they glowed like two lamps. And her face was very frightened.

"My G.o.d! Not Ross!" she broke out uncertainly, shutting her hands together across her breast in her agitation. "Then--who are you?"

"Who knows?" he responded with a touch of gallantry. "It was your mistake in the first place, remember, not mine. A friend in need, perhaps, who has been able to save you from the consequences of a very foolish action. You know what those men were doing?"

She shook her head dumbly.

"Then you will learn to-morrow from the lips of a man whom you have learned to distrust, because he has proved more than a match for you already. That is so, isn't it? Your Mr. Deland up at the Castle. From what I heard, you have broken parole, and to do that----"

"You won't tell?--oh, surely you won't tell!" she gave out in a low, wrung voice. "How you could mimic Ross Duggan as you did is beyond me.

But you stole my confidence, and I demand its return: that you tell nothing of to-night to a living soul. Will you promise me that?"

He paused a moment and looked down at her with frowning brows. Then his face cleared.

"Very well, then. That is a bargain. But I don't think you realize just how near to actual danger you ran to-night in your mad pursuit of Ross Duggan. What made you think I was he?"

"I don't know. Only I had followed him from the Castle down the lane, and then lost sight of him at the edge of the little burn which skirts that particular valley. And then I saw--you. And somehow, to my untrained eyes in the darkness, you looked like him--perhaps I was so anxious to find him that I willed myself unconsciously to think that you were he--but be that as it may, I made the profound mistake, and--now the mischief is done with a vengeance. What shall I do now? What _shall_ I do?"

"Return to Aygon Castle, my dear young lady, by the route by which you left it, and leave things in Higher Hands than yours," Cleek returned gravely, as they whizzed past in the darkness, the motor thrumming a purring accompaniment to his low-pitched voice. "Never urge a criminal to flee from justice, for as surely as he remains alive justice will find him--and make him pay the penalty all the more severely for his pains! Justice must be done in a civilized country, my dear young lady; that is what we pay our taxes for--to uphold those same judges who will mete out justice in a proper, unprejudiced fas.h.i.+on."

"But Ross--you think he is guilty?"

"Who knows? Time alone will tell. And his innocence will be better proved if he is not urged to fly away from the outcome of his actions. I must ask you, too, a favour. Rather, I must exact a promise. Please leave Ross Duggan alone until after to-morrow."

"And then?"

"If I know aught of anything, he will be beyond the power of your a.s.sistance--and perhaps not in need of it," he replied quietly. "Here is the Castle. Slip in, now, through that wicket-gate that the tradesmen use, I believe, and get back to the house as quickly as you can. I'll give your orders to the chauffeur."

She got out unsteadily, and then stood looking up at him, her eyes glowing darkly in the frame of her pale, serious face.