THE COMEDY OF A SHEEPFOLD
A glance, a word—and joy or pain
Befalls; what was no more shall be.
How slight the links are in the chain
That binds us to our destiny!
—T.B. Aldrich.
Oscar’s eye, roaming the landscape as he left Shirley Claiborne and
started for the bungalow, swept the upland Claiborne acres and rested
upon a moving shadow. He drew rein under a clump of wild cherry-trees at
the roadside and waited. Several hundred yards away lay the Claiborne
sheepfold, with a broad pasture rising beyond. A shadow is not a thing to
be ignored by a man trained in the niceties of scouting. Oscar,
satisfying himself that substance lay behind the shadow, dismounted and
tied his horse. Then he bent low over the stone wall and watched.
“It is the big fellow—yes? He is a stealer of sheep, as I might have
known.”
Zmai was only a dim figure against the dark meadow, which he was slowly
crossing from the side farthest from the Claiborne house. He stopped
several times as though uncertain of his whereabouts, and then clambered
over a stone wall that formed one side of the sheepfold, passed it and
strode on toward Oscar and the road.
“It is mischief that brings him from the hills—yes?” Oscar reflected,
glancing up and down the highway. Faintly—very softly through the night
he heard the orchestra at the hotel, playing for the dance. The little
soldier unbuttoned his coat, drew the revolver from his belt, and thrust
it into his coat pocket. Zmai was drawing nearer, advancing rapidly, now
that he had gained his bearings. At the wall Oscar rose suddenly and
greeted him in mockingly-courteous tones:
“Good evening, my friend; it’s a fine evening for a walk.”
Zmai drew back and growled.
“Let me pass,” he said in his difficult German.
“It is a long wall; there should be no difficulty in passing. This
country is much freer than Servia—yes?” and Oscar’s tone was pleasantly
conversational.
Zmai put his hand on the wall and prepared to vault.
“A moment only, comrade. You seem to be in a hurry; it must be a business
that brings you from the mountains—yes?”
“I have no time for you,” snarled the Servian. “Be gone!” and he shook
himself impatiently and again put his hand on the wall.
“One should not be in too much haste, comrade;” and Oscar thrust Zmai
back with his finger-tips.
The man yielded and ran a few steps out of the clump of trees and sought
to escape there. It was clear to Oscar that Zmai was not anxious to
penetrate closer to the Claiborne house, whose garden extended quite
near. He met Zmai promptly and again thrust him back.
“It is a message—yes?” asked Oscar.
“It is my affair,” blurted the big fellow. “I mean no harm to you.”
“It was you that tried the knife on my body. It is much quieter than
shooting. You have the knife—yes?”
The little soldier whipped out his revolver.
“In which pocket is the business carried? A letter undoubtedly. They do
not trust swine to carry words—Ah!”
Oscar dropped below the wall as Zmai struck at him; when he looked up a
moment later the Servian was running back over the meadow toward the
sheepfold. Oscar, angry at the ease with which the Servian had evaded
him, leaped the wall and set off after the big fellow. He was quite sure
that the man bore a written message, and equally sure that it must be of
importance to his employer. He clutched his revolver tight, brought up
his elbows for greater ease in running, and sped after Zmai, now a blur
on the starlighted sheep pasture.
The slope was gradual and a pretty feature of the landscape by day; but
it afforded a toilsome path for runners. Zmai already realized that he
had blundered in not forcing the wall; he was running uphill, with a
group of sheds, another wall, and a still steeper and rougher field
beyond. His bulk told against him; and behind him he heard the quick
thump of Oscar’s feet on the turf. The starlight grew dimmer through
tracts of white scud; the surface of the pasture was rougher to the feet
than it appeared to the eye. A hound in the Claiborne stable-yard bayed
suddenly and the sound echoed from the surrounding houses and drifted off
toward the sheepfold. Then a noble music rose from the kennels.
Captain Claiborne, waiting for his sister on the veranda, looked toward
the stables, listening.
Zmai approached the sheep-sheds rapidly, with still a hundred yards to
traverse beyond them before he should reach the pasture wall. His rage at
thus being driven by a small man for whom he had great contempt did not
help his wind or stimulate the flight of his heavy legs, and he saw now
that he would lessen the narrowing margin between himself and his pursuer
if he swerved to the right to clear the sheds. He suddenly slackened his
pace, and with a vicious tug settled his wool hat more firmly upon his
small skull. He went now at a dog trot and Oscar was closing upon him
rapidly; then, quite near the sheds, Zmai wheeled about and charged his
pursuer headlong. At the moment he turned, Oscar’s revolver bit keenly
into the night. Captain Claiborne, looking toward the slope, saw the
flash before the hounds at the stables answered the report.
At the shot Zmai cried aloud in his curiously small voice and clapped his
hands to his head.
“Stop; I want the letter!” shouted Oscar in German. The man turned
slowly, as though dazed, and, with a hand still clutching his head,
half-stumbled and half-ran toward the sheds, with Oscar at his heels.
Claiborne called to the negro stable-men to quiet the dogs, snatched a
lantern, and ran away through the pergola to the end of the garden and
thence into the pasture beyond. Meanwhile Oscar, thinking Zmai badly
hurt, did not fire again, but flung himself upon the fellow’s broad
shoulders and down they crashed against the door of the nearest pen. Zmai
swerved and shook himself free while he fiercely cursed his foe. Oscar’s
hands slipped on the fellow’s hot blood that ran from a long crease in
the side of his head.
As they fell the pen door snapped free, and out into the starry pasture
thronged the frightened sheep.
“The letter—give me the letter!” commanded Oscar, his face close to the
Servian’s. He did not know how badly the man was injured, but he was
anxious to complete his business and be off. Still the sheep came
huddling through the broken door, across the prostrate men, and scampered
away into the open. Captain Claiborne, running toward the fold with his
lantern and not looking for obstacles, stumbled over their bewildered
advance guard and plunged headlong into the gray fleeces. Meanwhile into
the pockets of his prostrate foe went Oscar’s hands with no result. Then
he remembered the man’s gesture in pulling the hat close upon his ears,
and off came the hat and with it a blood-stained envelope. The last sheep
in the pen trooped out and galloped toward its comrades.
Oscar, making off with the letter, plunged into the rear guard of the
sheep, fell, stumbled to his feet, and confronted Captain Claiborne as
that gentleman, in soiled evening dress, fumbled for his lantern and
swore in language unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.
“Damn the sheep!” roared Claiborne.
“It is sheep—yes?” and Oscar started to bolt.
“Halt!”
The authority of the tone rang familiarly in Oscar’s ears. He had, after
considerable tribulation, learned to stop short when an officer spoke to
him, and the gentleman of the sheepfold stood straight in the starlight
and spoke like an officer.
“What in the devil are you doing here, and who fired that shot?”
Oscar saluted and summoned his best English.
“It was an accident, sir.”
“Why are you running and why did you fire? Understand you are a
trespasser here, and I am going to turn you over to the constable.”
“There was a sheep-stealer—yes? He is yonder by the pens—and we had
some little fighting; but he is not dead—no?”
At that moment Claiborne’s eyes caught sight of a burly figure rising and
threshing about by the broken pen door.
“That is the sheep-stealer,” said Oscar. “We shall catch him—yes?”
Zmai peered toward them uncertainly for a moment; then turned abruptly
and ran toward the road. Oscar started to cut off his retreat, but
Claiborne caught the sergeant by the shoulder and flung him back.
“One of you at a time! They can turn the hounds on the other rascal.
What’s that you have there? Give it to me—quick!”
“It’s a piece of wool—”
But Claiborne snatched the paper from Oscar’s hand, and commanded the man
to march ahead of him to the house. So over the meadow and through the
pergola they went, across the veranda and into the library. The power of
army discipline was upon Oscar; if Claiborne had not been an officer he
would have run for it in the garden. As it was, he was taxing his wits to
find some way out of his predicament. He had not the slightest idea as to
what the paper might be. He had risked his life to secure it, and now
the crumpled, blood-stained paper had been taken away from him by a
person whom it could not interest in any way whatever.
He blinked under Claiborne’s sharp scrutiny as they faced each other in
the library.
“You are the man who brought a horse back to our stable an hour ago.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You have been a soldier.”
“In the cavalry, sir. I have my discharge at home.”
“Where do you live?”
“I work as teamster in the coal mines—yes?—they are by Lamar, sir.”
Claiborne studied Oscar’s erect figure carefully.
“Let me see your hands,” he commanded; and Oscar extended his palms.
“You are lying; you do not work in the coal mines. Your clothes are not
those of a miner; and a discharged soldier doesn’t go to digging coal.
Stand where you are, and it will be the worse for you if you try to
bolt.”
Claiborne turned to the table with the envelope. It was not sealed, and
he took out the plain sheet of notepaper on which was written:
CABLEGRAM
WINKELRIED, VIENNA.
Not later than Friday.
CHAUVENET.
Claiborne read and re-read these eight words; then he spoke bluntly to
Oscar.
“Where did you get this?”
“From the hat of the sheep-stealer up yonder.”
“Who is he and where did he get it?”
“I don’t know, sir. He was of Servia, and they are an ugly race—yes?”
“What were you going to do with the paper?”
Oscar grinned.
“If I could read it—yes; I might know; but if Austria is in the paper,
then it is mischief; and maybe it would be murder; who knows?”
Claiborne looked frowningly from the paper to Oscar’s tranquil eyes.
“Dick!” called Shirley from the hall, and she appeared in the doorway,
drawing on her gloves; but paused at seeing Oscar.
“Shirley, I caught this man in the sheepfold. Did you ever see him
before?”
“I think not, Dick.”
“It was he that brought your horse home.”
“To be sure it is! I hadn’t recognized him. Thank you very much;” and she
smiled at Oscar.
Dick frowned fiercely and referred again to the paper.
“Where is Monsieur Chauvenet—have you any idea?”
“If he isn’t at the hotel or in Washington, I’m sure I don’t know. If we
are going to the dance—”
“Plague the dance! I heard a shot in the sheep pasture a bit ago and ran
out to find this fellow in a row with another man, who got away.”
“I heard the shot and the dogs from my window. You seem to have been in a
fuss, too, from the looks of your clothes;” and Shirley sat down and
smoothed her gloves with provoking coolness.
Dick sent Oscar to the far end of the library with a gesture, and held up
the message for Shirley to read.
“Don’t touch it!” he exclaimed; and when she nodded her head in sign that
she had read it, he said, speaking earnestly and rapidly:
“I suppose I have no right to hold this message; I must send the man to
the hotel telegraph office with it. But where is Chauvenet? What is his
business in the valley? And what is the link between Vienna and these
hills?”
“Don’t you know what _you_ are doing here?” she asked, and he flushed.
“I know what, but not _why_!” he blurted irritably; “but that’s enough!”
“You know that Baron von Marhof wants to find Mr. John Armitage; but you
don’t know why.”
“I have my orders and I’m going to find him, if it takes ten years.”
Shirley nodded and clasped her fingers together. Her elbows resting on
the high arms of her chair caused her cloak to flow sweepingly away from
her shoulders. At the end of the room, with his back to the portieres,
stood Oscar, immovable. Claiborne reexamined the message, and extended it
again to Shirley.
“There’s no doubt of that being Chauvenet’s writing, is there?”
“I think not, Dick. I have had notes from him now and then in that hand.
He has taken pains to write this with unusual distinctness.”
The color brightened in her cheeks suddenly as she looked toward Oscar.
The curtains behind him swayed, but so did the curtain back of her. A
May-time languor had crept into the heart of April, and all the windows
were open. The blurred murmurs of insects stole into the house. Oscar,
half-forgotten by his captor, heard a sound in the window behind him and
a hand touched him through the curtain.
Claiborne crumpled the paper impatiently.
“Shirley, you are against me! I believe you have seen Armitage here, and
I want you to tell me what you know of him. It is not like you to shield
a scamp of an adventurer—an unknown, questionable character. He has
followed you to this valley and will involve you in his affairs without
the slightest compunction, if he can. It’s most infamous, outrageous, and
when I find him I’m going to thrash him within an inch of his life before
I turn him over to Marhof!”
Shirley laughed for the first time in their interview, and rose and
placed her hands on her brother’s shoulders.
“Do it, Dick! He’s undoubtedly a wicked, a terribly wicked and dangerous
character.”
“I tell you I’ll find him,” he said tensely, putting up his hands to
hers, where they rested on his shoulders. She laughed and kissed him, and
when her hands fell to her side the message was in her gloved fingers.
“I’ll help you, Dick,” she said, buttoning her glove.
“That’s like you, Shirley.”
“If you want to find Mr. Armitage—”
“Of course I want to find him—” His voice rose to a roar.
“Then turn around; Mr. Armitage is just behind you!”
“Yes; I needed my man for other business,” said Armitage, folding his
arms, “and as you were very much occupied I made free with the rear
veranda and changed places with him.”
Claiborne walked slowly toward him, the anger glowing in his face.
“You are worse than I thought—eavesdropper, housebreaker!”
“Yes; I am both those things, Captain Claiborne. But I am also in a great
hurry. What do you want with me?”
“You are a rogue, an impostor—”
“We will grant that,” said Armitage quietly. “Where is your warrant for
my arrest?”
“That will be forthcoming fast enough! I want you to understand that I
have a personal grievance against you.”
“It must wait until day after to-morrow, Captain Claiborne. I will come
to you here or wherever you say on the day after to-morrow.”
Armitage spoke with a deliberate sharp decision that was not the tone of
a rogue or a fugitive. As he spoke he advanced until he faced Claiborne
in the center of the room. Shirley still stood by the window, holding the
soiled paper in her hand. She had witnessed the change of men at the end
of the room; it had touched her humor; it had been a joke on her brother;
but she felt that the night had brought a crisis: she could not continue
to shield a man of whom she knew nothing save that he was the object of a
curious enmity. Her idle prayer that her own land’s commonplace
sordidness might be obscured by the glamour of Old World romance came
back to her; she had been in touch with an adventure that was certainly
proving fruitful of diversion. The _coup de théâtre_ by which Armitage
had taken the place of his servant had amused her for a moment; but she
was vexed and angry now that he had dared come again to the house.
“You are under arrest, Mr. Armitage; I must detain you here,” said
Claiborne.
“In America—in free Virginia—without legal process?” asked Armitage,
laughing.
“You are a housebreaker, that is enough. Shirley, please go!”
“You were not detached from the army to find a housebreaker. But I will
make your work easy for you—day after to-morrow I will present myself to
you wherever you say. But now—that cable message which my man found in
your sheep pasture is of importance. I must trouble you to read it to
me.”
“No!” shouted Claiborne.
Armitage drew a step nearer.
“You must take my word for it that matters of importance, of far-reaching
consequence, hang upon that message. I must know what it is.”
“You certainly have magnificent cheek! I am going to take that paper to
Baron von Marhof at once.”
“Do so!—but _I_ must know first! Baron von Marhof and I are on the same
side in this business, but he doesn’t understand it, and it is clear you
don’t. Give me the message!”
He spoke commandingly, his voice thrilling with earnestness, and jerked
out his last words with angry impatience. At the same moment he and
Claiborne stepped toward each other, with their hands clenched at their
sides.
“I don’t like your tone, Mr. Armitage!”
“I don’t like to use that tone, Captain Claiborne.”
Shirley walked quickly to the table and put down the message. Then, going
to the door, she paused as though by an afterthought, and repeated quite
slowly the words:
“Winkelried—Vienna—not later than Friday—Chauvenet.”
“Shirley!” roared Claiborne.
John Armitage bowed to the already vacant doorway; then bounded into the
hall out upon the veranda and ran through the garden to the side gate,
where Oscar waited.
Half an hour later Captain Claiborne, after an interview with Baron von
Marhof, turned his horse toward the hills.