Eleven o'clock that night found Castle Craneycrow wrapped in the
stillness of death. Its inmates were awake, but they were petrified,
paralyzed by the discovery that Dorothy Garrison was gone. Scared
eyes looked upon white faces, and there was upon the heart of each
the clutch of an icy hand. So appalling was the sensation that the
five conspirators breathed not nor spoke, but listened for the
heartbeats that had stopped when fears finally gave way to complete
conviction. They were as if recovering from the fright of seeing a
ghost; spirits seemed to have swept past them with cold wings,
carrying off the prisoner they thought secure; only supernatural
forces could be charged with the penetration of their impregnable
wall.
The discovery of the prisoner's flight was not made until Baker
knocked on Lady Saxondale's door and inquired for Miss Garrison at
bedtime. Then it was recalled that she had left the others at nine
o'clock, pleading a headache, but she did not go to her room.
Investigation revealed the fact that her jewelry, a cape and a
traveling hat were missing. Remembering her first attempt to escape
and recalling the very apparent nervousness that marked her demeanor
during the day, Lady Saxondale alarmed the house.
Ten minutes later the conspirators and a knot of sleepy servants
stood in the courtyard, staring at the great gate. It was closed but
unlocked. There were but two known keys to the big lock, and since
the arrival of the party at the castle they had not been out of Lord
Saxondale's possession. The girl could not have used either of them
and the lock had not been forced; what wonder, then, that in the
first moments of bewilderment they shrank back as if opposed by the
supernatural?
No one present had seen her leave the castle, and there was no way
of telling how long she had been gone, except that it was not longer
than two hours. After the first shock of realization, however, the
men came to the conclusion that assistance had come from the
outside, or that there was a traitor on the inside. They were
excitedly questioning the long-trusted servants when Lady Jane made
a second discovery.
“Where is Turk?” she cried, and every eye swept through the group.
“Gone, by God!” exclaimed Quentin, in helpless amazement. No one had
given thought to his illness in the excitement of the moment. He had
been called forth with the rest, and when he coughed not even he
took note of the fact. This was no time to think of colds and fevers
and such a trifling thing as death. He shivered, but it was not with
the chill of a sick man; it was the shiver of fear.
“Good Lord, he can't be the one! Turk would die for me!” he cried,
almost piteously.
“He is gone, and so is she,” grated Lord Bob. “What are we to infer?
He has sold us out, Quentin; that's the truth of it.”
“I'm damned!” almost wept Dickey Savage. “They'll have a pack of
officers here before morning. I don't give a hoot for myself, but
Lady Saxondale and--”
“Great heaven! what have I brought you to in my folly?” groaned
Quentin, covering his face with his hands.
“Open the gate!” called a hoarse voice outside the wall, and every
heart stopped beating, every face went white. A heavy boot crashed
against the gate.
“The officers!” whispered Lady Jane, in terror. Dickey Savage's arm
went round her.
“Let me in! Git a move on!'
“It's Turk!” roared Quentin, springing toward the gate. An instant
later Turk was sprawling inside the circle of light shed by the
lantern, and a half-dozen voices were hurling questions at him.
The little man was in a sorry plight. He was dirt-covered and
bloody, and he was so full of blasphemy that he choked in
suppressing it.
“Where is she? Where have you been?” cried Quentin, shaking him
violently in his agitation.
“Gimme time, gimme time!” panted Turk. “I've got to git my breath,
ain't I? She's flew th' coop, an' I couldn't head her off. Say, has
a priest been loafin' aroun' here lately?”
“A priest!” cried Lord Bob. “There hasn't been one here since Father
Bivot came three years ago to--”
“I mean this week, not t'ree years ago. She's gone with a priest,
an' I'm nex' to who he is, too. He ain't no more priest 'n I am.
It's that French detective, Courant, an' he's worked us to a
fare-you-well. He's th' boy!”
This startling news threw the party into deeper consternation than
before. The little ex-burglar was not a fluent talker at best, but
he now excelled himself in brevity. In three minutes he had
concluded his story, and preparations were well under way for the
pursuit.
He was, according to his narrative, sitting in the lower end of the
courtyard about nine o'clock, calmly smoking his pipe, when his
attention was caught by the long, shrill call of a night bird. No
such sound had come to his ears during his stay at the castle, and
his curiosity was aroused. Not dreaming of what was to follow, he
slowly walked toward the front of the castle. A woman stood in the
shadow of the wall near the gate. Hardly had his eyes made out the
dim figure when the whistle was repeated. Before he fully grasped
the situation, the big gate swung slowly inward and another figure,
at first glance that of a woman, stood inside the wall. He heard the
woman call softly: “Is that you, Father?” A man's voice replied, but
the words were too low to be distinguished. The woman drew back as
if to return to the house, but the newcomer was at her side, and his
hand was on her arm.
There was a moment of indecision, then resistance, two or three
sharp words from the man, and then the two seemed to fade through
the wall. The ponderous gate was closing before the dumbfounded
watcher could collect his wits. Like a shot he was across the
stones, now alive to the meaning of the strange proceeding. With
desperate hands he grasped the bar of the gate and pulled, uttering
a loud shout of alarm at the same time. Surprised by the sudden
interference, the man on the other side gave way and Turk was
through the opening and upon him. A stunning blow on the head met
him as he hurled himself forward, and he plunged headlong to the
ground. As he struggled to his feet another blow fell, and then all
was darkness.
When he opened his eyes again two figures were careening down the
steep path, a hundred yards away. They were running, and were
plainly distinguishable in the moonlight. Turk knew that the woman
was Dorothy Garrison. He had heard her cry, after the first blow,
“Don't! Don't kill him, Father! It is Turk!” Crazed with anger and
determined to recapture her single-handed, Turk neglected to call
for help. With the blood streaming down his face, he dashed off in
pursuit. There was in his heart the desire to kill the man who had
struck him down. Near the foot of the hill he came up with them and
he was like a wildcat.
Miss Garrison had fallen to her knees and was moaning as if in pain.
The priest crouched behind her, protecting his person from a
possible shot from the pursuer. “For God's sake, don't shoot him!”
screamed the girl, but a moment later there was a flash of light, a
report, and a pistol ball whizzed by Turk's ear. He was unarmed, but
he did not stop. Throwing himself forward, he stretched out his arms
to grasp the crouching priest, hoping to prevent the firing of
another shot. But he had not reckoned on the cleverness of the man
at bay. The priest dropped flat to the ground and Turk plunged over
his body, wildly clutching for the prostrate man as he went. With
the cunning of a fox, the priest, on realizing that he could not
avoid a personal conflict, had looked about for means to end the
pursuit effectually.
Retarded in his progress by the tired, trembling girl, he saw that a
stand against the oncomer was unavoidable. He cleverly selected the
spot for this stand, and braced himself as for the onslaught.
Scarcely a yard beyond his position there was a sharp declivity
among the rocks, with a clear drop of a dozen feet or more to the
bottom of a wide crevasse. His shot went wild and he could not
repeat it, for Dorothy was frantically clutching his arm. The
strategem worked well, and he had the satisfaction of hearing a
mighty oath as Turk, unable to check himself, slipped from the edge
and went crashing to the rocks below.
With the speed of a hunted animal, the priest leaped to his feet,
dragging the girl after him, and a harsh laugh came from his throat
as they dashed onward. A quick glance behind showed there had been
but one pursuer, and the man in the robes of holiness chuckled
exultantly. But, if Dorothy Garrison believed him to be the priest
his robes declared, the moonlight told the fallen Turk the truth.
Indeed, it was the intentness with which the little ex-burglar gazed
upon the white face of Courant that prevented him from seeing the
ledge as he dashed up to the couple.
How long it was afterward that Turk came to his senses and crawled
back to the roadway, dizzy, weak and defeated, he knew not. He could
only groan and gnash his teeth when he stood erect again and saw
that he was utterly alone. Courant and the girl were gone. In shame
and humiliation he climbed the hill to call for help.
Just as the searching party was about to rush recklessly from the
courtyard, servants having been instructed to bring out the horses,
Lady Jane espied a white piece of paper on the ground near the gate.
And then it was that they read the parting message from the girl who
was gone. With a trembling voice Lady Saxondale read:
“I have found a way, and I am going, if nothing prevents. With the
help of my good angel I shall soon be far from this place. A holy
man in passing saw my signal of distress and promised rescue. You
have been good to me, and I can only repay you by refusing to expose
you. This priest does not know who you are. I shall not tell him or
any who may be with him. No one shall ever know from me that you
were my abductors. God grant that you may never have to pay the
penalty. Go, while you may, for the truth may become known without
my help, and I may not be able to save you. Save yourselves, all of
you. I mean Philip Quentin, too, because I know he loves me.
“Dorothy.”
Philip Quentin took the forlorn, even distressed, message from the
hands of Lady Saxondale, kissed it devoutly, and placed it in his
pocket.
“Philip is too ill to go out on this desperate chase,” cried Lady
Saxondale.
“Ill! I'll die if I am not gone from here in five minutes! Great
Lord, Bob, those fools have been an hour getting the horses!”
groaned Quentin, pacing back and forth like a caged animal.
“Don't get excited, Phil; keep your head. You're not fit to be
running about in a business like this, but all Christendom couldn't
stop you. It may be a wild goose chase, after all,” said Lord Bob.
“She's been carried back to the accursed villain who employs
Courant, and I'll die before I'll let him have her. Oh, what fools
we've been!”
“Here's a puzzler, old man,” said Dickey. “Why was not Ugo here to
help Courant if he knew anything about the fellow's actions? By
cracky, I don't believe Ugo knows anything about the Frenchman's
find.”
“He owns Courant, body and soul!”
“That jacky is out for the hundred thousand francs, and he's working
on his own hook this time, my boy. He's after the reward, and he's
the only one that has been keen enough to find us out. Mark me, he
is working alone.
“Sure, he is,” added Turk. “He's got no pardners in th' job, er he'd
a' had em along to-night. S'pose he'd run into a gang like this
alone if he had anybody t' fall back on? Not on your life. We're a
mighty tough gang, an' he takes no chances with us if he's workin'
fer anybody else.”
“We're not a tough gang!” wailed Lady Jane, in tears. “Oh, what will
become of us!”
“The Lord only knows, if we fail to get both Dorothy and Courant,”
said Quentin, in real anguish.
“They may be in Luxemburg by this time,” said Saxondale. “Gad, this
is working in the dark!”
“That road down there don't go t' Luxemburg direct, m' lord,”
quickly interposed Turk. “It goes off into th' hills, don't you
remember? An' then out th' valley some place 'way to th' north. If
he'd been goin' to th' city he'd 'a' taken th' road back here an'
kep' from goin' down th' hill.”
“You're right, Turk,” exclaimed Lord Bob. “He has gone up the
valley, headed for one of the little towns, and will steer clear of
the Luxemburg officers for fear they may demand a part of the
reward.”
“God, Saxondale, are those horses never coming?” fumed Quentin. “I
won't wait!” and he was off like a madman through the gate and down
the steep. Behind him tore Turk, the faithful.