THE PART OF ABERCROMBIE, R.N.
"Come, girl, you must go!" commanded Millard, harshly.
"I will not," she replied, coldly, "until my escort is ready to go with
me."
"He will not go with you," replied Millard, significantly. "And you
must not remain. What is to be done here is no thing for a dainty woman
to see."
"Mr. Benson," appealed the girl, "will you enter the cab first?"
"If he does, the cab will not leave," sneered Millard.
All this while the four men who had just come from the house were
stealthily grouping themselves. Jack watched them alertly. He did not
intend to be taken unawares, yet he hesitated to draw his pistol while
Miss Huston was there.
"Go, girl!" Millard ordered again.
"I have told you, already, that I shall go only when Mr. Benson gives
the word and accompanies me," replied the girl, white but courageous.
"Then we won't waste more time," laughed the wretch, harshly. "Since
you will stay, then you must be a witness of what you have brought on
my worst foe! Close in, men--get him!"
As the men sprang to obey, and Jack dodged nimbly back, Daisy Huston
uttered a piercing scream. The next thing she did was wholly natural.
Under the intense strain of her feelings the girl fainted.
"Take her!" nodded Millard, to the driver, who was plainly one of the
desperate lot. "Take her from here as fast as you can."
The driver, ready for his work, snatched up the girl's light form.
"Have a care what you do--all of you!" cried Jack Benson, warningly,
and now, in his hand, the revolver gleamed.
But one of the wretches, darting in at Jack's right, from behind, aimed
a blow with a cudgel at the weapon. He struck it from the young
lieutenant's hand.
Down to the ground it fell, but Lieutenant Benson was as quick as
thought, now.
He bent over, snatching up the weapon, then ducked away from a follow-up
blow at his own head, and sprang back.
"You first, then, Millard!" cried the young acting naval officer.
Full of purpose, Lieutenant Jack pressed the trigger. It stuck. No
report followed. That blow from the cudgel had jammed the cylinder.
Having dropped the senseless form of Daisy Huston in the cab the driver
sprang to the box, lashing the horses, just as Lieutenant Benson
discovered the uselessness of his weapon as a firearm.
Then, indeed, young Benson knew that this must be a fight to the very
death. Yet he was a naval officer at heart, as much as by special
appointment. At a time like this he held life cheaply.
The first man to get within reach was laid flat by a blow with the butt
of Jack's revolver.
Instantly young Benson wheeled, to strike at another pressing foe.
Instead, he received a glancing though painful blow on his own left
shoulder. Ere the assailant could recover, however, Benson leaped at
him and would have felled him had not Millard himself leaped in,
striking up the young naval officer's arm.
Once more Lieutenant Jack leaped back. His whole body was alert, nerves
and muscles responding magnificently. He fairly vibrated defense.
"Close in on him, men--surround him!" snarled Millard. "You've got to
get him! We haven't many minutes left. We don't know at what instant
to look for interference."
Jack landed effectively on another of the rascals. Just as he was
wheeling, however, to ward off the attack of another, a stick landed
against his left knee, partly crippling him.
In moving backward Benson almost stumbled over a stone half the size of
his head.
Right there, in the same movement with which he thrust the revolver into
one of his pockets, he bent down, snatched up the heavy stone, and held
it poised over his head.
"Now, come on! Now, close in!" cried Jack Benson, exulting. "The first
man who gets too close has his head split open! Who wants it?"
His usually, good-humored face was transformed by the fiery rage of
battle.
Surely there was some of the old Norseman streak left in Jack Benson's
make-up.
As he stood there, keenly alert, ready to heave the rock, he looked like
a young Thor armed with massive stone hammer.
"Spread! Get in back of him!" yelled Millard, hoarsely. "I'll take
the position of attack in front. Down him!"
"Guess which way I'm going to heave this stone!" cried Jack, tauntingly,
as he half wheeled, so as to watch those trying to steal a march in
his rear.
"Bosh! You can soon stop that, men!" jeered Millard, suddenly. "Fall
back and get a fistful of stones. Rain them in on the youngster at a
safe distance. One of you will soon hit him and send him down!"
Young Benson gasped inwardly with dismay, though his face did not
blanch. Millard's followers drew back to obey.
Yes! These fellows could throw small stones from a much greater distance
than the young lieutenant could hurl the large one. They had but to
keep up this fire for a few seconds when one of them was certain to hit
him in the head, putting him out of the fight.
Jack Benson dropped the big stone, though he stood over it. Like a
flash his revolver came out again. Aiming at Millard, the young naval
officer made frantic efforts to make the cylinder revolve. But the
weapon proved to be hopelessly jammed.
"Now, keep on volleying the youngster with until you have him down and
wholly out!" yelled Millard, hoarsely.
The air seemed filled with stones. Jack hopped about as nimbly as
possible, dodging all he could. Yet one part of his body after another
was hit.
Rat-a-tat-tat! Jack hardly comprehended what this new noise meant when
it grew in volume. Then a horseman rode into the yard at a charge.
"One down!" yelled the rider, with savage glee, as he drove his mount
squarely against one of the wretches, bowling him over and underfoot.
Hardly seeming to veer, the rider made for another fellow, and barely
missed him.
Just a second later, so it seemed, this valiant rider hauled the horse
on its haunches, and swung back, heading for another wretch.
Millard leaped at the horseman, a stone in his uplifted fist.
But Jack Benson saw him, and a well-planted blow sent Millard to the
ground.
"Bully good of you, Benson, old chap!" called a hearty voice. Then the
horseman spurred forward, running down another of Benson's late
assailants. The two remaining bolted as fast as they could, go.
"Mr. Abercrombie!" cried Lieutenant Jack.
"Yes, it's I: and jolly glad I got here in good time," laughed the
British naval officer, whom this brief rollicking battle had made as
gleeful as a boy.
"But how on earth did you happen to turn up?" asked Jack, a feeling of
mystery coming over him after he had glanced at Millard and had made
sure that the latter would "sleep" for some time to come.
"Why, I was out for my afternoon canter, dear old fellow," bubbled
Lieutenant Abercrombie, R.N. "I was coming down the road at a hard
trot, don't you know, when a cab rolled by. A young woman--and a
deuced pretty one--thrust her head out and shrieked at me. What
could I do? It was deuced extraordinary, and I had to do something
quickly, so I rode alongside the cab and told the driver to hold up.
I must have looked unusually menacing, don't you know, for, by Jove,
the fellow obeyed me. Then I reached up and yanked him down off the
cab. The fellow really started to blackguard me, while the young
woman was shouting something at me at the same time I had to silence
the fellow, don't you know, so I could understand the young lady.
So I struck him over the head with the butt of my riding whip. My
word, I must have hit the blackguard hard, for he just curled up and
lay down. The young lady sprang out of the cab and begged me to hurry
down here. She looked able to take care of herself, so I just left my
revolver with her, and, by Jove, here I am--and deuced glad of it.
Upon my word, Benson, dear old fellow, all the luck seemed to be
running against you."
"It was," Jack admitted, dryly. "But now I've got the man I came after.
I've got to keep him, too," added Lieutenant Benson, gravely.
As he spoke, the submarine boy drew a pair of handcuffs from an inner
pocket.
"By Jove, do naval youngsters in this country carry such jewelry?"
murmured Lieutenant Abercrombie, R.N.
"They do, I guess, when they're engaged on work like mine at present,"
smiled Lieutenant Jack, United States Navy.
"Now, then, by Jove, I think I'd better go back to the young lady,"
suddenly decided Abercrombie, for Millard still showed no signs of
recovering his senses. One of the other two men who had been ridden
down now recovered enough to begin to crawl away furtively.
"Do you want that chap?" asked Abercrombie.
"I have no facilities for keeping him a prisoner," Jack answered.
"For that matter, I guess he's nothing but a hired tough. The
Washington police can find and take care of him at their convenience."
"Good enough," nodded the British lieutenant. "And now--"
"Would you mind if I go to her, instead?" inquired Benson, hastily.
"Not in the least, dear old fellow. And, while you're gone, I'll
constitute myself a special 'bobby' to look after this chap of yours
in the bracelets."
So Jack hurried off up the road, wondering how Daisy Huston fared
with a revolver and a hostile cabman.