AS they talked the young girls wandered over the grassy sward of the
churchyard and their voices grew fainter and fainter to the cyclist and
Miss Sallie.
The latter had seated herself on the stump of an old tree and was busily
engaged in re-reading her mail, at which she had glanced only carelessly
that morning.
The air was very still and hot, and the hum of insects made a drowsy
accompaniment to the songs of the birds. The cyclist had stretched
himself at full length on the grass under an immense elm tree and was
lazily blowing blue rings of smoke skywards.
Presently there broke upon the noonday stillness a cry for help. It was
in a high, girlish voice--Mollie's in fact--and it was followed by
others in quick succession.
Miss Stuart, scattering her mail on the ground in her fright, rushed in
the direction of the cries, the cyclist close behind her.
On a knoll near the church the sight which met Miss Sallie's eyes almost
made her knees give way. But she had a cool head in danger, in spite of
her lavender draperies and pretended helplessness.
A tramp, who seemed to them all at the moment as big as a giant, with
matted hair and beard and face swollen from drink, had seized Ruth and
Barbara by the wrists with one of his enormous hands. A woman equally
ragged in appearance was tugging at the fellow's other hand in an effort
to quiet him.
As Miss Sallie ran toward the group she heard Barbara say quietly:
"Let go our wrists and we shall be glad to give you all the money we
have with us."
"I tell you I want more money than that," said the man in a hoarse,
terrible voice. "I want enough money to keep me for the rest of my days.
Do you think I like to sleep on the ground and eat bread and water? I
tell you I want my rights. Why should you be rich and me poor? Why
should you be dressed in silks while my wife wears rags?"
As he raved, he jerked his hand away from the woman, almost throwing her
forward in his violence, and gesticulated wildly.
The two girls were both very pale and calm, but the poor tramp woman was
crying bitterly.
Barbara's lips were moving, but she said nothing, and only Mollie knew
it was her mother's prayer she was repeating.
"Don't be frightened, young ladies," sobbed the woman, "I will see that
no harm comes to you, even if he kills me."
"Do you call this a free country," continued the tramp, "when there are
thousands of people like me who have no houses and must beg for food? I
would like to kill all the rich men in this country and turn their
children loose to beg and steal, as we must do to get a living! Do you
think I would ever have come to this pass if a rich man had not brought
me to it? Do you think I was always a tramp like this, and my wife
yonder a tramp, too?"
At this point the drunken wretch began to cry, but he still held the two
girls tightly by the wrists.
"I tell you I'll take a ransom for you and nothing less. I'll get out of
the world all it's taken from me, and your father will have to do the
paying. Come on!" he cried in a tone of command, to his trembling wife.
At this critical moment Miss Stuart and the motor cyclist came running
to the scene.
There was a look of immense relief on Miss Sallie's face when she saw
the courteous stranger at her heels. She had been about to speak, but
was silent.
"Oh, ho!" cried the tramp, "so you've got a protector, have you? Well,
come on! I'll fight the whole lot of you, women and men, too, and with
one hand, at that!"
He loomed up like a giant beside the small, slender cyclist, but he was
a drunken giant nevertheless and not prepared for what was about to
happen.
However, at first, it appeared to them all that a little persuasion
might be better than force.
"If you will let the young ladies go, my good man," said the cyclist,
"you will not regret it. You will be well paid. I would advise you to
take a sensible view of the matter. You cannot kidnap us all, and it
would not take long to get help. Would you prefer a long term in jail to
a sum of money?" And the cyclist drew a leather wallet from his coat
pocket.
"You think you are mighty smart, young man," sneered the tramp, "but I
can kidnap all of you, and nobody ever be the wiser. Do you think I'd
let a chance like this go? My pals are right over there." He pointed
with his free hand to the woods back of him.
"You will be sorry," said the cyclist.
With an oath, the tramp put his finger to his mouth and gave a long,
shrill whistle.
But in that moment he was off his guard, and the cyclist leaped upon him
like a leopard on a lion. One swift blow under the jaw and down tumbled
the giant as Goliath fell before David.
The poor woman, who was crouching in terror behind a tree, jumped to her
feet.
"Run!" she cried in a frightened whisper. "Run for your lives!"
The cyclist seized Miss Sallie by the arm.
"She is right. It is better to run. The others may be coming."
And they did run. Terror seemed to lend wings to their feet. Even Miss
Stuart, assisted by their rescuer, fled over the grass as swiftly as her
charges.
Ruth and Barbara reached the automobile first. In an instant Ruth had
cranked up the machine while Barbara opened the door.
Another moment, and they were off down the road, the black-clad cyclist
following. Glancing back, they saw two other rough-looking men helping
their comrade to rise to his feet. Then they disappeared in the woods
while the woman, with many anxious backward glances, followed her
companions.
Nobody spoke for some time. The girls were too much terrified by the
narrow escape to trust to their voices. The bravest women will weep
after a danger is past, and all five of these women were very near the
point of tears.
Presently the cyclist came up alongside of the automobile, which had
slowed down somewhat when they reached the main road.
"I will go ahead and inform the police," he called over his shoulder,
"but I fear it will not be of much use. Men like that will scatter and
hide themselves at the first alarm."
Miss Sallie smiled at him gratefully. Touching his cap, which was
fastened under his chin with a strap and could not be lifted without
some inconvenience, the stranger shot ahead and soon disappeared in a
cloud of dust.
Miss Sallie was thinking deeply. She wished that Major Ten Eyck and the
boys had not left the hotel that morning. She felt need of the strong
support of the opposite sex. She felt also the responsibility of being
at the head of her party of young girls.
Should they dare start off again next day into the wilderness after such
an experience? Of course, as long as they were in the automobile, going
at full speed, nothing could stop them except a puncture, and punctures
on country roads were not as frequent as they were on city streets. What
would her brother say? Would he sanction such a trip after this fearful
experience? And still she hesitated.
The truth was, Miss Stuart was as eager as the girls to accept the
invitation that had been so unexpectedly made. She did not wish to
revive the romance of her youth, but she did have an overweening desire
to see the ancestral home of her old lover, and to talk with him on the
thousand subjects that spring up when two old friends come together
after many years.
It was, therefore, with half-hearted vehemence that she said to the four
rather listless girls:
"My dears, don't you think it would be very dangerous for us to go over
to Major Ten Eyck's, to-morrow, after this fearful attack?"
Everybody looked relieved that somebody had had the courage to say the
first word.
"Dear auntie, we'll leave it entirely to you," replied Ruth. "Although,
I don't believe we are likely to be kidnapped as long as we keep the
automobile going. The fastest running tramp in Christendom couldn't keep
up with us, even when we're going at an ordinary rate. From what Major
Ten Eyck said, the road is pretty good. We ought to get there in an
hour, since it's only fifteen miles from here, and the last mile or so
is on his estate."
The other girls said nothing, it being a matter for the chaperon to
settle.
"Very well, my dear," answered Miss Sallie, acquiescing so suddenly that
the others almost smiled in spite of the seriousness of their feelings
at the moment. "But I do feel that we had a narrow escape this morning.
If it had not been for the young man on the motor cycle I tremble to
think what would have been the consequences. And I certainly believe if
we are not going back to New York, the sooner we get into the society of
some male protectors the better for us. I am sorry that fifteen miles
separate us. I wish those boys had thought to motor back and get us
to-morrow."
"Oh, well," observed Barbara, "fifteen miles is a mere bagatelle, when
you come to think of it. Why, we shall be there before we know it."