FIGHTING LADS.
While attending school at Fardale Military Academy, Frank had met and
become acquainted with a charming girl by the name of Inza Burrage. They
had been very friendly--more than friendly; in a boy and girl way, they
were lovers.
After leaving Fardale and starting to travel, Frank had written to Inza,
and she had answered. For a time the correspondence had continued, but,
at last, Frank had failed to receive any answers to his letters. He
wrote again and again, but never a line came from Inza, and he finally
decided she had grown tired of him, and had taken this method of
dropping him.
Frank was proud and sensitive, and he resolved to forget Inza. This was
not easy, but he thought of her as little as possible, and never spoke
of her to any one.
And now he had met her in this remarkable manner. Some fellow had
written him from Fardale that Mr. Burrage had moved from the place, but
no one seemed to know whither he had gone. Frank had not dreamed of
seeing Inza in New Orleans, but she was the mysterious Queen of Flowers,
and, for some reason, she was in trouble and peril.
Although dazed by his astonishing discovery, the boy quickly recovered,
and he felt that he could battle with a hundred ruffians in the defense
of the girl beyond the broken door.
Barney Mulloy seemed no less astonished than Frank.
"Be me soul! it is thot lassie!" he cried.
"Inza! Inza!" shouted Frank, through the broken panel.
She heard him.
"Frank! Frank! Save me!"
"I will!"
The promise was given with the utmost confidence.
At that moment, however, the ruffian whose wrist Frank had broken,
leaped upon the girl and grasped her with his uninjured arm.
"_Carramba!_" he snarled. "You save-a her? Bah! Fool! You never git-a
out with whole skin!"
"Drop her, you dog!" cried Frank, pointing his revolver at the
fellow--"drop her, or I'll put a bullet through your head, instead of
your wrist!"
"Bah! Shoot! You kill-a her!"
He held the struggling girl before him as a shield.
Like a raging lion, Frank tore at the panel.
The man with the girl swiftly moved back to a door at the farther side
of the room. This door he had already unfastened and flung open.
"_Adios!_" he cried, derisively. "Some time I square wid you for my
hand-a! _Adios!_"
"Th' spalpanes are comin' up th' shtairs again, Frankie!" cried Barney,
in the ear of the desperate boy at the door.
Frank did not seem to hear; he was striving to break the stout panel so
that he could force his way through the opening.
"Frank! Frank! they're coming up th' shtairs!"
"Let them come!"
"They'll make mince mate av us!"
"I must follow her!"
"Well, folly, av ye want to!" shouted the Irish lad. "Oi'm goin' to
shtop th' gang!"
Crack! The panel gave. Crack! splinter! smash! Out came a long strip,
which Frank flung upon the floor.
Barney caught it up and whirled toward the stairs.
The desperadoes were coming with a rush--they were well up the stairs.
In another moment the leading ruffian would have reached the second
floor.
"Get back, ye gossoons! Down, ye haythen! Take thot, ye bloody pirates!"
The strip of heavy wood in Barney's hands whirled through the air, and
came down with a resounding crack on the head of the leader.
The fellows had not learned caution by the fate of the first man to
climb the stairs, and they were following their second leader as close
as possible.
Barney had a strong arm, and he struck the fellow with all his power.
Well it was for the ruffian that the heavy wood was not very thick, else
he would have had a broken head.
Back he toppled upon the one behind, and that one made a vain attempt to
support him. The dead weight was too much, and the second fell, again
sweeping the whole lot to the foot of the stairs.
"Hurro!" shouted the Irish boy, in wild delight. "This is th' koind av a
picnic pwhat Oi admire! Come on, ye nagurs! It's Barney Mulloy ye're
runnin' up against, an' begobs! he's good fer th' whole crowd av yez!"
At the foot of the stairs there was a writhing, wrangling, snarling mass
of human beings; at the head of the stairs was a young Irishman who
laughed and crowed and flourished the cudgel of wood in his hands.
Barney, feeling his blood leaping joyously in his veins, felt like
singing, and so he began to warble a "fighting song," over and over
inviting his enemies to come on.
In the meantime Frank had made an opening large enough to force his body
through.
"Come on, Barney!" he cried, attracting the other boy's attention by a
sharp blow.
"Pwhere?"
"In here--somewhere."
"Frankie, ye're muddled, an' Oi nivver saw yez so before."
"What do you mean?"
"Nivver a bit would it do for us both to go in there, fer th' craythers
moight hiv us in a thrap."
"You're right, Barney. I will go. You stay here and hold the ruffians
back. Here--take my revolver. You'll need it."
"G'wan wid yez! Quit yer foolin', Frankie! Oi hiv an illigant shillaly
here, an' thot's all Oi nade, unliss ye have two revolvers."
"This is the only one I have."
"Thin kape it, me b'y, fer ye'll nade it before ye save the lass, Oi
think."
"I think you may be right, Barney. Here goes! Hold them back. I'll not
desert you."
"It's nivver a bit Oi worry about thot, Frankie. G'wan!"
Through the panel Frank forced his way. As soon as he was within the
room he ran for the door through which the ruffian had dragged Inza.
Frank knew that the fellow might be waiting just beyond the door, knife
in hand, and he sprang through with his revolver held ready for instant
use.
There was no light in the room, but the light from the lamp in the
adjoining room shone in at the doorway.
Frank looked around, and, to his dismay, he could see no one.
"Are they gone?" he asked himself. "If so, whither?"
It was not long before he was convinced that the room was empty of any
living being save himself.
The Spanish ruffian and the unfortunate girl had disappeared.
"Oh, confound the infernal luck!" raved the boy. "He has escaped with
her! But I did my best, and I followed as soon as possible."
Then he remembered that he had promised Inza he would save her, and it
wrung a groan from his lips.
"Which way have they gone?" he cried, beginning to look for a door that
led from the room.
By this time he was accustomed to the dim light, and he saw a door. In a
twinkling he had tried it, but found it was locked or bolted on the
farther side.
"The fellow had little time and no hands to lock a door. He may not have
gone this way. He must, for this is the only door to the room, save the
one by which I entered. He went out this way, and I will follow!"
Retreating to the farther side of the room, Frank made a run and plunged
against the door.
It was bolted on the farther side, and the shock snapped the iron bolt
as if it had been a pipe stem.
Bang! Open flew the door, and Frank went reeling through, revolver in
hand, somewhat dazed, but still determined and fierce as a young tiger.
At a glance he saw he was in a small room, with two doors standing
open--the one he had just broken down and another. Through this other he
leaped, and found himself in a long passage, at the farther end of which
Barney Mulloy was still guarding the head of the stairs, once more
singing the wild "fighting song."
Not a trace of the ruffian or the kidnaped girl could Frank see.
"Gone!" he palpitated, mystified and awe-stricken. "Gone--where?"
That was a question he could not answer for a moment, and then----
"The window in that room! It is the one by which Barney entered! It must
be the one by which the wretch fled with Inza!"
Back into the room he had just left he leaped. Two bounds carried him to
the window, against which brushed the branch of the old willow tree.
He looked out.
"There they are!"
The exultant words came in a panting whisper from his lips as he saw
some dark figures on the ground beneath the tree. He was sure he saw a
female form among them, and his ears did not deceive him, for he heard
at last a smothered appeal for help.
Then two other forms rushed out of the shadows and fell upon the men
beneath the tree, striking right and left!
There was a short, fierce struggle, a woman's shriek, the death groan of
a stricken man, a pistol shot, and scattering forms.
Without pausing to measure the distance to the ground, Frank sprang over
the window sill and dropped.